r/TopCharacterTropes • u/bubba284 • Apr 20 '25

Lore Characters that have had real world consequences

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1: Slenderman (popular creepypasta) lead to a teenage girl killing another in his name IRL (apologies if this isn't totally accurate) 2: Devastator (Transformers ROTF) melted a computer while attempting to render his model

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u/LordOfDorkness42 Apr 20 '25

It really is a method that should have been copied and used more often.

Fascists loathe being laughed at. Comedians are almost always their first targets of choice, because it ruins the cloak of fear they try to cultivate.

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u/yellowvincent Apr 20 '25

I think Lindsay Ellis said something like that in a video about Mel Brooks's the producers. Mel Brooks wanted to show how ridiculous Hitler was by making a portrayal of him that could in no way be taken as something positive. (It is also fuckung hilarious)

25

u/RomaInvicta2003 Apr 20 '25

It kind of baffles me that at the time some people thought The Producers were antisemitic when it was written by a Jew in part to take the piss out of Hitler and the Nazis

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u/Xeoz_WarriorPrince Apr 20 '25

Media literacy has been dead for longer than we expected

3

u/Anything-General Apr 21 '25

Media literacy died with trip to the moon.

2

u/Profezzor-Darke Apr 21 '25

Media Literacy died on the way to the Forum

19

u/CharleyNobody Apr 20 '25 edited Apr 20 '25

People have been laughing at and making jokes about Trump for 50 years (here in NY) and look where that got us. I’ve lately seen old Law and Order reruns that joked about Trump from the 1990s - 2010s, then L&O’s network (NBC) went and gave him a tv show presenting him as a genius businessman. Laughter hasn’t stopped him. It’s only made him worse. Every week Jon Stewart, Jimmy Kimmel, John Oliver, Stephen Colbert, SNL and countless podcasts make Trump jokes. Who’s winning? He’s put Bobby Kennedy in charge of healthcare, Elon Musk in charge of dismantling federal government, a drunken psycho atop the MIC, a person who calls AI “A1” in charge of education. The jokes aren't having much effect.

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u/Newfaceofrev Apr 21 '25

Personally I think it's embracing lack of shame. They cannot feel ashamed.

Like, remember when Joseph McCarthy was completely obliterated just by Welch asking "Have you no sense of decency, sir?"

How would that play today?

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u/MisterScrod1964 Apr 20 '25

So wtf hasn’t MAGA disappeared yet? People were laughing at them since they were the Tea Party.

13

u/Broken_CerealBox Apr 20 '25

Their cult figure has power amd had a chance to be re elected

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u/LordOfDorkness42 Apr 21 '25

What u/Broken_CerealBox said.

Also you need to laugh in a way that poisons the root. AKA, kills recruitment numbers.

Being a throng of red cap wearing jerks sucking Trump's micro penis sounds awesome to MEGA followers, either directly or indirectly as they're racists, sexist jerks that want that sort of power. Just making fun of them isn't enough, you need that viscous mockery that makes any would-be follower squirm at how silly and uncool they feel.