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The lines between various "disbelief" and "skeptic" tropes

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MissConduct (Septatroper)
#1: Dec 25th 2024 at 7:03:18 PM

So, Eskimos Aren't Real has been looked over by the Tropes with Outdated and Offensive Names thread for its first word. That thread (unfortunately) doesn't have the authority to change names on their own, so it needs a Wick Check to go through TRS, but there was enough concerns that the name was misleading people into thinking that it was only for people not believing in the existence of specific real ethnic groups while the trope covers much more ground. That's what I started Wick Checks Arent Real to look for. But then I slowly realized that we already have quite a number of "disbelief" and "skeptic" tropes. A lot of these may have issues, and there's a chance a good number of them may not be necessary. So, in the absence of any (finished) wick checks on tropes besides Eskimos Aren't Real:

  • Eskimos Aren't Real is for "Not believing a demonstrably real thing exists." (the wick check found that it was generally used correctly to the Laconic - although "not believing a demonstrably real ethnic group exist" was definitely a notable trend, taking up about a third of the examples, with "not believing in real animals" and "not believing in real individual people" also prominent". I'm unsure as to whether "character doesn't believe in something fantastical IRL but very real in-universe counts as misuse. I was also wondering if people were using it as the impromptu tropes for "climate change denier", "flat earther", and/or "anti-vaxxer" (none of which I think are tropeworthy concepts), while I found one example of each of the first two that's not enough to call it a trend.)
  • Arbitrary Skepticism is for "A character refuses to believe something, despite already believing, being involved with, or even being something equally or even more unlikely." (I haven't checked this one yet, but I'm concerned people aren't necessarily following the "disbelief contrasted with belief in something weirder" and are just using it as "any skepticism that seems arbitrary" without the compare and contrast.)
  • Flat-Earth Atheist is for "In a fantasy setting, something fantastic clearly exists, but this character remains arbitrarily skeptical." (Is it only being used for "arbitrary skepticism in a fantasy setting" or is it being used in non-fantasy settings, and even if the distinction is clear, isn't this trope "Arb Skep But More?" Also, because both the title and the description talk about atheism specifically, it may be being used too narrowly like EAR. That it links to Arbitrary Skepticism in its laconic seems like a bad sign.)
  • If Jesus, Then Aliens says it's for "If anything paranormal exists, then everything paranormal exists", which seems valid (and it probably is), but the description also has a soft split with a skeptic variant "If No Aliens, Then No Jesus". (A wick check would probably check whether or not this second variant is ever even used.)
  • Agent Scully is a character-focused variant, "A character who doesn't believe in the paranormal and finds contrived scientific explanations for it instead" (I'm concerned that it may be being used to mean "any character who is a skeptic". There's also the issue of whether or not an Agent Scully is always supposed to come in a pair with an Agent Mulder character.)
  • Scully Syndrome is "Skeptical characters come up with overly-convoluted theories to "rationally" explain a phenomenon that is blatantly supernatural" (or, in other words, the thing Agent Scully characters do. This one is the most blatant copy of the bunch - its page quote is literally the comic on Agent Scully's page.)
  • Skepticism Failure is "If you're a skeptic in a paranormal or supernatural work, you will be proven wrong. Painfully." (This seems pretty straightforward in theory, being about the way a work treats its skeptics as opposed to anything the skeptics themselves do, but I'm not certain that every bullet that uses this trope necessarily follows the "and they're punished or humiliated for their skepticism" angle of the trope. There's also a chance it might overlap with the similar Skeptic No Longer, which tends to follow for the skeptics who survive their encounter with the paranormal.)
  • How Unscientific! is actually about "The story makes a temporary break from its usual place between mundanity and fantasy", but it sure sounds like a stock phrase a skeptic would say, so it may be being misused that way (a lot of the skeptic tropes have this in their see also's, which may be contributing to the idea it's about skepticism).


So, I just wanted to clear some definitions up before I take Eskimos Aren't Real to TRS soon - remember, that still needs a name change if we do decide to keep it. And actually, the trope I'm actually worried EAR is closest to is actually Global Ignorance (which isn't a "disbelief" trope normally, but might eat up a lot of EAR if we decide to split it.) I feel like EAR isn't an entirely necessary trope (even if it got a name change), but I wouldn't want to throw any EAR bullets into a trope that shouldn't be taking them.

jandn2014 SMILE! from somewhere in Connecticut Since: Aug, 2017 Relationship Status: Hiding
SMILE!
#2: Dec 25th 2024 at 7:27:09 PM

While it's not clearly defined as such in its description, I've always assumed the spirit of Eskimos Aren't Real is "character doesn't believe in something comically mundane that's obviously real", whenever that be Eskimos, or the nation of Sweden, or the Queen of England. Not quite sure about the differences between Arbitrary Skepticism and Flat-Earth Atheist, but I've usually perceived those two as usually applying to fantastic subjects, or more broadly anything that doesn't exist in real life.

CompletelyNormalGuy Am I a weirdo? from a place where folks put cream cheese on hot dogs (Oldest One in the Book)
Am I a weirdo?
#3: Dec 25th 2024 at 9:46:00 PM

The difference between Arbitrary Skepticism and Flat-Earth Atheist is proof. The Flat-Earth Atheist has it (or at least could easily acquire it), but ignores it. Arbitrary Skepticism doesn't require it. Imagine someone in a world where most people believe magic is real. This person hangs around with wizards all the time, and knows that they're a thing. However, when the possibility of ghost is brought up, they dismiss it out of hand. That's Arbitrary Skepticism. Now, if they then meet a whole bunch of ghosts, but still claim that there's no such thing as ghosts, then they're a Flat-Earth Atheist. If anything, Flat-Earth Atheist is the most similar of these tropes to Eskimos Aren't Real, as it is essentially Eskimos Aren't Real, but for fantastic elements.

As far as I can tell, you're right about everything else.

Bigotry will NEVER be welcome on TV Tropes.
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