Trope names with outdated and/or offensive language

"Schizo" is also slang for "schizophrenic" (or Split Personality, because people love to conflate unrelated conditions), and if I had to guess which meaning was intended by the person who named Schizo Tech, I would not guess "the Greek root word 'skhizein' meaning 'to split'".

e: This issue was actually brought up nine years ago on the discussion page.

Edited by wingedcatgirl on Nov 10th 2020 at 12:23:19 PM

Well that shows some precedence for a rename. I think Schizophrenic Difficulty would be easier to change than Schizo Tech though, just because of the lower number of wicks, though the former would be more of a lateral move.

Don't make me bring up the very long debate over Transgender's name change again...

Edited by mightymewtron on Nov 10th 2020 at 3:45:36 PM

Good ol' TVT and it's decade-long procrastination. I swear, most of our issues today exist because people back then never bothered to fix them.

Edited by WarJay77 on Nov 10th 2020 at 3:38:07 PM

I think the actual problem is that the maintenance system is too bureaucratic... How are we going to resolve that underlying issue?

The actual problem is that you're looking at the words without context.

I don't want a repeat of the Hot Gypsy Woman TRS, and I believe Schizo Tech (and for that matter Magical Negro et al) to be in the same situation.

I'm less concerned with Schizo Tech than with Schizophrenic Difficulty, as the latter would be much easier to change and the former can sneak by without being an obvious reference to Schizophrenia.

But yeesh guys, by "problems" I wasn't referring to just TRS stuff

Edited by WarJay77 on Nov 10th 2020 at 8:10:24 AM

I mean, Hot Gypsy Woman and Magical Negro are about the actual groups to whom the slurs refer, and the negative stereotypes associated with those terms. Schizo Tech has nothing to do with schizophrenia. It's unnecessary.

Edited by mightymewtron on Nov 10th 2020 at 8:45:23 AM

I don't know if this is the place for discussing this, but somebody recently threw Sim Sim Salabim on the Tropes Needing TRS page because the name sounds too much like "Arabian Nights" Days, and it's about Hollywood Atlas India. The description says there's often Culture Chop Suey with Arab/Muslim nations,^note Somewhat justified, because there is some Islamic influence in the culture of the Indian subcontinent (the Taj Mahal is Islamic architecture) so I'm not 100% sure if it deserves a rename.

Edited by ccorb on Nov 11th 2020 at 10:09:49 AM

The problem is less that it sounds Arabic and more that it has nothing to do with India. "Simsalabim" is just magical word gibberish popularized by a Danish guy. The page itself is tropenamersyndrome-y from one guy from Jonny Quest, who is probably intended to be Sikh.

Still, Everything You Wanted to Know About Changing Names still applies.

Edited by Synchronicity on Nov 11th 2020 at 3:16:45 PM

Anachronistic Tech Blend or just Anachronistic Tech would work for Schizo Tech.

Speaking off the cuff, Sim Sim Salabim is a horrible trope name.

Speaking as someone born in the early 2000s, I'm more likely to think of Apu or Baljeet when I think "cringingly-exaggerated Indian stereotype".

For a rename, how about Bollywoodland?

I'd go with Exaggerated Ethnic Stereotype as a supertrope, but I'm an incorrigible lumper.

I mean, that'd be a good trope idea regardless.

Hollywood Bollywood?

That makes me think of stereotypical depictions of the Indian film industry. The description is more about the mystical and exotic qualities.

Would be a missing supertrope if anything, not a replacement for Sim Sim Salabim.

Edited by Synchronicity on Nov 11th 2020 at 6:06:49 PM

It's sort of a South Asian equivalent to Animeland. The description seems to focus on the mystical qualities, though.

"Anachronistic Tech" is not quite right, because that suggests technology that is historically inaccurate, but the trope is broader than that, encompassing fantastical settings where the technology is inconsistent simply from an internal perspective.

My own feeling is that "schizo" is fine; as others have said, the link to "schizophrenia" is not one that comes to mind. Indeed we could look at it as a Greek loanword on its own and it makes perfect sense. We can keep "schizo" as a word to mean "made up of ill-fitting parts".

From that angle, I would like to rename Schizophrenic Difficulty, but not Schizo Tech.

For Sim Sim Salabim, maybe "Indian-Islamic Mystic Pastiche"? I can say the description is not quite clear either, relying too much on invoking a stereotype that might not be the same for all readers.

How about Mughal Mystic Pastiche?

Mughals were Islamic rulers of India before the British Raj.

Discussion about specific name change ideas would probably be more productive on the TRS threads themselves, once there's enough proof that we need a change.

Edited by mightymewtron on Nov 11th 2020 at 11:00:02 AM

I google-searched the title and only found the page itself, its copy on AllTheTropes, and references to the trope namer. Another good reason for a rename.

Agree that Sim Sim Salabim is a horrible name. I associate the phrase "sim salabim" with fake/joke magic spells, not India, and the article doesn't even explain the Indian connection.

EDIT: Anyway, that's Off Topic for this thread, since Sim Sim Salabim (disregarding the trope it refers to) isn't an offensive term in any way.

Edited by DoktorvonEurotrash on Nov 12th 2020 at 11:46:00 AM

For the trope currently known as Schizo Tech ... Why not update the name to Mix And Match Technology? It would fit well with the Mix-and-Match Critters that sometimes need to be hunted with it.

Bumping because this got brought up on ATT.