History Main / ProtagonistCenteredMorality

* One of the biggest complaints against the ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' series is how Bella suffers no repercussions for treating others like crap.

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* ''AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho'' often uses this trope, particularly in one StoryArc that pits the Eighth Doctor against [[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E9TheTimeMeddler the Monk]]. Simply put, the Doctor can't force his friends to sacrifice their lives, even if it would save thousands, whereas the Monk would gladly murder one person if it would prevent an entire planet from being destroyed. Of course the Doctor gets the moral victory, albeit at great personal cost. Other stories and arcs explore the idea further, but no matter how much GreyAndGrayMorality comes into play, the Doctor typically comes out as a hero because he's, well, the hero.
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* ''WesternAnimation/{{Rumble}}'': The Morality if this film seems to be centered on protagonist Winnie Coyle and her hometown of Stoker as the movie declares that anything bad done to that town is an act of evil as it is impoverished. In that regard, it paints Tentacular as the villain as he wants to move away from Stoker to Slitherpoole to forge his own identity and it tries to paint him as evil by portraying the injuries and trauma he inflicted on fellow wrestler King Gorge as a KickTheDog moment. However the film glosses over the fact that Gorge’s trauma and injuries are partially Winnie’s fault because she interferes with the match it occurred in and told Tentacular how to beat Ming Gorge. Winnie is never called out for this and her overall hypocrisy and behavior throughout the film as it blames Tentacular and Tentacular alone for everything.

* In the novel ''The Red Blazer Girls,'' a character who stalks the protagonists and is apparently in competition with them is described by one as "Pure evil!", although he actually turns out to be on their side, and they forgive him.

* ''Film/ThreeHundred'' is full of this, mostly due to the UnreliableNarrator. The Spartans are touted as a just and free society, even though they're shown in the movie to hurl imperfect babies off cliffs, kill messengers, and toss boys into the wilderness as a rite of passage. The sequel makes this explicit, with a few Athenians visiting the city and concluding the Spartans are just lunatics.

* In ''Literature/{{Twisted}}'', Railrunner gushes about how much he loves drinking blood and killing, and during his initial transformation and rampage, straight-out murders dozens of cops who were just doing their duty, then has the audacity to bitch that no one accepts him as he really is. He also has no problem with killing the Fallen, even though they're evil through no fault of their own... and he's the good guy!

* ''Film/PitchPerfect'': Bumper, the leader of the Troublemakers, is the closest thing the movie has to a villain. The Bellas' leader, Aubrey, is every bit as cruel, arrogant, selfish, and obnoxious as he is, but she's on the same team as the main character and he isn't, so the audience is supposed to root for her.

*** Later in the book, Kip Chalmers, a politician, also demands that ''his'' train be got moving again because he doesn't want to be late to his destination; because he is a looter and a villain, the result is that ''[[KillEmAll absolutely everyone on the train dies]]'' and infrastructure that is critical to the ''entire nation'' is destroyed.

* It shows up, believe it or not, in Disney's ''WesternAnimation/{{The Little Mermaid|1989}}''. Sebastian the crab, a major character, narrowly escapes Chef Louie, who kills and cooks fish. The moment when Sebastian reaches safety is treated as the end of the matter; the fact that the other fish Louie still kills and cooks were clearly ''sentient'' is glossed over.
* This trope is in full action in ''Animation/VukTheLittleFox''. Since the story focuses on Vuk, he is treated as a good guy, despite killing a lot of (apparently sentient) animals for food and systematically destroying a man's property. At the same time, the hunter is treated as the BigBad, even though he just kills foxes to protect his livestock. Justified, since Vuk would not survive otherwise.

* PlayedForLaughs in ''WesternAnimation/TheLEGOMovie''. Batman reveals he stole the hyperdrive of the passing ship [[spoiler:(the ''Millennium Falcon'')]] so that the group could use it for their own ship. The very next scene shows the now-hyperdrive-less starship being eaten alive by a space slug.

* In ''Film/OnDeadlyGround'' an oil executive pressures his crews to find oil before the exploration permit expires, even if it means harming the environment or ignoring safety regulations. When protesters and employees complain, he hires some paramilitaries to harass troublemakers. When the paramilitaries kill an employee, clearly they are villains. But does this justify destroying the exploration site and presumably causing multiple deaths and millions of dollars in property and environmental damage? Apparently it does, for everyone, including the press, who give Creator/StevenSeagal a standing ovation.
* [[DeanBitterman Dean Walcott]] in ''Film/PatchAdams'' is unambiguously presented as the film's villain because he tries to block the title character's graduation from medical school. This despite the fact that Patch frequently behaves immaturely in class, impersonates a third-year medical student so he can get in to see hospital patients, sneaks into patients' rooms late at night to bombard them with balloons, advocates a "laughter cures everything" approach to medicine that he never even ''attempts'' to prove with science, practices medicine out of his house without a license, steals supplies from a hospital, and gets some of the highest grades in school even though no one ever sees him studying (making it perfectly logical to suspect him of cheating). Worst of all, his methods [[spoiler:directly lead to the murder of another med student]]. But of course, since he's the protagonist, anyone who doesn't think he would make a good doctor must be evil. The real Patch Adams was quite upset about this portrayal of his life, which was highly inaccurate. [[http://channelawesome.com/nostalgia-critic-patch-adams/ The Nostalgia Critic had a field day with this]].

* ''Film/PitchPerfect'': Bumper, the leader of the Treblemakers, is the closest thing the movie has to a villain. The Bellas' leader, Aubrey, is every bit as cruel, arrogant, selfish, and obnoxious as he is, but she's on the same team as the main character and he isn't, so the audience is supposed to root for her.

* ''Film/{{The Scarlet Pimpernel|1982}}:'' In the 1982 Anthony Andrews version, Percy purposefully makes Marguerite's married life with him a living hell; he justifies this by his understandable belief that she murdered the Marquis de St. Cyr and his family, but since the Revolution, there's this new thing called divorce, hey? Worse, once he's learned of Marguerite's innocence and reconciled with her, Percy still arranges his own fake execution to humiliate Chauvelin, which predictably devastates Marguerite. It would not have been surprising if she had committed suicide, turning his practical joke into a tragedy. Possibly justified by the RuleOfFunny.

* A CentralTheme in ''Film/TeamAmericaWorldPolice'' (along with MyCountryRightOrWrong). Team America are a squad of gung-ho {{Straw C|haracter}}onservatives [[DestructiveSaviour who keep destroying other countries in their ham-fisted attempts to "stop terrorists"]], but in the end [[BlackAndGrayMorality they are still better than genuine tyrants and dictators.]]

* Jonas from ''Film/{{Twister}}''. He's the bad guy because he 'stole' the idea for Dorothy (even though he helped invent it in the first place), got funding for his research, and was 'competing' with the heroes to launch his invention first. But the movie sets him up as evil because he's a jerk to the hero despite the fact that if he succeeded, his data could also save people from tornadoes. Furthermore, Bill walks up and punches Jonas for no reason while Jonas is talking with reporters. And Jonas's "jerk-ness" is him snidely saying "I really like your weather reports", sarcastically complimenting Bill on the job that Bill voluntarily quit tornado chasing to take!

* Subverted in ''Literature/LazarilloDeTormes'', when the title character (who has had a long string of abusive employers) works for a [[SinisterMinister corrupt pardoner]] who treats him very well. Lazarillo knows, deep down, that the man is scum, but he's willing to overlook it because he's sharing in the benefits. This episode is one of the darkest parts of the novel's satire.
* The heroes of ''Literature/LeftBehind'' are often shown generally acting like unmitigated jackasses to anyone they meet, but those who insult or do ''them'' the slightest harm are quite literally condemned to Hell for it.
** In [[http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2011/12/06/tf-stuck-in-traffic/ this blog post,]] Fred "Slacktivist" Clark notes that the heroes seem [[SkewedPriorities more worried about the traffic jam they're stuck in]] (hindering them from reaching their comrades) than the news of ''the outbreak of World War III'' which preceded the traffic jam announcement.

* [[DiscussedTrope Actively analyzed]] in ''Literature/TrappedInADatingSimTheWorldOfOtomeGamesIsToughForMobs''. Protagonist Leon is a non-fan of the OtomeGenre who was {{blackmail}}ed into beating a ScienceFantasy otome game by his sister, before [[ReincarnateInAnotherWorld dying in an accident and reincarnating as a background character in the game world]], and therefore doesn't look kindly on its tropes.
** In the game, Olivia is portrayed as the pure-hearted heroine, while Angelica is portrayed as the villainess who opposes her; in the gameworld, Marie usurps Olivia's position. But from Angelica's perspective, she is trying to defend her engagement with a man she genuinely loves from someone trying to steal him away. Ditto the fiancees of the ''four'' other boys whom Olivia/Marie ensnare in the ReverseHarem route.

* A major part of the background in ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''. Almost every book published by the Black Library is Imperial propaganda, and the fluff included in each faction's codex casts them in a good light (with the exception of Chaos and Tyranids, both of which are mostly from Imperial point of view as well, probably because the stars of those books are insane or all-devouring cosmic horrors).

* A CentralTheme in ''Film/TeamAmericaWorldPolice'' (along with MyCountryRightOrWrong). Team America are a squad of gung-ho {{Straw C|haracter}}onservatives [[DestructiveSaviour who keep destroying other countries in their ham-fisted attempts to "stop terrorists"]], but in the end [[BlackAndGrayMorality they are still better than genuine tyrants and dictators.]]
* ''Film/JohnQ'' has this in spades. The protagonist's son needs a heart transplant but can't afford it. Clearly, the big bad insurance agent is evil for not paying for his son's surgery. So John holds an entire hospital emergency room hostage, threatens to kill people if his son doesn't get a heart, and causes terror. However, there are only so many hearts available for transplant in the world. By blackmailing others to get his son a heart, he stole it from someone else, effectively killing that person. Then his son had his heart transplanted last minute by a group unprepared for the surgery, which lowered the odds of the transplant working. So John gave his son a lower chance of success of surviving the surgery than the person he stole the heart from. Not to mention the whole holding people hostage and thus disrupting an emergency room, which nearly resulted in one person dying due to lack of proper treatment (he gets convicted of that at the end, but he's still treated as right).
* Jonas from ''Film/{{Twister}}''. He's the bad guy because he 'stole' the idea for Dorothy (even though he helped invent it in the first place), got funding for his research, and was 'competing' with the heroes to launch his invention first. But the movie sets him up as evil because he's a jerk to the hero despite the fact that if he succeeded, his data could also save people from tornadoes. Furthermore, Bill walks up and punches Jonas for no reason while Jonas is talking with reporters. And Jonas's "jerk-ness" is him snidely saying "I really like your weather reports", sarcastically complimenting Bill on the job that Bill voluntarily quit tornado chasing to take!
* The biographical film ''Film/MichaelCollins'' depicts the morality of the IRA's [[YourTerroristsAreOurFreedomFighters terrorist/guerrilla war]] against the UK largely in terms of what side Collins is on. When Collins is for revolution, revolution is the answer; when Collins decides that the revolution is over and turns his forces against those who want to keep the war going, that's that. The movie makes only half-hearted attempts at ambiguity, clearly basing itself on the audience siding with Collins.
* ''Film/{{Jumper}}'' is based on the audience siding with its AntiHero, who supports himself with crime enabled by his superpowers. We side with him because the organization who hunts down people with his powers are {{Knight Templar}}s and will kill people who try to help him. The opening scenes have the protagonist ignoring a news story about hundreds of people whose lives are in danger due to a flood so that he can rob a bank and have lunch on top of the Sphinx. Note that this is before he knew people wanted to kill him. Neither he nor the hundreds of other teleporters in the world have ever tried to use their powers for good.
* In ''Film/TheLostWorldJurassicPark'', Sarah and Nick sabotage some mercenaries hired by the company who owns the dinosaurs. Granted, the team of mercenaries sent to capture the dinosaurs weren't using kid gloves, but the sabotage that the two of them did is directly or indirectly responsible for ''every human death in the film''. Even after the mercenaries save the two of them from death, Nick uses it as an opportunity to sabotage Roland's gun. Apparently, killing a dinosaur is wrong even if it is rampaging through your camp ''and killing your men''. And it wasn't as if nature was at stake. The dinosaurs were created in a lab and introduced in a time period that was unsuitable for them. The fact that they exist at all could be disastrous to the ecosystem. This was the entire point of the first movie and pounded home more in the ''Lost World'' book yet somehow, the filmmakers forgot all about that.
* ''Film/ThreeHundred'' is full of this, mostly due to the UnreliableNarrator. The Spartans are touted as a just and free society, even though they're shown in the movie to hurl imperfect babies off cliffs, kill messengers, and toss boys into the wilderness as a rite of passage. The sequel makes this explicit, with a few Athenians visiting the city and concluding the Spartans are just lunatics.
* At the end of ''Film/FindingForrester'', William Forrester stands up for his protege Jamal against the bitter English teacher that had a grudge against him. But the film seems to forget the fact that the reason that Professor Crawford was bitter was that Forrester had fraudulently scuttled the man's dreams 20 years earlier by falsely alluding to a non-existent second book, just to encourage publishers not to work with him. Also, Crawford's negative attention on Jamal is because Jamal actually did plagiarize the work that he's being accused of plagiarizing, and Forrester had specifically told Jamal not to use any of his work. Crawford may be a jerk, but he's justified in his actions.
* In ''Film/OnDeadlyGround'' an oil executive pressures his crews to find oil before the exploration permit expires, even if it means harming the environment or ignoring safety regulations. When protesters and employees complain, he hires some paramilitaries to harass troublemakers. When the paramilitaries kill an employee, clearly they are villains. But does this justify destroying the exploration site and presumably causing multiple deaths and millions of dollars in property and environmental damage? Apparently it does, for everyone, including the press, who give Creator/StevenSeagal a standing ovation.

* [[DeanBitterman Dean Walcott]] in ''Film/PatchAdams'' is unambiguously presented as the film's villain because he tries to block the title character's graduation from medical school. This despite the fact that Patch frequently behaves immaturely in class, impersonates a third-year medical student so he can get in to see hospital patients, sneaks into patients' rooms late at night to bombard them with balloons, advocates a "laughter cures everything" approach to medicine that he never even ''attempts'' to prove with science, practices medicine out of his house without a license, steals supplies from a hospital, and gets some of the highest grades in school even though no one ever sees him studying (making it perfectly logical to suspect him of cheating). Worst of all, his methods [[spoiler:directly lead to the murder of another med student]]. But of course, since he's the protagonist, anyone who doesn't think he would make a good doctor must be evil. The real Patch Adams was quite upset about this portrayal of his life, which was highly inaccurate. [[http://channelawesome.com/nostalgia-critic-patch-adams/ The Nostalgia Critic had a field day with this]].
* Jay-Jay Manners in ''Film/HighSchoolUSA'' is portrayed as the everyman good guy while the preppy Beau Middleton gets the bad guy treatment. Jay-Jay isn't entirely innocent. He crashes Beau's party and hits on Beau's girlfriend constantly, even kissing her in public, and in the sight of Beau, yet Jay-Jay is still supposed to be the good guy.

* ''Film/{{Maleficent}}'' curses the newborn Aurora to fall into a coma on her sixteenth birthday, solely because she wanted to get revenge on Aurora's father. She also unblinkingly [[spoiler:kills dozens if not hundreds of men during her reign of terror. Most of them were trying to kill her, sure, but they were JustFollowingOrders from their own tyrant king]]. A lot of that could have been avoided if she hadn't cursed Aurora in the first place. Still, all of that gets to be completely ignored at the end when [[spoiler:she makes her HeelFaceTurn and gets to live HappilyEverAfter with Aurora's praise and respect]].

* In ''Film/{{Accepted}}'', we’re supposed to see Dean Van Horne as a tyrant and a raging conservative who wants to stop Bartleby and his friends from starting their own college. He’s kind of a jerk, but he is [[JerkassHasAPoint absolutely right]] when he points out that said college isn’t a college at all, as it lacks the basics: teachers, a curriculum, a library, and so forth. Also, Bartleby started said "college" simply because he didn’t have the guts to tell his parents that he hadn’t been accepted into a real college. But we’re supposed to side with him and be moved by his passionate speech at the end of the movie.
* ''Film/{{The Scarlet Pimpernel|1982}}:'' In the 1982 Anthony Andrews version, Percy purposefully makes Marguerite's married life with him a living hell; he justifies this by his understandable belief that she murdered the Marquis de St. Cyr and his family, but since the Revolution, there's this new thing called divorce, hey? Worse, once he's learned of Marguerite's innocence and reconciled with her, Percy still arranges his own fake execution to humiliate Chauvelin, which predictably devastates Marguerite. It would not have been surprising if she had committed suicide, turning his practical joke into a tragedy. Possibly justified by the RuleOfFunny.
* Zigzagged in ''Film/JupiterAscending''. Jupiter herself clearly wants to prevent the Earth from being harvested; but the ''Aegis'' crew, and in general anyone who helps her, are never shown to care one way or the other about the Earth. They're portrayed as heroic simply for protecting Jupiter's legal inheritance.

* ''Film/PitchPerfect'': Bumper, the leader of the Treblemakers, is the closest thing the movie has to a villain. The Bellas' leader, Aubrey, is every bit as cruel, arrogant, selfish, and obnoxious as he is, but she's on the same team as the main character and he isn't, so the audience is supposed to root for her.
* ''Film/FindMeGuilty'' by Creator/SidneyLumet is a CourtroomDrama about the 1980s RICO trial against the entire Lucchese Crime Family that ended in an acquittal after more than a year, in particular the antics of the already convicted Jackie [=DiNorscio=] (Creator/VinDiesel), [[AFoolForAClient who represented himself at the trial]] after firing his previous lawyer. [=DiNorscio=], despite being a repugnant, completely unapologetic lifelong gangster, is treated as an underdog ComedicHero fighting against a corrupt system, while his opponent NY District Attorney Sean Kierney is a bonafide {{Jerkass}} despite his indictments against the Calabrese Family's numerous crimes (murder, racketeering, drug dealing, etc.) being absolutely correct. This is exacerbated because [[OffstageVillainy their crimes are never shown]], only mentioned during the courtroom proceedings, making the mafioso come off like a bunch of well-dressed goofsters being maliciously targeted by the authorities. At one point Kierney, after becoming frustrated by them getting sympathy from the jury, [[LampshadeHanging denounces this]] in private, saying to his aides that they don't get what kind of people the defendants are. Some reviewers were also repelled, saying it was difficult to be happy with a movie that ends like this.
* ''Film/{{The Mummy|1999}}'': while the titular mummy is obviously the villain, the protagonists Evy, O'Connell, and Jonathan constantly go around stealing things, which is presented as KleptomaniacHero; but when their rival Burns notices that Evy has his stolen tool kit ''O'Connell points a gun in his face to get him to back off,'' and Evy refuses to give the kit back. One can question why the American dig team is portrayed as the bad side, when the 'heroic' characters are doing the exact same things as them; essentially grave-robbing an ancient site, getting innocent local people killed (albeit accidentally), and refusing to listen to the warnings of the Medjai, all of which ends up releasing Imhotep and endangering the world.

* In ''Film/{{Bean}}'', [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Mr. Bean]] quite literally defaces a priceless piece of American art, [[spoiler:replaces it with a poster and steals the original to boot]], but ends up as a hero for it. The only other person aware of what he's done is David, who cannot say anything in protest because he would lose his job and possibly face a multi-million dollar lawsuit for negligence if anybody else found out.

** Early on, the protagonist and narrator, Taylor, is offered a chance to work with the Undersiders, a gang of superpowered teenage villains working for a mysterious boss. She accepts the offer with the notion of insinuating herself into their group to hand over valuable intel to the local Protectorate, a group of adult heroes, via Armsmaster, who owes her a favor. Although she does this without the approval or knowledge of the Protectorate, she still goes to Armsmaster ''after'' she's accepted the Undersiders' offer and asks him to ensure she stays out of prison should things go sour. [[spoiler:Armsmaster predictably refuses, pointing out that the favor she's calling in--allowing him to take credit for apprehending a dangerous gangster named Lung--blew up in his face due to her own recklessness. Rather than apologizing and asking what she can do to help, Taylor gets angry with Armsmaster and storms out to go her own way.]] Armsmaster is portrayed as insensitive and stubborn, with Taylor comparing him to the bullies who abuse her on a daily basis.
** This becomes a major theme of the story. Centered around the interactions between Heroes and Villains, one character describes the whole thing as a high-stakes game of 'Cops and Robbers'. As long as Villains respect the unoffical boundaries, they are given significantly more leeway than you might expect, while Heroes are given very long leashes when it comes to their actions, being protected from the law [[SlavetoPR as long as they don't make their bosses look bad.]] As a result, they're able to have an effective (if uneasy) truce when working together against truly awful villains like the [[OmnicidalManiac Slaughterhouse Nine]] or [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt world-ending threats like the Endbringers]]. The resultant culture is dubbed 'The Unwritten Rules', a code by which both Heroes and Villains agree to follow. Essentially, as long as crimes are kept under a certain level of severity and you work towards the greater good when needed, crimes can be swept under the rug...

** Raven Mockers are mindless creatures of Darkness and they should all be wiped out. Everybody agrees with the KillEmAll attitude and, as of ''Burned'', around twenty Raven Mockers have been killed. Even the idea of giving them a burial is seen as strange. The only exception is Stevie Rae and when she raises valid points of WhatMeasureIsANonHuman and IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim not only does every character tell her she's wrong but she is suspected of secretly turning over to TheDarkSide.

Suppose, for example, there is a character who slaughters [[InnocentBystander innocent villagers]] by [[AMillionIsAStatistic the thousands]], but once helped save the [[EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas mother]] of the protagonist or some other character simply because he thought [[StacysMom she was hot]]; said character will {{easily forgive|n}} this guy, buy him a drink, and may even [[SixthRanger invite him to join the team]]. Then there is another character who routinely saves orphans from burning buildings who once used his resultant fame to [[RomanticFalseLead woo away]] the {{Love Interest|s}} of the character. They will be [[FelonyMisdemeanor an object of scorn]] as apparently her choice didn't matter at all. This ''alone'' would just be portraying a flawed [[TheHero hero]] (or a {{hypocrit|e}}ical villain if the character is evil) -- the final piece of the puzzle is that the narrative is in on the myopia. There will be no warning signs that the protagonist is being unfair to the hero who saved all these people. No one [[WhatTheHellHero calls them out]] on how disrespectful they're being to the memory of thousands of the mass-murderer's victims. This will not come back to haunt them. The protagonist is essentially acting as though, in certain respects, it really is [[ItsAllAboutMe All About Them]], and the narrator AuthorTract might well [[WriterOnBoard be agreeing]].

'''NOTE: This is an in-universe trope'''. It only applies when ''the story'' ignores bad things done by the protagonist, or good things done by the antagonist. If the story presents a character as a clear hero or villain, but some ''fans'' ignore the facts, that's MisaimedFandom, RonTheDeathEater or DracoInLeatherPants.

* It shows up, believe it or not, in Disney's ''WesternAnimation/{{The Little Mermaid|1989}}''. Sebastian the crab, a major character, narrowly escapes Chef Louie, who kills and cooks fishes. The moment when Sebastian reaches safety is treated as the end of the matter; the fact that the other fish Louie still kills and cooks were clearly ''sentient'' is glossed over.
* This trope is in full action in ''Animation/VukTheLittleFox''. Since the story focuses on Vuk, he is treated as a good guy, despite killing a lot of (apparently sentient) animals for food, and systematically destroying a man's property. At the same time, the hunter is treated as the BigBad, even though he just kills foxes to protect his livestock. Justified, since Vuk would not survive otherwise.

* ''Film/{{Jumper}}'' is based on the audience siding with its AntiHero, who supports himself with crime enabled by his superpowers. We side with him because the organization who hunts down people with his powers are {{Knight Templar}}s and will kill people who try to help him. The opening scenes have the protagonist ignoring a news story about hundreds of people whose lives are in danger due to a flood so that he can rob a bank and have lunch on top of the sphinx. Note that this is before he knew people wanted to kill him. Neither he nor the hundreds of other teleporters in the world have ever tried to use their powers for good.

* At the end of ''Film/FindingForrester'', William Forrester stands up for his protege Jamal against the bitter English teacher that had a grudge against him. But the film seems to forget the fact that the reason that Professor Crawford was bitter was because Forrester had fraudulently scuttled the man's dreams 20 years earlier by falsely alluding to a non-existent second book, just to encourage publishers not to work with him. Also, Crawford's negative attention on Jamal is because Jamal actually did plagiarize the work that he's being accused of plagiarizing, and Forrester had specifically told Jamal not to use any of his work. Crawford may be a jerk, but he's justified in his actions.

* ''Film/{{The Scarlet Pimpernel|1982}}:'' In the 1982 Anthony Andrews version, Percy purposefully makes Marguerite's married life with him a living hell; he justifies this by his understandable belief that she murdered the Marquis de St. Cyr and his family, but since the Revolution there's this new thing called divorce, hey? Worse, once he's learned of Marguerite's innocence and reconciled with her, Percy still arranges his own fake execution to humiliate Chauvelin, which predictably devastates Marguerite. It would not have been surprising if she had committed suicide, turning his practical joke into a tragedy. Possibly justified by the RuleOfFunny.

* ''Film/{{The Mummy|1999}}'': while the titular mummy is obviously the villain, the protagonists Evy, O'Connell and Jonathan constantly go around stealing things, which is presented as KleptomaniacHero; but when their rival Burns notices that Evy has his stolen tool kit ''O'Connell points a gun in his face to get him to back off,'' and Evy refuses to give the kit back. One can question why the American dig team is portrayed as the bad side, when the 'heroic' characters are doing the exact same things as them; essentially grave-robbing an ancient site, getting innocent local people killed (albeit accidentally) and refusing to listen to the warnings of the Medjai, all of which ends up releasing Imhotep and endangering the world.

** A minor character actually calls them out on it at one point. An acquaintance of the minor character has been pretending to be on the side of the protagonists, but is actually running a kind of con game. They pull a reverse con on him and cheat him, and the minor character says something along the lines of "So, yeah, I don't think I can be your friend anymore. Yes, he was trying to cheat you too, but if you're serious about following the teachings of Christ, you're ''supposed'' to be better than him."

* E. E. Smith's ''Literature/{{Lensman}}'' series exemplifies this. The actions of various protagonists are consistently applauded -- including one man judge/jury/execution, destruction of entire planets/solar systems/civilizations, with or without noncombatants, various nasty means of underhanded (or overhanded) warfare, torture, mind rape, etc. It's stated in-story that only paragons of IncorruptiblePurePureness can ever be Lensmen in the first place (and that the Arisians are actively weeding out those who fall short just before they actually get Lenses), but we do have to kind of take the author's word for it.
* ''Literature/DiaryOfAWimpyKid'': Greg suffers from this big time. For example, in ''Rodrick Rules'', he mistreats Chirag Gupta by pretending he doesn't exist. If the same thing happened to him, he'd almost certainly complain about it and call the kid(s) doing it to him bulllies. The book series might actually be one of the best explorations of this trope, especially if one treats it as a look into the worldview, life and perceptions of a borderline amoral Middle School student.

** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in ''Literature/{{Night Watch|Discworld}}'', in which young Sam points out to Vimes that in certain circumstances, Vimes is prepared to do things which are illegal or immoral (like knocking people unconscious before they can hit him). Vimes evades giving an explanation, and privately admits to himself that his main justification is "It's Me Doing It" -- and that this is a pretty poor justification, especially because it's the one the people on the other side are using too (and he feels [[TheFettered he could do worse if he let himself]], but he doesn't). Also downplayed in that he's using it about the EliteMooks of a corrupt, oppressive king, so there is ''some'' justification.
** PlayedForLaughs in ''Literature/ReaperMan'', where Miss Flitworth has no truck with the idea of moral relativism, because she was taught the difference between right and wrong. Death points out that the father who taught her this was an occasional smuggler.

** Both Magrat in ''Literature/WitchesAbroad'' and the Senior Wrangler in ''Literature/TheScienceOfDiscworld 3'' have used the phrase "It can't be bad if ''we're'' doing it. We're the good ones!" Their collegues have to point out that they've got cause and effect reversed there.

** In ''Hunted'', Zoey catches Stark raping a vampire girl through forcible blood drinking, but ignores Darius condemning him because Nyx herself guides Zoey into deciding to redeem Stark. On the flipside, in ''Tempted'', Zoey calls Stark out on what he did and Stark angrily declares that she's been misled and turned against him by Kalona.

** Barak drunkenly raped his wife in the backstory, but nobody cares (except Barak himself, and then only in a 'kinda regrets the circumstances' way), because he's a good guy - though that could be coloured by the fact that the only one who heard about it is a 14 year old Garion, and the terminology was sufficiently obscure that while most readers would get it straight off, it goes straight over Garion's head, meaning that no one else may actually have known.

** In the case of [[spoiler: Zakath]], it's a bit more ambiguous. It's noted a) that he spent most of the series as a cold-blooded monster, as a product of being manipulated into executed the woman he loved when he'd just taken the throne, which drives his genocidal RoaringRampageOfRevenge, b) nearly has a breakdown when he realises that pretty much everything he's done since the end of ''The Belgariad'' has been absolutely pointless, c) very nearly reverts after he feels as if he's been betrayed by the heroes. In other words, he's not presented as performing a HeelFaceTurn overnight, nor is it presented as either smooth or easy.

** Patch walks around threatening, mindraping and torturing {{Nephilim}}, but seeing as he’s doing it for Nora, it’s okay. It's treated as evil when someone else does it.

* The second book of ''Literature/TheCobraTrilogy'' has the titular Cobra super-soldiers agree to consider attacking the planet Qasama (which they know nothing about) in exchange for new territory elsewhere. They go to Qasama pretending to be a diplomatic party while actually spying, and when caught, kill a lot of Qasamans and threaten to do more damage until they're allowed to leave. Then they come back in greater force to conduct experiments, and kill more Qasamans to make their getaway. Their conclusion: Jeez, these people we've attacked twice are a damn ''menace'', aren't they? We've got to start a full-scale war with them, quick! (The fact that the Qasamans used spy tricks and violence against the Cobras is cited as proof that they're dangerous, even though the Cobras were first to spy and first to kill.) In the end, the Cobras find a solution short of war which will "only" overturn the foundations of Qasaman society. But it's the Cobras doing all this, so yay! A few people on the Cobra side note that the conflict was probably unnecessary, but even then, most treat it as a strategic blunder rather than a [[HeelRealization maybe-we're-the-bad-guys realisation]].

* Shows up in ''Literature/TheFaultInOurStars'' when Hazel and her friends [[spoiler:vandalize Monica's house as paback for her abruptly ditching Isaac after he lost his vision]].

** This becomes a major theme of the story. Centered around the interactions between Heroes and Villains, one character describes the whole thing as a high-stakes game of 'Cops and Robbers'. As long as Villains respect the unoffical boundaries, they are given significantly more leeway than you might expect, while Heroes are given very long leashes when it comes to their actions, being protected from the law [[SlavetoPR as long as they don't make their bosses look bad.]] As a result they're able to have an effective (if uneasy) truce when working together against truly awful villains like the [[OmnicidalManiac Slaughterhouse Nine]] or [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt world ending threats like the Endbringers]]. The resultant culture is dubbed 'The Unwritten Rules', a code by which both Heroes and Villains agree to follow. Essentially, as long as crimes are kept under a certain level of severity and you work towards the greater good when needed, crimes can be swept under the rug...
* ''Literature/AsianSaga'': Subverted with shades of deconstruction. Dirk Struan, the protagonist of ''Tai-Pan'' is... not a very nice person. He comes across fairly well, due to having very progressive attitudes about employer-employee relations, intercultural interaction and corporal punishment, but is completely ruthless in dealing with anyone who opposes him, in business or at sea. His EvilCounterpart, Tyler Brock, has more typical attitudes in regards to race, violence and the treatment of women, but firmly believes that EvenEvilHasStandards and in many ways holds himself to a higher standard than Struan (among other things, he insists that Struan be "broken regular" i.e. killed in a fair fight, whereas Struan showed no qualms about sending a triad hit squad after Brock's son). Both Struan and Brock are POV characters at some point, and it is clear that, from their perspective and with the information they have, both are doing what they think is best for their families and the people around them. Both men are also very well aware that they are not angels, but rough-and-tumble China traders and opium smugglers, and that a lot of what they do as a matter of course is morally dodgy at best. Both men throw the phrase IDidWhatIHadToDo around with abandon.
** A telling scene is when Brock attempts to sink a lorcha carrying bullion Dirk Struan intends to use to pay off a huge debt to Brock,, who has been buying up Struan's mortgages in the hope of driving him out of business. Culum goes on a long rant about how Brock should hang for a pirate. Dirk just shrugs and says that if he had been in Brock's shoes he would have done exactly the same thing, and that Brock's only crime was failure.

* Wrestling/BigShow once got disqualified for pulling Wrestling/JohnCena out of the ring during a {{tag team}} match also involving Wrestling/ChrisJericho and Wrestling/RandyOrton. Wrestling/{{Kane}} once got disqualified ''for giving John Cena a big boot''. At some point the rules of wrestling as far as WWE is concerned became "It is illegal to try and stop John Cena from winning a match."

* A major part of the background in ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''. Almost every book published by the Black Library is Imperial propaganda, and the fluff included in each faction's codex casts them in a good light (with the exception of Chaos and Tyranids, both of which are mostly from Imperial point of view as well, probably because the stars of those books are insane or all devouring cosmic horrors).

* Discussed in "Stepsisters' Lament," a song from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical adaptation of ''Literature/{{Cinderella}}''. The stepsisters, watching Cinderella dance with the Prince, point out that conventionally pretty but mysterious girls--"frail and fluffy beauties" who are "obviously unusual"--always end up with happy endings and the support of the audience, while "solid," "usual" women like them are inevitably left with nothing. It's worth noting that these stepsisters, while somewhat mean, have a softer, kinder side. Their final fates vary depending on the version -- in the original 1957 TV production and its stage adaptation they and their mother are at the wedding celebrating Cinderella's good fortune, while in the 1997 TV movie remake they all end up cast out of the palace. In the 2013 Broadway version one of the sisters is part of the BetaCouple so "Stepsisters' Lament" is sung only by the other, backed by the chorus. [[spoiler: This sister and the stepmother make Heel-Face Turns at the end, as Cinderella's forgiveness moves them.]]

** In the larger ''VisualNovel/ShinzaBanshoSeries'' of which ''Dies Irae'' is part of there is Mirtha, The First Heaven, who took this trope to its logical conclusion by making it into a universal law. She believed herself to be the ultimate justice and thus, anyone who followed her where good and anyone else was evil. Thus her law made this a universal and objective truth. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the era under her rule was just one big ForeverWar between the two sides of Good and Evil, [[EvilVersusEvil neither of which really fit the labels]].
* This is an in-universe plot point in ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''; the main criteria for a human becoming a Heroic Spirit is they are the hero of their own story. Even if they are truly rotten, and thus rightfully remembered as an antagonist in their legend, if they were a "hero" by that definition their soul is stored in the Throne of Heroes rather than reincarnated. Originally the Grail System was designed to prevent such "Anti-Heroes" from being summoned in any role other than Assassin. After the Third Grail War this restriction was removed due to [[spoiler:the corruption of the Grail by Angra Mainyu]].

* This trope runs so rampant in the Website/GoAnimate "X Gets Grounded" videos, it would probably be easier to list grounded videos where this trope ''isn't'' in effect in some way. Generally speaking, though, if the main character of a grounded video is a designated troublemaker or a "baby show character" (i.e. WesternAnimation/{{Caillou}}) and does something horrible or stupid, this is portrayed as wrong and the troublemaker will get grounded. However, if a main character of a grounded video who ''isn't'' a troublemaker/baby show character does the same exact thing to a troublemaker/baby show character (whether in retaliation to a troublemaker's wrong-doings, as part of a [[TraumaCongaLine Punishment Day]], or even just because they don't like the troublemaker/baby show character), this is portrayed as justified or as a winning moment for the "good" character, who will subsequently be rewarded for stooping down to the troublemaker's level.

** Protagonist Rayne gets away with being insanely rude, selfish, insulting, etc. because, well, it's him. In earlier strips his friends would give back about as good as they got, but in more recent years Rayne is the only one allowed to look good in the end. The ''modus operandi'' of late involves Rayne doing something mean or selfish to his friends for 90% of the storyline, then taking the last 10% to do something that magically makes everyone forgive him, whether it's honestly nice or just him cleaning up the mess he got them into in the first place. Not helping matters at all is the fact that Rayne is pretty well an AuthorAvatar for Ryan Sohmer.
** One of the more extreme examples is when Rayne finds a homeless orphan and starts using him as an ill-defined personal assistant/slave/plaything, often verging on abuse at the very least. At one point, he gets called out on it. His reaction is one of indignation, and he points out how he is saving the kid from a life on the street, and how he is actually the child's legal guardian. The accuser (an attractive woman, of course) backs down, saying something to the effect "I'm sorry for assuming the worst". The comic (and the accuser) completely ignores/forgets that such behaviour towards someone entirely dependent on you is still very much abusive, and paying money for someone's living doesn't render their basic dignity moot. If anything, the boy is in no position to protest for fear that he might actually have nothing to eat if he gets kicked out. (Never mind that "I may treat you badly, but you'll be worse off without me" is a tactic used by '''real life abusers'''.) Arguably, switching from the usual ComedicSociopathy to a weak attempt at treating the situation realistic and justifying Rayne's behaviour makes it worse, by claiming the situation is a-OK rather than dismissing it as a comedic, unrealistic situation.

** Conversely, Redcloak's motivation for the inverted trope - Villain Protagonist Centered Immorality - stems from the realization that a band of roving paladins can use their Duty to eliminate all threats to Azure City to justify killing an entire nearby village of women and children who happen to have the unfortunate ability to connect to an evil god, even if they never intended to be the one person who could use it their entire lives. He uses ThenLetMeBeEvil to justify his crippling NeverMyFault character flaw and KickTheDog moments, which are clearly a combination of his own fault and the influence of his spiteful, neglectful god.

* Occasionally, a story on ''Website/NotAlwaysRight'' will feature an employee who clearly thinks they're the "good guy" of the story, when really they're worse than the customer they posted the story to complain about. [[UnreliableNarrator That's assuming these events actually happened, of course.]] This pops up on the sister sites as well; many stories posted to ''Website/NotAlwaysWorking'' are written by customers who mistreat employees but see themselves as the protagonist of the story. For example, [[https://notalwaysright.com/putting-a-dent-in-your-fun/63475/ someone pretends to be an irrational customer]] a la ''Not Always Right'' and then mocks the employee for not realizing it was only an act.

* Parodied in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzyUcXR05Z4 this video]]. Despite seen as people doing charity for good, the {{speedrun}}ners are blatantly doing things like stealing college degrees, killing their own parents, literally trying to kill themselves, and generally causing $1000's worth of damage, all to raise [[spoiler:only $25]] for an unnamed charity. There's even a narrator reassuring us that it's for charity.

---> '''Jeremy:''' Rousing speech time! Hey, one thing they forgot to do with this movie is give us a reason to care! This ain't [[Film/{{Braveheart}} William Wallace]] talking about their freedom and shit. This is a bunch of lawless pirates! Oh shit I guess I spoke to soon. So this ''is'' about their freedom? To loot and plunder? What the fuck are pirates in these movies anymore? [[EvilVersusEvil Just because the East India Company is evil doesn't make these assholes Robin Hood!]] (Ding!)

** As noted above, Wrestling/JohnCena runs into this ''a lot''. Over the course of nearly a decade and a half, Cena has piled up quite a list, which includes but is not limited to: hitting {{Wrestling/Batista}} with an [[FinishingMove Attitude Adjustment]] off the roof of a car and through a hole in the stage, after Batista begged him not to; viciously attacking Wrestling/{{Rusev|AndLana}} outside of any match, putting him in a submission hold and making him tap out ''and pass out'' just to get him and Lana to agree to a match at ''Wrestling/{{WrestleMania}} 31'', when doing something very similar to {{Wrestling/Edge}} was meant to be considered Wrestling/SethRollins' MoralEventHorizon; and challenging a worn-out Wrestling/ReyMysterioJr to a match for the WWE title on the same night Rey won it for the first and only time in his career (notable especially because Rey might be even more of a "perpetual face" than Cena), when both before and since this event Cena would often be first in line to take moral umbrage with anyone using Money in the Bank advantageously to become champion. This is one of the biggest criticisms of Cena, as he is shown doing things like this frequently, but it is almost never acknowledged and even then only by heels who are meant to be wrong.

* The Music/SteveMillerBand's "Take the Money and Run." A pair of young, possibly teenage protagonists rob and murder someone, then escape the police and flee to Mexico. Everything about the song acts like we should be rooting for them rather than the police detective who's trying to bring them in.

* Played straight in ''WesternAnimation/RalphBreaksTheInternet'', as in [[WesternAnimation/WreckItRalph the first film]], it's explicitly stated that game-jumping is bad and there are massive repercussions for Ralph when he temporarily abandons his game to get a medal proving he can be a good guy and the BigBad of the first movie did the same thing, causing [[spoiler: his game, ''Turbotime'' and the game he kept jumping into to be shut down for good]]. In the sequel, Vanellope wanting to abandon ''Sugar Rush'' and go to ''Slaughter Race'' [[UngratefulBastard because she's bored of winning all the time]] is framed like a natural part of her growing up and ''Ralph'' is the one who has to learn to let Vanellope go so she can do the thing he and [[spoiler: Turbo]] got vilified for in the first movie. Speaking of Ralph, him leaving his game ''again'' (albeit for a far less selfish motive than in the first movie) is treated as no big deal as Felix offers to cover his shift, despite Ralph being the most essential part of ''Fix-It Felix Jr.'' next to Felix himself, as opposed to Vanellope whom ''Sugar Rush'' could, and even used to, run perfectly fine without. It almost feels like "Going Turbo" isn't even a concept anymore, at least as far as the good guys are concerned.