History Main / MedalOfDishonor

* In the ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'' story [[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/badges-and-scorecards Badges and Scorecards]], the narrator has this happen twice.

* When the names on the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixon%27s_Enemies_List Nixon's Enemies List]] was revealed, Creator/PaulNewman and UsefulNotes/DanielSchorr stated (separately) that inclusion on the list was their greatest accomplishment. Ironically, Schorr announced the revelation live on television as part of his news report, not realizing that he was on the list until he came to his own name.

** Randy once won a place in the Guinness World Records for The Biggest Piece of Shit Taken, to Sharon's disgust and shame. [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]] because Randy and his friends, however, thought this was awesome; even his son Stan, usually the StraightMan for ludicrous plots like this, seemed to approve. As well as this, [[Music/{{U2}} Bono]], the previous record holder [[spoiler:(or, perhaps more accurately, the previous ''[[TalkingPoo record]]'')]], was desperate to maintain his title.

* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'': When [=SpongeBob=] met karate master Fuzzy Acorns and tried to prove he was worthy of a karate belt, he did so poorly that Fuzzy considered awarding him with the lowest belt possible, the ''clear'' belt, but decided that he wasn't even worthy of [[ComedicUnderwearExposure the belt keeping his pants up]].

* The ever-popular [[https://darwinawards.com/ Darwin Awards]], which is given to those who remove themselves from the gene pool through their own stupidity. While it's a type 1, the ridicule is often posthumous, as "removing oneself from the gene pool" often means the recipient got a bad case of dead because they thought some incredibly stupid action was a good idea. Past winners include:

** In "Conjoined Fetus Lady", the school nurse given an award for her birth deformity, when she just wanted everyone to ignore it.

* In the spinoff ''WesternAnimation/TotalDramaPresentsTheRidonculousRace'' the [[BigBad Ice Dancers]] consider any medal that isn't gold and any placing that isn't first to be this. Josee even spits with disgust when she talks about winning a bronze medal. [[spoiler: They end up placing third in the race, and Josee throws a tantrum when they get eliminated.]]

** Randy once won a place in the Guinness World Records for The Biggest Piece of Shit Taken, to Sharon's disgust and shame. PlayedWith because Randy and his friends, however, thought this was awesome; even his son Stan, usually the StraightMan for ludicrous plots like this, seemed to approve. As well as this, [[Music/{{U2}} Bono]], the previous record holder [[spoiler:(or, perhaps more accurately, the previous ''[[TalkingPoo record]]'')]], was desperate to maintain his title.

** Best New Artist at the Grammys: The award is notorious for its completely erratic track record. You either go to soaring new heights (like Music/TheBeatles or Music/MariahCarey) or your career tanks afterwards. In particular, the category has had a lot of {{One Hit Wonder}}s and acts that were briefly big but couldn't sustain longterm success (Music/MenAtWork is probably the best example). Almost every Best New Artist winner is asked afterward if they're worried about the curse. More specifically, the 1990 award, which was awarded to Music/MilliVanilli and was later revoked. They had planned to give the award to one of the other nominees (Neneh Cherry, [[Music/IndigoGirls the Indigo Girls]], Soul II Soul, or Music/ToneLoc), but none of them wanted it.

** Best New Artist at the Grammys: The award is notorious for its completely erratic track record. You either go to soaring new heights (like Music/TheBeatles or Music/MariahCarey) or your career tanks afterwards. In particular, the category has had a lot of {{One Hit Wonder}}s and acts that were briefly big but couldn't sustain longterm success (Music/MenAtWork is probably the best example). Almost every Best New Artist winner is asked afterward if they're worried about the curse. More specifically, the 1990 award, which was awarded to Milli Vanilli and was later revoked. They had planned to give the award to one of the other nominees (Neneh Cherry, the Indigo Girls, Soul II Soul, or Tone Lōc), but none of them wanted it.

** In "Party Pooped", Rainbow Dash mentions a trophy for "most stuff broken in under a minute". Both her record and the trophy are broken by some visiting yak {{diplomat|icImpunity}}s.

** The Draconis Combine has the 'Honor of Wakizashi'. It is awarded to a high ranking person who puts the honor of themselves or their family above the needs of the Combine but has a high enough rank or political connections to avoid outright execution. A person so 'honored' is expected to commit {{seppuku}} on receipt of the award.
** Clan Hell's Horces has the Mark Of Hell'', a tattoo that a warrior is given if they were selected to participate in The Branding ritual but failed due to being argumentative, arrogant, or otherwise failing to sufficiently cooperate with the rest of their hunting party. They're expected to cover this tattoo by wearing a black armband, indicating their disgrace to fellow warriors.

-->-- ''Machinima/RedVsBlue PSA: "The Olympics Suck"''

* An example of the second variant: [[Roleplay/DarwinsSoldiers Shelton]] is embarrassed about the [[http://z7.invisionfree.com/thegangoffive/index.php?showtopic=7319&view=findpost&p=9195867 Commendation medal]] he got while in Dragonstorm.
* In the Wiki/SCPFoundation story [[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/badges-and-scorecards Badges and Scorecards]], the narrator has this happen twice.
--> The only thing worse than killing an innocent girl is getting a medal for doing so.
* From an episode of WebVideo/TheAngryVideoGameNerd, featuring WebVideo/PatTheNESPunk:
-->'''Nerd:''' "I'll give [your copy of Nintendo World Championships] The Nerd Seal of Approval."
-->'''Pat:''' "So... what, you'll take a dump on it?"
-->'''Nerd:''' "No, that would be The Nerd Seal of ''Dis''approval."

* Website/{{Newgrounds}} had a "prize" called Turd of the Week that was given to the Flash submission with the lowest score that passes judgment (calculated as closest score to 1.6 out of 5 after 200 votes, with 1.59 or below being disqualified). The most (in)famous submission to win this award was [[Website/TheClockCrew Strawberry Clock's]] [[https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/28240 B]]. This was discontinued in 2012 because people were flooding the Portal with crappy submissions just to get the award.

* Blog/{{Froghand}}:

---> When you make me believe I'm at risk of having a seizure, then it's never a good sign for you personally.

---> The awards have no structure beyond what I will state, so don't leave your comfy chairs, because you never know what to expect. Who knows, maybe Oprah will show up and give you a free car, laundering the money from her illegal hairspray business while using her book club sticker factory as a front for the revival of the Illuminati, using unprecedented access to the Internet to edit Wikipedia articles to include typos, causing readers to slowly go insane as subliminal messages are included in each and every paragraph.
* In one episode of WebVideo/CriticalRole, Travis (out of character) is gifted with a medal for being the runner up in his fight with an NPC. The Dungeon Master, Matthew Mercer, declares immediately that Travis' character Grog received the medal in-universe, making it this.

* Yahtzee/Ben Croshaw who reviews games in his animated web video series WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation on Website/TheEscapist, refused to list VideoGame/RideToHellRetribution in his worst games of 2013 list, instead calling it "congealed failure" and giving it the "Zero Punctuation lifetime achievement award for Total Abhorrence." You can watch his "best and worst games of 2013" [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7rMUvEPXK0 here.]] and you can watch his Ride to Hell: Retribution review [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWxEwdGpIPQ here.]]
* ''Website/SFDebris'': in Chuck Sonnenberg's funhouse-mirror ''Franchise/StarTrek'' universe, Starfleet has the [[Series/StarTrekEnterprise Hoshi Sato]] Cowering Chicken medal, with clusters. More metatextually, there are the end-of-episode awards, such as "Most Annoying Character".
* ''FSTDT'' Gives out awards is a quote is particularly stupid/bigoted. They also have the 'fundie of the year award' for the person who does the best quotes over a year.

* Website/WrestleCrap has the Gooker Award, named after Wrestling/TheGobbledyGooker, to this day considered one of the ''worst'' gimmicks in all of professional wrestling history. It's annually awarded to the worst angle of that year -- to put into perspective of how bad the angle has to be to attain this award, [[{{Squick}} Katie]] [[OldShame Vick]] was one of the recipients. Other notable recipients include David Arquette as WCW Champion, the NEW Monday Night Wars, and Wrestling/{{TNA}}'s answer to the Katie Vick angle, Claire Lynch.
** A good measure of how bad something has to be is to look at the godawful stuff that DIDN'T "win." For instance, the absolutely without merit "Diva's Revolution" lost because the abysmal Lana-Ziggler-Summer-Rusev love tetrahedron occurred the same year.
* Website/GameShowGarbage, meanwhile, hands out the yearly "Wayney Award" (named after the host of the infamous 1990 version of ''Series/TicTacDough'', Patrick Wayne {the son of Creator/JohnWayne}, derided constantly in the game show community for being an incompetent host), to what the readers vote to be the worst game show-related thing of the year.
* WebVideo/UrinatingTree has "Lolcow of the Week"[[note]] Lolcow of the Month for his MLB coverage[[/note]] from his "This Week in Sportsball" series, which recognizes the biggest on-field EpicFail during the time period covered by a particular installment. He is known to give out more than one when he deems that there's a tie for biggest Lolcow.

[[folder:Web Video]]

** In "Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes," the "Montgomery Burns Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence" is kind of one, although no one but Burns and his lawyers realize it. It's a made-up award invented by Burns as an excuse to give Homer——whose results from a routine physical showed that he had become sterile after years of radiation exposure——a $2000 check to forestall any future medical lawsuits, while ensuring he wouldn't read the fine print. So essentially it's an award for being infertile.

** In "The Front", Homer went to his high school reunion and got all kinds of rewards that embarrassed Marge, like "Most Weight Gained" and "Least Distance Traveled to Get Here". He was proud to receive every single one and was outraged when they were confiscated on the basis of his failure to graduate.

** The only other person who won both awards the same weekend besides Bullock and Helgeland, composer Alan Menken, proudly received his Worst Original Song Razzie for ''Film/{{Newsies}}'' [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTreDSnKE4Q in 2020]], and [[http://www.alanmenken.com/m/awards/ his website]] also shows his "nomination" for the same award for ''Film/RockyV''. [[https://twitter.com/aimenken/status/765626279651663872 And lyricist Jack Feldman requested his statue]] so he could display it alongside the Tony won by the stage adaptation of ''Newsies''. ([[http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/05/alan-menken-goes-for-the-egot-and-the-regot/?_r=0 Menken has mockingly said he's only an Emmy short of a "REGOT"]] [[HilariousInHindsight which he has since finished]]).

** Best New Artist at the Grammys: The award is notorious for its completely erratic track record. You either go to soaring new heights (like Music/TheBeatles or Music/MariahCarey) or your career tanks afterwards. In particular, the category has had a lot of [[OneHitWonder One Hit Wonders]] and acts that were briefly big but couldn't sustain longterm success (Music/MenAtWork is probably the best example). Almost every Best New Artist winner is asked afterward if they're worried about the curse. More specifically, the 1990 award, which was awarded to Milli Vanilli and was later revoked. They had planned to give the award to one of the other nominees (Neneh Cherry, the Indigo Girls, Soul II Soul, or Tone Lōc), but none of them wanted it.

* In the ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'' episode The Scavenger Vortex, the fact that Raj has slipped everyone the gold coin they were all searching for in said scavenger hunt basically amounts to this. Needless to say the contestants aren’t thrilled about his little “we’re all winners when we’re having fun” lesson, especially since the competition really brought out some nasty things about them and all for a booby prize.

*** He further awarded the Dragoons' commander a bag containing [[Literature/TheBible thirty pieces of silver]] in "commemoration" of the original Dragoons going native and ultimately working alongside the Inner Sphere in the Clan Invasion of 3050. This calculated insult caused the Dragoons to not only [[ScrewThisImOutOfHere immediately storm out of the ceremony]], but even more importantly, Alaric had inadvertently declared war on the Dragoons, and the Dragoons were [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge more than happy to show the ilKhan exactly what an enraged Dragoons looked like.]]

*** He had minted "Bloodribbons", special campaign medals given to the Warriors from Clan Wolf and Clan Jade Falcon who had participated in the capture of Terra. He had intended to give the Dragoons Wolf Bloodribbons, but the Dragoons' commander pointed out that while the unit's lineage was originally from Clan Wolf, they no longer considered themselves as ''part of'' Clan Wolf, but as mercenaries ''working for'' Clan Wolf. Ward then had a third medal produced for the Dragoons, but excluded them from specific recognition in the special salute given to a Bloodribbon bearer[[note]]the saluter extends the index and middle fingers of their right hand and places it over their heart, the two fingers representing Clans Wolf and Jade Falcon. Wolf's Dragoons also abides by this tradition, but adds the extension of the ring finger to represent the Dragoons' contribution[[/note]]
*** He also awarded the Dragoons' commander a bag containing [[Literature/TheBible thirty pieces of silver]] in "commemoration" of the original Dragoons going native and ultimately working alongside the Inner Sphere in the Clan Invasion of 3050. This calculated insult caused the Dragoons to not only [[ScrewThisImOutOfHere immediately storm out of the ceremony]], but even more importantly, Alaric had inadvertently declared war on the Dragoons, and the Dragoons were [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge more than happy to show the ilKhan exactly what an enraged Dragoons looked like.]]

Either way, this can be PlayedForDrama, [[PlayedForLaughs comedy]], or even both. Usually, a recipient of such an award who treats it as such is engaging in SelfDeprecation or playing a GracefulLoser role UpToEleven. Other times, the recipient may be genuinely proud of their supposed award of dishonor, thus turning it into an InsultBackfire.

** Given to individuals who need to atone for some crime or other. They usually take the form of long scraps of parchment affixed with wax seals (though the actual heroic medals use the same, listing their accomplishments). The Sisters Repentia take it UpToEleven, as the punishment for their crimes is to charge into battle with chainswords, wearing nothing but strategically-placed parchments. And they still kick ass for the Emperor while doing it.

** At the end of "Homer Defined," Homer's name enters the dictionary as a noun meaning "American bonehead," with the phrase "[[PersonAsVerb pull a Homer]]" meaning "[[TheFool to succeed despite idiocy]]." He and his family are perfectly happy with the mark he's made on the culture.

* In TheStinger of the ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'' episode "Gaming the System," Dr. Doofenshmirtz, [[ItMakesSenseInContext who happens to be wearing a]] PimpedOutDress, falls through the roof of a building where a beauty pageant is being awarded just in time to be accidentally given the First Place crown.

-->'''Doofenshmirtz:''' Oh, I am honored! And, at the same time, humiliated. So thank you, and ''[[CatchPhrase curse you]].'''