Needs Help: Butt Brand

Butt Brand is exactly what it says on the tin: a trope about branding irons applied to the hindquarters or buttocks (most closely associated with cattle). Some of the examples stretched the meaning to butt-stamps and logos on pants, so I decided to investigate all its 50 wicks (and the 56 examples contained therein).

Wick Brand results:

• Correct Usage: 21 (37.5%)
• Misuse: 3 (5.4%)
• Unsure: 2 (3.6%)
• Other: 12 (21.4%)
• A particular butt-stamping scene used twice in The Ren & Stimpy Show (incl. page image): 18 (32.1%)

If I'm lumping in the R&S stamps (which aren't technically brands) with "Misuse," then that's 21 misused vs. 21 correct, but I think this is so skewed that doing so would be misrepresentation. The mentions of this scene seem to be pimped by the same troper, too.

What to do? I'm leaning toward expanding to all locations of brands (if there's any mentions on this site of people being branded elsewhere) or misuse cleanup rather than expanding to be all butt-located text, but that's just my personal preference. But if it's going to be extended to butt stamps, I think "logos on the seat of pants is an invoked Butt Brand" is a bit of a stretch.

Expanding sounds fine to me.

Expansion, as the person who originally suggested it when this trope came up in the Wick Check thread.

Sure, expand.

Hmmm, sure.

Edited by Amonimus on Aug 13th 2022 at 9:39:46 PM

Expand.

Is there a preference as to which way (other brands vs. other butt-text) to expand the trope?

Do tattoos on the buttocks count?

Currently, no. Branding is done with a hot iron (or more modernly, a coolant + alcohol). Depending on how the trope is expanded, it could be.

I mean, that wouldn't count as a "brand" anymore, would it? I don't think we should expand it so far that any mark on the butt counts, because then why even call it a "brand"?

I'm of the same opinion, yeah.

Edited by Yindee on Aug 13th 2022 at 7:43:09 AM

There's a difference between a mark applied to someone's rear to indicate ownership or for painful comedy and somebody happily getting a tattoo or wearing a logo, so I'm in favor of expanding while forbidding willing examples. A tattooed rear as a Slave Brand still counts under this trope, I think.

I think a tattoo could count as an invoked example if its design is based on actual brands, but otherwise tattoos wouldn't count.

Also, when I said I'm in favor of expanding, I meant expanding to include brands on any part of the body, rather than including any kind of marks/tattoos/stamps on the butt. I would appreciate it if the other people who voted in favor of expanding would say how they think it should be expanded.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 13th 2022 at 7:45:05 AM

Initially I was willing to expand this to include other "words on the ass" examples but that feels too rare to trope unless we include, like, Juicy shorts and stuff.

I think we could work with hot-iron branding/stamping as a means of humiliation and subjugation.

Yeah I'd be for that. That'd make Drakos's 18 citations of Ren & Stimpy relevant, then.

Edited by Yindee on Aug 14th 2022 at 2:53:51 PM

So if we're expanding to any time any character is branded by hot iron, would it be a supertrope for Slave Brand? Or would it be something more specific, and if so, how would they differ?

I'm honestly not sure how useful a trope for "any time someone's butt is marked in some way" would be.

Edited by Adept on Aug 14th 2022 at 6:00:28 PM

I'm pretty sure expanding Butt Brand to allow brands on any part of the body would make it a supertrope to Slave Brand.

Also, I've been wondering if maybe we should rename Butt Brand if we expand the definition to allow brands on other parts of the body. How does Body Brand sound? It's still alliterative, hopefully without sounding forced.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 14th 2022 at 8:55:42 AM

Mark of Shame already covers iron branding on the body as a punishment so if we expand Butt Brand to a broader trope for "iron branding someone's body to punish or shame them" then those examples would have to be moved there. Not sure how much we would be taking out of Mark of Shame if we do that as iron branding is one of the most common forms of that trope.

EDIT: Originally, I was ok with expanding to other types of butt brands/ body brands in general but as points out butt brands are covered by several broader tropes so maybe we can just turn Butt Brand into a disambig since I don't think if it's distinct enough to have its own trope.

Edited by MacronNotes on Aug 14th 2022 at 11:57:13 AM

That, too.

I genuinely doubt we can expand this into something we don't already have. Branding someone in general can be covered by Slave Brand and Mark of Shame. Butt-related jokes are covered by Pain to the Ass. Especially since this trope don't have that much examples to begin with, I don't think we'd have much left of anything for a new trope.

Edited by Adept on Aug 14th 2022 at 10:51:21 PM

EDIT: NVM my comment was already addressed

to a disambig then

Edited by themayorofsimpleton on Aug 14th 2022 at 12:10:22 PM

Get the disambig iron ready.

Mmm, that's all fair, a disambig also sounds valid.

Yeah, let's disambiguate this per what was said about brands already being covered elsewhere.

Agreed. I was going to ask about potential overlap with the other branding tropes, butttt it was better stated above.

Fine with that. Those tropes popped up in the wick check, too, being potholed alongside Butt Brand.