History Main / StupidNeutral

* Explored in the ''VideoGame/MegaManX'' and ''VideoGame/MegaManZero'' series. X's ultimate goal is to bring about mutual peace between humans and reploids, which is regularly derided as foolishly utopian by his adversaries, who insist that humans and reploids can never coexist as equals. Indeed, by the ''Zero'' series, a copy of X is made without the century of ethics testing that X himself underwent, and he almost immediately picks a side, creating a utopia for humans while brutally oppressing reploids. [[spoiler: In the end, X's dream of mutual peace is finally realized, though unfortunately X himself doesn't live long enough to see it.]]

* Invoked and justified by King Dheginsea of Goldoa in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemPathOfRadiance'' and ''VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn''. Many centuries ago, he formed a covenant with the goddess Ashera to prevent the continent of Tellius from descending into war, lest she pass judgement on humanity. To this end, he maintains a policy of absolute isolationism, refusing to get involved in other countries affairs even when megalomaniacal lunatics attempt to conquer the world. That way, he can claim that Tellius is not at war because Goldoa is neutral.

* This is the MO of the Rilmani of ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons''. They're anthropomorphic personifications of the Balance, and will take steps to ensure that balance.

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* When Christmastime comes, it's not uncommon for children or ManChild characters in cartoons to start (insincerely) reforming their naughty ways so that Santa Claus will bring them presents.
** Calvin of ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' fame tended to spend the Christmas season torturing himself by ''forcing'' himself to be good - or "good", since Calvin only wanted to act as moral as absolutely necessary and without genuinely good intentions to back up superficially "nice" actions. As a result, he would "unselfishly" let Hobbes read one of his comic books or "politely" agree to eat his mother's disgusting cooking, all the while sarcastically ranting about how "good" he's being and that Santa had better be happy with that. Another time, when he was abstaining from throwing snowballs at Susie Derkins, she hit ''him'' in the face with a ball, causing him to conclude that [[PayEvilUntoEvil now he was justified in hitting]] ''[[PayEvilUntoEvil her]]'' [[PayEvilUntoEvil in the face with a ball]]. When Hobbes pointed out that a ''truly'' moral person would forgive her and not retaliate, Calvin tells him that he doesn't want to be ''that'' good.
** ComicStrip/{{Garfield}}, too, tried to make up for being a {{Jerkass}} in December by doing really phony "good" things, such as kissing Jon. When Jon admonished him for waiting until the last minute to reform so that Santa would bring presents instead of being good ''all year'', Garfield thought that was unfair: he's doing his best, dammit!
** Garfield also once, when being scolded by Jon for eating all the cookies, [[TheGrovel knelt down and put his face in his hands and loudly sobbed "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"]] - and then, when Jon wasn't looking, [[BreakingTheFourthWall acknowledged the audience]] with a tearless face and a huge sick grin, indicating [[{{Hypocrite}} he hadn't meant a word of what he'd said]].
-->'''Garfield:''' It's called remorse without guilt!
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* PeterPan, when fighting the Indians would sometimes switch sides if he felt the Lost Boys were winning too easily. (Of course, this was probably more to [[RuleOfFun make the games last for as long as possible]] than not being able to decide whom to sympathize with.) However he never did this with the pirates.

* ''VideoGame/AncientDomainsOfMystery'' has a central theme of LawVsChaos that's really GoodVsEvil because ChaosIsEvil. Chaos as a cosmic power is unambiguously evil and destructive; even a Chaotic player character's default goal is to stop its invasion to prevent TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. This trope appears in a song of the Mad Minstrel that gives the backstory of the Eternal Guardian: a noble king told his brother to stop defeating the [[LegionsOfHell forces of Chaos]] for the time being, because he was a supporter of Balance and all this Chaos-fighting was getting too Lawful.

* ''VideoGame/AncientDomainsOfMystery'' has a central theme of LawVsChaos that's really GoodVsEvil because ChaosIsEvil. Chaos as a cosmic power is unambiguously evil and destructive; even a Chaotic character's default goal is to stop its invasion to prevent TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. This trope appears in a song of the Mad Minstrel that gives the backstory of the Eternal Guardian: a noble king told his brother to stop defeating the [[LegionsOfHell forces of Chaos]] for now, because he was a supporter of Balance and all this Chaos-fighting was getting too Lawful.

* ''VideoGame/AncientDomainsOfMystery'' has a central theme of LawVsChaos that's really GoodVsEvil because ChaosIsEvil. Chaos as a cosmic power is unambiguously evil and destructive. This trope appears in a song of the Mad Minstrel that gives the backstory of the Eternal Guardian: a noble king told his brother to stop defeating the [[LegionsOfHell forces of Chaos]] for now, because he was a supporter of Balance and all this Chaos-fighting was getting too Lawful.

* ''VideoGame/AncientDomainsOfMystery'' has a central theme of LawVsChaos that's really GoodVsEvil because ChaosIsEvil. This trope appears in a song of the Mad Minstrel that gives the backstory of the Eternal Guardian: a noble king told his brother to stop defeating the [[LegionsOfHell forces of Chaos]] for now, because he was a supporter of Balance and all this Chaos-fighting was getting too Lawful.

* ''VideoGame/AncientDomainsOfMystery'' has a central theme of LawVsChaos that's really GoodVsEvil because ChaosIsEvil. This trope appears in a song of the Mad Minstrel that gives the backstory of the Eternal Guardian: a noble king told his brother to stop defeating the forces of Chaos for now, because he was a supporter of Balance and all this Chaos-fighting was getting too Lawful.

** Caleb the Healer in ''Literature/DarthBane'' was willing to help heal soldiers on either side of the Jedi-Sith War,but refuses to help either the Sith Lords OR the Jedi as he blames both of them for the fighting...even though the Jedi are benevolent peacekeepers reacting to the Siths OPEN attempt at intergalactic domination, and while neither side has clean hands the latter is still far more blatantly bloodthirsty and power hungry than the former and far more prone to committing atrocities. He may be a {{Downplayed}} trope somewhat since the Jedi and Sith war has certain particular "quirks" about it - some Jedi are self-styled Lords who rule planets and lead armies, the leader of the Sith is himself a former Jedi, the war was but the latest in a century of violent conflicts- but these aren't really brought up in story and the Sith are still clearly the villains and pretty open about their evil intentions either way. His daughter is arguably just as bad as she tried to find and kill Bane as she (semi-wrongly) blames him for [[spoiler: killing Caleb]] but also has little regard for the Jedi Order, and thinks that she is just as qualified or deserving as anyone else to bringing Bane to justice, in the end [[spoiler: just getting a ton of her own people and herself killed at the hands of the most dangerous and evil people in the galaxy, achieving little other than seriously annoying the two surviving Sith]].

* This seems to be the concept behind a majority of the neutral route characters of ''[[NexusWar Nexus Clash]]''. One learns to stop trusting "neutral" characters rather quickly after the counter of Neutral Myrmidons that have senselessly slaughtered your Good character in the night hits double digits.

* Played with in the literal Batman Cold Opening of ''Franchise/{{Batman}}: The Court of Owls''. Two-Face, Killer Croc, Mr. Freeze, Black Mask and several other Arkham Asylum inmates have Batman cornered on their own turf (a corrupt GCPD guard let them out) and are prepared to kill him...when just in the nick of time TheJoker (who has said in the past that he doesn't ''really'' want Batman to die, since he's [[ItAmusedMe just so much fun to fight against]]) unexpectedly joins forces with Batman ("Lets get to the punch line!") and physically assaults various fellow members of the RoguesGallery, much to their disgust ("Joker! You turncoat [[CurseCutShort son of a-!]]"). However, this proves to be a subversion, because [[spoiler: in this case it was really Nightwing wearing a computer-generated Joker mask]].

'''Neutral President:''' If I don't survive, tell my wife: "{{Hello}}"

** Calvin of ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' fame tended to spend the Christmas season torturing himself by ''forcing'' himself to be good - or "good", since Calvin only wanted to act as moral as absolutely necessary and without genuinely good intentions to back up superficially "nice" actions. As a result, he would "unselfishly" let Hobbes read one of his comic books or "politely" agree to eat his mother's disgusting cooking, all the while sarcastically ranting about how "good" he's being and that Santa had better be happy with that. Another time, when he was abstaining from throwing snowballs at Susie Derkins, she hit ''him'' in the face with a ball, causing him to conclude that [[PayEvilUntoEvil now he was justified in hitting]] ''[[PayEvilUntoEvil her]]'' [[PayEvilUntoEvil in the face with a ball]]. When Hobbes pointed out that a ''truly'' moral person would just walk away without retailiating, Calvin tells him that he doesn't want to be ''that'' good.

* Garfield also once, when being scolded by Jon for eating all the cookies, [[TheGrovel knelt down and put his face in his hands and loudly sobbed "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"]] - and then, when Jon wasn't looking, [[BreakingTheFourthWall acknowledged the audience]] with a tearless face and a huge sick grin, indicating [[{{Hypocrite}} he hadn't meant a word of what he'd said]].

* Grand Cleric Elthina of ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'' is a strange case in that she is portrayed quite sympathetically. It is her express job to control the templars, who at this point are out of control and openly abusing their power, and yet such is her desire to maintain the status quo (believing, almost literally, that StatusQuoIsGod) that she does ''nothing'' about it, other than some vague talk about making a "compromise", would ever really explaining or specifying what exactly that would entail, making her leadership come across as HeadInTheSandManagement. The consequences of her decisions--or rather lack thereof--are not pretty.

* Grand Cleric Elthina of ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'' is a strange case in that she is portrayed quite sympathetically. It is her express job to control the templars, who at this point are out of control and openly abusing their power, and yet such is her desire to maintain the status quo (believing, almost literally, that StatusQuoIsGod) that she does ''nothing'' about it. The consequences of her decisions--or rather lack thereof--are not pretty.

[[folder:Film]]
* ''Franchise/StarWars'': This is what convinces the Jedi Council once and for all that Chancellor Palpatine isn't all he seems to be. After Count Dooku is slain and General Grievous is chased back to the Outer Rim after nearly capturing Coruscant, it would make sense to let the Separatists realize they have been beaten and wait for their surrender; but Palpatine insists on pursuing the Separatists to the Rim, apparently to keep the conflict going by provoking the Separatists into fighting back. This causes Mace Windu to suspect that Palpatine is [[RunningBothSides secretly manipulating every facet of the Clone Wars]] - which, of course, he is.
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* OlderThanPrint: Early on in Dante's ''Literature/DivineComedy'', he meets the Uncommitted, who refused to choose good or evil in life, and as a punishment are forced to eternally chase after a banner while being stung by wasps.

** {{Garfield}}, too, tried to make up for being a {{Jerkass}} in December by doing really phony "good" things, such as kissing Jon. When Jon admonished him for waiting until the last minute to reform so that Santa would bring presents instead of being good ''all year'', Garfield thought that was unfair: he's doing his best, dammit!

* This sometimes pops up in ''SurvivalOfTheFittest'' with non-players who refuse to attack ''anyone'' under any circumstances (at least one person has died because they refused to defend themselves).
* Arguably the staff at [[WhateleyUniverse Whateley Academy]] are bordering on this. While their desire to provide a safe haven for the superpowered children of both heroes and villains is understandable, their execution of their policy leaves much to be desired-- turning a blind eye to some of the criminal and even outright vicious behavior of many "ethically alternative" students, hiring staff of criminal and even murderous backgrounds, welcoming an EldritchAbomination prophesied to destroy all humanity as a student.....

* In ''StarWarsLegacy'' the Fel Empire would count if you don't consider them really evil. Though the new Empire has good intentions, they though it was a good idea to side with the ObviouslyEvil Sith who have a long history of ChronicBackstabbingDisorder, and were responsible for the death of billions and don't mind killing billions more to achieve their goals, one of them is backstabbing the Empire.

* Red Mage of ''Webcomic/EightBitTheater'' has this attitude, at first, to the point of refusing to use a spell that would change his alignment even to save his own life.

'''Neutral President:''' If I don't survive, tell my wife: "{{Hello}}."

-->'''Zapp Brannigan:''' I hate these filthy Neutrals, Kiff! With enemies, you know where you stand, but with neutrals? Who knows. It ''sickens'' me. [...] What makes a man turn Neutral? Lust for gold? Power? Or were you just born with a heart full of ''neutrality?!''