This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Adam850: What about when the target (Reluctant Monster, The Grotesque, etc) is or is not defended by the hero, but instead saves the mob from the real danger? The Torches and Pitchforks mob goes after the Reluctant Monster, but before they can do anything to him, an evil monster attacks. The Reluctant Monster saves the mob from the evil monster, and all is forgiven? This effectively shames the mob, but in a different way.
Arilou: Not sure if this qualifies but I seem to recall an instance of Nicholar I basically riding out alone with two officers and shaming a group of mutineers to stop by shouting at them for rebelling against their rightful Tsar and Autocrat....
Jordan: I brought up an example like this earlier where in The Princess Bride, Buttercup defeats some mooks by calling upon her authority as Queen and noted something similar stops the pirates in The Pirates of Penzance. Also, similar to that real example, I know George Washington stopped a mutiny in the military at some point by calling upon his authority as general, as did Juan Carlos of Spain.
I changed the entry on Washington and the Newburg conspiracy because the original entry had it backwards.
fleb: I cut this example...
- * Subverted in Paul Robinson's Instrument Of God, where Supervisor 246 brings a rapist out to meet the crowd who wants to tar and feather him, along with other beatings and miscellaneous (and painful) mopery and dopery. This is in the Afterlife, where people are already dead, so while they could torture him horribly and he would live through it, 246 announces to the crowd that the legislature has passed a new law: if they assault a prisoner in handcuffs, he gets to rape them in retaliation either for one hour or twice as long as they tortured him. And he can have them turned into a woman, first. "We're really not going to try to stop you if you do. So unless you're planning to be this man's 'bitch' I suggest you go home or wherever you came from." The crowd, realizing it wouldn't be any fun if he got to respond back in kind, dissipates.
...because I don't know what to call that, but it's not this.
h_v: Cut this example...
- Tragic Real Life example: Three cops had been investigating a house for days without the public knowing about their mission. Cue an accidental "disappearance" of some kids in a nearby school and the whole town thought it had been the cops. The mob beat and tied up the poor cops for non-existant answers. No one knew who the apparent 'kidnapped' kids were and "reliable facts" were lies. The apparent "evidence" (cameras, apparent diaries, photos of children) were nonexistant and wrong. A lone reporter who was there and was shown the "evidence" of the cops' crimes realized that the cops were innocent. However, he had to shut up because the mob grew more insane every second. The ending: the mob put the cops' car on fire and it ended up killing some of the cops.
...because it isn't an example of the trope.
Ambar: Having read To Kill A Mockingbird a few years ago, I'm pretty sure the page quote from Scout is butchered horribly, but can't quite remember.
Won Sab: The addendum to the "Quirites" example is a tad redundant. Advice on how to merge the addendum into the main example in such a way as to remedy this?
