Tropes Media Browse Indexes Forums Videos Ask The Tropers Trope Finder Media Finder Trope Launch Pad Tech Wishlist Reviews Tools
Cut List New Edits Edit Reasons Launches Images List Crowner Activity Un-typed Pages Recent Page Type Changes Changelog
Tips
Creating New Redirects Cross Wicking Tips for Editing Text Formatting Rules Glossary Edit Reasons Handling Spoilers Word Cruft Administrivia FAQ
Tropes HQ
About Us Contact Us Advertise DMCA Notice Privacy Policy Report Bug
Go Ad-Free Changelog
  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Highlight Links
 

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Needs Help: Acceptable Targets

Go To

To-do list:

Original post:

Note: This thread was proposed by badtothebaritone.

Acceptable Targets and its various subtropes are supposed to be about groups of people that society deems acceptable to make fun of. However, the usage suffers from a few major issues. Acceptable Targets is both a ZCE magnet and a pothole magnet. Those two categories alone made up over half the wicks, and that's only counting the entries that had no examples with context at all. There are several other entries with ZCEs but have at least one example with context, which I put in the appropriate category for that example. The vast majority of examples that do have context don't talk about how the group is acceptable to make fun of and are therefore redundant with Take That!. The few that do are generally hypotheticals. The examples don't show the audience's perspective either, which is unacceptable because the tropes are YMMV. To summarize the Acceptable Targets Wick Check:

  • Something is explicitly okay to make fun of - 6/52
  • Something is made fun of - 15/52
  • Something is repeatedly made fun of - 3/52
  • ZCE/Pothole/Related Trope/Misc. - 28/52

The discussion thread came up with two main ideas for how to deal with this:

  • Disambiguate between Take That!, Author Tract, and possibly other tropes
  • Retool the trope into something along the lines of "A work repeatedly and consistently makes fun of a specific thing throughout," preferably with a new name.

Wick check for this thread:

Wicks checked: 52/52

     Something is explicitly acceptable to make fun of (6/52) 
  1. PlayingWith.Rich Bitch - Enforced: The creators make a wealthy character unpleasant because they have a beef against the wealthy or because they know that the "uppity and selfish socialite" is an acceptable target.

  2. Hate Dumb - Bandwagon Hater: Opposes this work, but only as long as it's the trendy thing to do. This hater is always on the lookout for Acceptable Targets, not because they truly hate them, but because it's fun to complain and no fun to do it alone. Sometimes, the Bandwagon Hater will like the Acceptable Targets but deny having anything but hate towards it. More often than not, these people may have even been fans of the show, especially in shows where it was trendy to like it, but then it became trendy to hate it. A very good way of spotting this if any Caustic Critic releases a scathing review, or if the majority of a fanbase or popular forum hates it, even if they had previously liked the work, and afterwards, start carbon-copying their opinions, sometimes word for word. In extreme cases, they may have no opinions of their own. The inverse happens in Fan Dumb, as well. This is what the page quote essentially describes; the person who hates something not because they genuinely dislike it, but because the "cool kids" told them to.

  3. PlayingWith.No Sympathy For Grudge Holders - Deconstructed: Bob's friends say that it is okay for his family to die. Bonus points if Bob's family happened to be on one of the Acceptable Targets list. This turns Bob against said friends, causing him to develop a deep seated hatred of humanity as a result. He becomes an antisocial recluse and lashes out, causing society to ostracize him more and causing him to lash out further.

  4. Zhirinovskys Russian Empire - Acceptable Targets: In-Universe, western media treats Zhirinovsky and Russia in general as one. For example, the Simpsons episode "You Only Move Twice" features him as an associate of Hank Scorpio. Zavidiya, however, blames American media for much of the tension between Russia and America by demonizing Russia as a whole.

  5. Have Yourself A Miserable Little Christmas - "Johnny, Baronessy, please, stop struggling," said Satan, "we need to succeed or you and all of your species will, otherwise, be condemned to oblivion. Johnny and Baronessy were very suspicious but being Indians and therefore, Acceptable Targets, they were very close to nature and the spirit world and knew the universe was a very dark and grim place. Johnny said, "very well but I don't trust you. I think you're a Sociopathic Hero and I am willing to die to save the world from Hell.

  6. CowboyBeBopAtHisComputer.Myth And Religion - Islam is subject to all manner of misconceptions in the West, many of them negative, owing to the religion being an Acceptable Target. Indeed, it's been a target for centuries among Christians, leading to some weird misconceptions.

     Something is made fun of (15/52) 
  1. Warrior Nun Areala - Acceptable Targets:
    1. The Freemasons, who are portrayed as being synonymous with The Illuminati.
    2. An even more agreeably undisputed group to vilify would be the Nazis.

  2. Funny.Dragon Ball Z Abridged Movies - The two radio personalities who have the gall to joke around when the Androids are blowing up a city and one of them just so happens to have a fiancee who lives there, but now he is likely single and open to dating.

  3. YMMV.Moone Boy - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Altar boys are depicted as shifty little terrors who operate a sort of miniature Mafia around a single musician (who doesn't really buy into their operation) and, in one episode, vandalise the Moone house in an attempt to terrorize Martin into shutting up about his alleged UFO sighting.
    2. Protestants, given that the series is set in a largely Catholic community. For example, in "Bells 'n' Smells", when Father Linehan visits Dessie's new religious store, which caters to a wide variety of religions, including Judaism and Islam, the only thing he takes any real issue to is the possibility of the store catering to Protestants. To his relief, it doesn't.

  4. YMMV.Would I Lie To You - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Rob Brydon's accent, height, and impressions are all fair game for mockery.
    2. When Ronnie Corbett appeared on the show, there were plenty of cracks about his short stature. Several of them made by Corbett himself.
    3. Cockney accents, especially if the speakers draw out their vowels, are ripe for mocking especially by Lee.

  5. YMMV.Bojack Horseman S 5 E 03 Planned Obsolescence - Acceptable Targets: As with anyone in this show who has anything better than a toxic sex life, Yolanda's sex positive family are depicted as depraved, hypersexual weirdos incapable of thinking about anything but sex. With that said, when Yolanda finally comes out of the closet, they are understanding and in fact Todd is shocked that they went for an unnecessary Zany Scheme.

  6. YMMV.Pop Quiz Hotshot - Acceptable Targets: Christian in Bunny Boobies, who not only wore a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic tee, but also admitted to writing MLP fanfiction. Critic made fun but not in a nasty way, while the comment section is full of accusations of him of being autistic and hopes that he really did get shot.

  7. YMMV.Jesus On Thy Face - Acceptable Targets: The rules of ThyFace warn against offensive behavior, except if it is directed at "women, gentiles or homos."

  8. YMMV.Raw - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Non-Irish characters to a slightly uncomfortable degree. Tanya, Max and Selena (British) are all Jerkasses (the latter being a scammer as well). Bobby isn't a jerkass but still a shameless womanizer and presented as the 'wrong' man for Jojo instead of Nice Guy Dylan (Irish). The Australian Geoff is loud and abusive (though eventually softened through Character Development). It seems Pavel is the only one shown to be sensible and responsible. While the Irish characters are flawed, they're usually shown to be more down to earth.
    2. Anthony takes the cake. He's a Hate Sink abusive husband who's controlling and trying to prevent Jojo from seeing her friends or family. Of course he's American.

  9. YMMV.Twisted Metal - Hollywood Homely: Deconstructed with Dollface in the PS3 remake. She is a former supermodel who got a (minor) scar on her face, decided that her beauty was ruined (even though it clearly wasn't, as her doctor could plainly see), and started wearing a mask to cover up her "imperfection." David Jaffe said (about 14 minutes in) that the character is a satire of the extreme standards of beauty that women are faced with by the media and pop culture... while flatly denying that the character was based on his ex-wife.

  10. YMMV.The Omniverse Event - Acceptable Targets: Calvin and Susie both take a shot at Candy Crush Saga and other "pay-to-win" games in Voidtrapped.

  11. YMMV.The Owl House S 2 E 10 Yesterdays Lie - Acceptable Targets: Jacob Hopkins, the curator of the historical society, is a jab at internet conspiracy theorists. Not only is Jacob wildly misinformed about demons, but even when presented with a real demon, he chooses to believe things he read on the internet over what Vee tells him. He's shown in a Freeze-Frame Bonus to be a flat-earther, which explains how he distrusts the official explanation simply because it's the official explanation. Jacob also displays a sociopathic disregard for Vee's sentience, and wants to cage and dissect her for the sake of internet fame rather than genuine curiosity. Luz already mentioned that she was scared of "jerks who want to debate online"; this episode shows that she had a good reason to be scared of them.

  12. YMMV.Dads - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Many jokes get made at the expense of Veronica's Asian heritage.
    2. In response, she often jokes about Eli's size.
    3. Warner's father constantly making racist comments.

  13. YMMV.Forum Fantasy - Acceptable Targets: Various types of users on Internet forums, being noobs, flamers, fanboys, trolls, spammers, and thread necromancers are made fun of in this game and are referred to as "Forum Pests".

  14. This Loser Is You - A new line of DirecTV commercials starring Rob Lowe as both himself and some sort of Acceptable Target stereotype go pretty deep into this, as they actually do seem more intended to directly insult customers of the competing companies than to win them over to this brand.

  15. YMMV.Xavier Renegade Angel - Acceptable Targets: New Age Retro Hippies, anarchists, rednecks, enviromentalists and religious fundamentalists.
    1. Xavier's character seems to be a Take That! to people who think they are wiser than everybody else just because they are familiar with spiritual themes and philosophical concepts. Most of the destruction in the series is caused by Xavier trying to be like a spiritual mentor and failing at it.

     Work or person a work likes taking potshots at a lot (3/52) 
  1. YMMV.The Mighty Jingles - Acceptable Targets:
    1. In World of Tanks, it is the artillery. One of his catchphrases is "artillery kills are the best kind of kills." Though he does occasionally show replays from arty players, he actually picks on the "Scumbags" (players who suicide when the game doesn't go in their favor).
    2. In World of Warships, he picks on battleship drivers when they get hit by torpedoes on account of sailing entirely in straight lines. The best example of this is here. When a battleship manages to avoid torpedoes, Jingles expresses amazement that the player actually knows what his rudder is for.

  2. YMMV.Matthew Reilly - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Judging from The Great Zoo of China, Reilly really isn't a fan of the Chinese government. Just the government, though; civilians are treated far more sympathetically.
    2. Before that, it used to be the French - but he's warmed up to them.
    3. Strangely enough, Chinese weaponry. Whenever a Chinese gun is named, it's usually followed by some variant of "the Chinese knockoff of the (original gun)". Done even more bizarrely in The Five Greatest Warrior, where he has the (fictional) Russian Mi-48 helicopter show up just to describe it as a "cheap Chinook knockoff" - despite the Russians having the extremely successful Mi-8, Mi-17 and Mi-26 transport helicopters that he could have more realistically used.

  3. YMMV.Mad - Acceptable Targets: Increasingly so from the 1970s onward.
    1. Lawyers are some of the most frequently targeted.
    2. Tobacco and alcohol companies, particularly in the early years of the magazine. Gaines had something of a Berserk Button when it came to smoking, particularly underage smoking. This was during the early Sixties, when alcohol and cigarettes were treated much more casually than today.

     ZCE/Pothole/Related/Whatever (28/52) 
  1. YMMV.TV Trash - Acceptable Targets:
    1. He REALLY likes to tear Cartoon Network apart.
    2. NBC isn't safe, either. Cancelling his favourite show without a proper finale is the root of these jokes; he has not watched NBC since.
    3. Also, the states of Oklahoma and California.
    4. He also likes to rip on TNA every once in a while.
    5. Oh, and American Football isn't safe, either. The Dallas Cowboys also get this treatment especially hard. In real life, Chris despises the sport for what he perceives is an overt amount of violence and an annoying (at best) fanbase. He barely covers the Dallas Cowboys on his DFW-focused sports blog.
    6. He also really enjoys splitting reality TV into two.

  2. YMMV.Sheldon - Acceptable Targets: L'Acadamie Francaise and the British legal system, among others.
    1. Bill Gates is a pretty popular target, too.

  3. Words - Portfolio

  4. Film/Better Off Dead - "Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that!" (quote listed twice, both with pothole)

  5. YMMV.At Midnight - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Florida.
    2. Just about everything under Acceptable Hobby Targets (Furries, Juggalos, Hipsters, etc.)
    3. Averted with Nerds. Comedians making a joke where being a nerd is treated as a bad thing generally get boos from the audience, scorn from Chris, and no points.

  6. Implacable - Acceptable Targets: Nazis, particularly in "Tolkien Was Half Right".

  7. Fark - Only in Florida: So much so that the state has its own tag. See Acceptable Targets.

  8. YMMV.National Lampoons Christmas Vacation - Unintentionally Sympathetic: While not to the point of them being designated villains, Todd and Margo Chester do end up being this. While they're vain, stuck-up, condescending yuppies, but they don't do much to Clark beyond insulting him as he tries to decorate his house. Yet they're constantly victims to Clark's destructive festivities, with frequent collateral damage to their house and occasional physical abuse. Granted, they're also no kinder to one another than they are to Clark, coldly sneering and snarking at each other while only keeping up appearances until, by the end, they're outright hostile to one another.

  9. Werewolf by Night - New-Age Retro Hippie: Hippies pop up here and there in volume 1 as Acceptable Targets.

  10. Funny.Saturday Night Live Season 43 - Ellen: "France is banning the use of cellphones in schools. According to a French official, it's important for kids to have their hands free to smoke."

  11. Metagame - * There have been rumors of discovery of a board game with simple rules under the countless metagame layers of Diplomacy, but it might just be the Russians trying to double-cross us again.

  12. Supernatural.Tropes M To P - Crowley: "There's a reason we don't call our chits in early: consumer confidence. This isn’t Wall Street, this is Hell! We have a little something called integrity. If this gets out, who'll deal with us? Nobody! Then, where are we?"

  13. Funny.Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol 2 - For most people the scene is an easy Take That! towards a well-known Butt-Monkey. However, it actually had a dedicated cult followingnote , and its treatment in the media (who really love its primary competitor) left its fans perennially irked about it always being an acceptable target. So it's pretty funny to see it referenced, given that GotG was once a cult classic itself that fans worried would be overshadowed by a much more well-known and shinier brand.

  14. YMMV.Jonah Hex - Acceptable Targets: Southerners, at least if they're Confederate sympathizers.

  15. Bait-and-Switch Boss - Fur Fighters has a rather humorous example. In the Space Station Meer, you bump into a Xenomorph, but before the fight starts, a stereotypical lawyer barges in, claiming to represent 31st Century Films, and begins berating the game for breaking 35 different copyrights. The player character argues back, so the lawyer draws a gun and begins shooting at them.

  16. TriumphantExample.A - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Twilight and its fandom. ~ Embracing Shadows
    2. Nazis. ~ Geek Code Red, DDRMASTERM
    3. Justin Bieber. ~ Hotel California, REV 6 Pilot, urielzet
    4. It's Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday...
    5. The Westboro Baptist Church. Assholes. ~ Arcane Azmadi
    6. Heterosexual cisgendered white men Tropers/Dragon-Feathers
    7. The Church of Happyology. They just make it too damn easy. ~ Savini 24

  17. YMMV.Fyodor Dostoevsky - Acceptable Targets: Nihilists, especially in combination with atheism and young people with left or liberal views. Of course, it's Dostoevsky's skill as a writer that avoids this.

  18. Cyber Nations - Kick the Dog: Pacifica had a habit of enforcing Perma-ZI on those who had 'offended' its leadership. The postwar terms dictated by said leadership after a GW were also known to be on a Versailles-level of draconic humiliation. The pillaging of the True Neutral GPA, depending on who you talk to, was either this, a Moral Event Horizon, or an acceptable target getting what was long coming to them.

  19. Useless Spleen - Getting hurt in the spleen is a sort of long-term Running Gag in Sluggy Freelance. It's more than just mentioned in a parody of Kill Bill, in which Bun-bun is killing telemarketers, and he's shown holding a spleen that he says one of them "dropped".

  20. Trek Verse - The Dominion: The Empire from another part of space, set to take over our side of the galaxy. Sort of a mirror version of the Federation, as it is comprised of many races, but unified through military force, with its most visible members being the Vorta and Jem'Hadar. Much of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine revolves around the war with them, and the consequences of this arc are sometimes felt in the other series. They also get to be stand-ins for the evil of drugs, as their warriors are addicted to one to keep them in line.

  21. Funny.GWAR - The movie "Lawn Jockey", where a racist family fires their black maid without realizing that she's in fact a Voodoo high priestess who curses their offensive lawn jockey ornament. They lie dead at its feet the next morning.

  22. YMMV.Tom Ska - Acceptable Targets:
    1. Pranksters, particularly Sam Pepper, hence "Epic Girlfriend Pranks".
    2. Justin Bieber is shown as one in the Justin Beiber parodies.
    3. In his vlogs, Bee Movie.

  23. Twofer Token Minority - Jem and the Holograms (IDW): Jetta who is British and Black. She was white in the original cartoon but that was due to Executive Meddling. The executives wouldn't allow a Black villain but an Evil Brit one was fine. The comic combines her creator's original vision with the fact she is British in the cartoon.

  24. IgnoredEpiphany.Live Action TV - Naked Chef's Jamie Oliver showed a group of American West Virginian school kids the basically inedible chicken parts go into their McNuggets and they still wanted to eat them. A follow-up article revealed the kids also rejected his healthy lunch for their usual pizza and soda, although they said they'll still try new foods so that's something. (Then again, the fact that we decree any part of a chicken inedible, when one clearly can eat it, is more than a little elitist.)

  25. Funny.Soviet Womble - Womble: "Wait, hang on, he's with the Daily Mail!" [opens fire]

  26. SFDebris.Tropes G To L - Idiot Plot: Invoked Not Chuck himself, but he WILL rip into any episode that does have one, especially if Kenneth Biller had anything to do with it. His review of the early season seven Voyager episode "Repression" is especially brutal for Chuck deconstructing why its plot about a rogue Bajoran vedek somehow managing to hack a Project Pathfinder transmission to Voyager, a recording of Tuvok's son, so he could subliminally activate brainwashing he did to Tuvok years before, so Tuvok can in turn brainwash the rest of the Maquis crew via Vulcan mind meld (which it has never been able to do before) into reverting into their pre-series selves as Maquis freedom fighters and restart the Maquis and fight the Cardassians, is brutal (bear in mind this episode takes place only a year or two after the end of the Dominion War, which left the Cardassian Union a shattered husk of its former, and Voyager is still stuck in the Delta Quadrant where they can't meaningfully do anything about it anyway).

  27. Dude, Not Funny! - Willingham: "Oh, who the fuck am I offending?! The Nazis?!"

  28. Flight of the Conchords - The main plot of the episode "Drive By" gears up towards a "xenophobia/racism is bad" aesop, with Bret and Jemaine being picked on because they are from New Zealand, to the point of having to sit in the back of the bus. In the end though, the aesop turns out to be xenophobia is bad, unless it's against people from Australia.

MOD EDIT: This thread's scope covers Acceptable Targets' subtropes in addition to Acceptable Targets itself. The full list:

This thread does not cover Unacceptable Targets as a wick check determined it was not necessary.

MOD EDIT: Copying the wick checks from the previous TRS thread here for reference purposes regarding usage. Note that it does not cover Unacceptable Targets or Once Acceptable Targets because that thread only covered Acceptable Targets and the Acceptable X Targets subtropes.

Wick check for Acceptable Targets and sub tropes (in folders due covering multiple tropes).

Acceptable Targets: 2474+132(redirect) wicks, 23,038 inbounds

    Wick Check 

Only 16 (14 discounting in-universe) out of 50 examples are valid as audience reactions. And all 16 are either such common targets (like Nazis) it’s its own trope, against RL people pushing ROCEJ, or have issues that make them suspect.

Acceptable Ethnic Targets: 148 wicks, 2,045 inbounds

    Wick Check 

Only 14 (9 discounting in-univsere) out of 50 valid, and are either common targets or in-universe.

Acceptable Hard Luck Targets: 37 wicks, 523 inbounds

    Wick Check 

ALL of the non in-universe are misused.

Acceptable Hobby Targets: 46 wicks, 860 inbounds

    Wick Check 

ALL of the non in-universe are misused.

Acceptable Political Targets: 220 wicks, 4275 inbounds

    Wick Check 

Only 12 (9 discounting in-univsere) out of 50 valid. Many of the WNAO are recent political ones that push ROCEJ, arguing this trope should be No Real Life Examples, Please!

Acceptable Professional Targets: 161 wicks, 1878 inbounds

    Wick Check 

Only 15 (5 discounting in-univsere) out of 50 valid.

Acceptable Religious Targets: 128 wicks, 4985 inbounds

    Wick Check 

Only 8 (4 discounting in-univsere) out of 50 valid.

Final tally: out of 283 total, only 41 non in-universe examples are valid audience opinions as opposed to the works/creators opinion. An 85.5% misuse. Joker (2019), Thirty Rock, Snow Dogs, 19 Kids and Counting, Villette, and The Jewish Americans are the only 5 that don’t fall under another trope and properly explain it as an audience reaction with enough objective history or explanation to avoid any ROCEJ.

Edited by Tabs on Feb 7th 2023 at 1:46:31 AM

WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#51: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:38:55 PM

Take That! probably needs a thread of its own. Some people think it's just for works calling out other works, which is certainly not how it's used, but expanding it should be simple.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#52: Feb 7th 2023 at 1:47:56 PM

It is just for works calling out other works Its title and "subtrope" titles (everything that follows the Take That! name) really work against its current definition.

Edited by Tabs on Feb 7th 2023 at 1:48:29 AM

WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#53: Feb 7th 2023 at 2:55:11 PM

Part of me thinks it's just a bad definition since the rest of the page paints a different picture BUT I think there's a Trope Talk discussion about it somewhere. For right now, I'm not sure if we want to err on the side of "keep misuse off" or not but depending on how things shake out, it might not end up mattering.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#54: Feb 7th 2023 at 5:39:11 PM

Yeah, I wanted to tell someone on the cut list to move examples to Take That!... and realized I'm wrong...

mightymewtron Angry babby from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Angry babby
#55: Feb 19th 2023 at 3:40:52 PM

Tabs mentioned on my recent TLP that we could maybe have a subindex for media forms and genres that receive scrutiny in the media — Rap Is Crap, Disco Sucks, Everyone Hates Mimes, Murder Simulators, All Anime Is Naughty Tentacles, etc. Not sure if we have enough but it feels plausible.

I'm also pro-expanding-Take That! — we could make a subtrope for the original definition if we so desire.

Edited by mightymewtron on Feb 19th 2023 at 6:41:44 AM

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
MadAboutLove97 Since: Jul, 2019 Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
#56: Feb 24th 2023 at 4:59:56 PM

I was able to remove Once Acceptable Targets from most of the remaining pages, but there's a few YMMV pages that need to be cut due to lack of content.

MadAboutLove97 Since: Jul, 2019 Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
#57: Feb 25th 2023 at 1:34:19 PM

Thanks to the last wicks being cut, can we remove "Once Acceptable Targets to Values Dissonance" from Wick Cleaning Projects

Yindee Just stoic wisdom. from New England Since: Jul, 2016
Just stoic wisdom.
#58: Feb 25th 2023 at 1:56:44 PM

[up] Done. This Is a Wiki, mind you!

Vehicle-Based Characterization | Grief-Induced Split | Locker Mail
Ferot_Dreadnaught Since: Mar, 2015
#59: Mar 25th 2023 at 5:06:25 PM

Acceptable Hobby Targets is down to two wicks: The newletter announcing the dewicking and the Italian Language tropes list. Do we want to just remove them or is there something more to do first.

And once we remove the redirects do we want to keep or cut them?

From Teeny Weenie:

As a general enough use to be its own trope is this a situation where Acceptable Targets is valid to keep?

Edited by Ferot_Dreadnaught on Mar 25th 2023 at 5:11:56 AM

themayorofsimpleton Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him from Elsewhere (Experienced, Not Yet Jaded) Relationship Status: Abstaining
Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him
#60: Mar 25th 2023 at 5:10:22 PM

[up] The newsletter wick stays. IDK about the Italian link though.

TRS Queue | Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#61: Mar 25th 2023 at 6:10:43 PM

Yes, the newsletter link stays, and I also don't know what to do with the Italian link.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Yindee Just stoic wisdom. from New England Since: Jul, 2016
Just stoic wisdom.
#62: Mar 25th 2023 at 6:11:40 PM

[up][up] Got rid of the Italian link. Those are just indices used to collect tropes alphabetically alongside their Italian names or intended Italian names. Since AHT never got made into an Italian page, it was a simple delete.

Vehicle-Based Characterization | Grief-Induced Split | Locker Mail
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#63: Mar 27th 2023 at 7:51:23 AM

Hard Luck is done.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#64: Mar 30th 2023 at 3:01:28 PM

Ethnic is done.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#65: Apr 1st 2023 at 2:14:25 PM

Religious is done. Three redirects (including the singular redirect) remain.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#66: Apr 5th 2023 at 10:51:50 AM

Political is done. Two redirects to go!

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#67: Apr 25th 2023 at 4:27:19 AM

Only the singular Acceptable Target redirect is left before we're left with the main plural name, now that Acceptable Professional Targets is out of business. Had to send a "not a trope" notifier after someone added a wick to a redirect that had already been dewicked.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Apr 25th 2023 at 6:28:16 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
sohibil pragmatic scientist from the Lab Since: Dec, 2020 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
pragmatic scientist
#68: May 6th 2023 at 12:07:57 AM

Sorry for coming up with this so late, but I thought Acceptable Target is an Audience Reaction. When did it turn into a trope?

The thing is, I just added an example to the YMMV.The Crooked Man page and only then checked the trope and learned it's under maintenance.

Should I remove the example or is there an audience reaction, which would cover it?

Humankind is like a train. No matter how powerful the locomotive is, it can only travel as fast as its slowest car allows it to.
WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#69: May 6th 2023 at 12:10:13 AM

It's not a trope, it's an index.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
MasterN Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button from Florida- I mean Unova Since: Aug, 2016 Relationship Status: Shipping fictional characters
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
#70: May 6th 2023 at 9:21:28 AM

Besides, having played the game, David is in no way portrayed as deserving his torment just for smoking.

One of these days, all of you will accept me as your supreme overlord.
themayorofsimpleton Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him from Elsewhere (Experienced, Not Yet Jaded) Relationship Status: Abstaining
Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him
#71: May 12th 2023 at 6:44:35 AM

Just so I know, Acceptable Target and Acceptable Targets are what's left? Should we update the OP then to account for that?

TRS Queue | Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall
ACW Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster from Arlington, VA (near Washington, D.C.) Since: Jul, 2009
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
#72: May 19th 2023 at 5:23:23 AM

Question: Just because something has lots of ZCE, does that automatically make it necessary to de-wick? Maybe that doesn't apply in this specific case, but...

CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#73: May 19th 2023 at 9:44:18 AM

If you're asking in a broader sense than just this one trope, this isn't really the correct thread to discuss it on.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
ACW Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster from Arlington, VA (near Washington, D.C.) Since: Jul, 2009
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
#74: May 19th 2023 at 11:06:35 AM

I'm kinda asking both. Though as applies to this trope, ZCE doesn't necessarily make an example wrong, and that seems to have been a problem here (not including some of the more possibly controversial ones).

And what's WNAO?

Edited by ACW on May 19th 2023 at 2:08:06 PM

CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#75: May 19th 2023 at 11:09:53 AM

Fine.

ZCE don't make a trope "wrong" exactly. It's not "misuse". But it is impossible to properly tell one way or another if it's valid use. And the more ZCE a particular trope has, the less and less likely we are to save it since either there's something about the trope that make people misunderstand the required context, or people simply just can't be trusted to provide context. Also there's less examples to salvage and we aren't going to try and retool a trope in every situation to save what may be, in extreme cases, less than 10% of the overall usage.

Anyway, this wasn't cut due to ZCE issues anyway, so...

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness

Trope Repair Shop: Acceptable Targets
31st Jan '23 9:33:19 AM

Crown Description:

Acceptable Targets and its various subtropes are supposed to be about groups of people that society deems acceptable to make fun of. However, the usage suffers from a few major issues. Acceptable Targets is both a ZCE magnet and a pothole magnet. Those two categories alone made up over half the wicks, and that's only counting the entries that had no examples with context at all. There are several other entries with ZCEs but have at least one example with context, which I put in the appropriate category for that example. The vast majority of examples that do have context don't talk about how the group is acceptable to make fun of and are therefore redundant with Take That. The few that do are generally hypotheticals. The examples don't show the audience's perspective either, which is unacceptable because the tropes are YMMV. In addition, a lot of examples are about targets works portray as acceptable, and Acceptable Targets and its subtropes (except for Once Acceptable Targets and Unacceptable Targets, which are not NRLEP) are No Real Life Examples Please.

What should be done with Acceptable Targets, the Acceptable X Targets subtropes, and Once Acceptable Targets? Note that this thread does not cover Unacceptable Targets.

Total posts: 108
  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Wide Load

Important Links

Ask The Tropers Trope Finder Media Finder Trope Launch Pad Tech Wishlist Reviews Go Ad Free!
Crucial Browsing
Resources
Top