History Main / TheComplainerIsAlwaysWrong

* Disney's ''SnowWhite'' has Grumpy who is forced to conform to the others' belief that Snow White is a good person. She is, but Grumpy was actually right about her leading the queen right to them. No one mentions this little fact, though.
** Not even Grumpy - does he say "I told you so" when they find out the queen is at their house? No, he says "We gotta save her!" (meaning Snow White).
** Of course not, at that point, one has to assume saving Snow White is infinitely more important than getting a little dig in. Grumpy would have been even more of a jerkass if he said "I told you so".

--->(The doors of the Great Hall burst open and a wall of water crashes through, knocking the Vikings off their feet. There is little doubt that the whole of Hy-Brasil is sinking see a street go down, a statue sink and then we Cut to a close-up of King Arnulf. He is standing at the top of the Forum steps addressing a crowd of anxious citizens. They are keeping surprisingly good order considering they are already standing ankle-deep in water, and the whole town is rapidly sinking around them.)
--->KING ARNULF: Now, I know what some of you must be thinking... the day has come.... we're all going down, etc. etc. But let's get away from the fantasy and look at the ''facts''. ''Fact One'' - The threat of total destruction has kept the peace for one thousand years. ''Fact Two'' - The chances of it failing now are therefore one in three hundred and sixty-five thousand. ''Fact Three''..."
--->(By this time the water is up to people's knees, and several have crowded onto the lower steps to avoid getting wet.)
--->KING ARNULF: "''Fact Three'' - Our safety regulations are the most rigorous in the world. We are all nice to each other, we never rub each other up the wrong way or contradict each other, do we?"
--->CROWD: "No."
--->(Rumble. The buildings sink and masonry falls.)
--->CITIZEN: "We... er... ''do'' seem to be going down quite fast, Your Majesty - not trying to contradict you, course."
--->KING ARNULF: "No, of course you're not, citizen. But let's stick to the facts. There has ''never'' been a safer, more certain way of keeping the peace. So whatever's happening, you can rest assured, Hy-Brasil is ''not'' sinking. Repeat, ''not'' sinking."

* Another MontyPython example, from TheLifeOfBrian...

* Inverted in ''StarWars''. Yoda was right for complaining about Luke rushing off to face Vader, Yoda was right to tell Anakin to rejoice his loved ones' return to the Force, Han was right to expect a trap...
** [[JerkSue Because I am always right this is. Take this for granted you should ...yes.]]

* Roger Manning in ''Tom Corbett: SpaceCadet'' is the complainer of his PowerTrio, and almost always wrong, especially in the earlier books.

* ''AllegrasWindow'' had an episode like this. The class was asked what their favorite vegetable was, and they all answered "blue zutabaga," (a fictional vegetable that often featured in the show) except Allegra, who had never had one before, and said that her favorite vegetable was the carrot. Over the course of the episode, Allegra was urged by everyone she knew to try blue zutabagas, until the end, when she finally tasted one, and decided it was, in fact, her favorite vegetable.

[[AC:Real Life]]
* Anyone who has ''ever'' worked in a customer service position would tell you this.
** You are not a customer until you purchase something. In the meanwhile, no loitering.
*** Actually we will lick your feet and kiss your ass to get you to purchase something. If that doesn't work for an hour or so, then we will ask you to leave.
* Overlaps with AdultsAreUseless in terms of bullying - since they will ''always'' assume you simply can't deal with being treated like shit by students or even other adults. Unless that is, you actually ''do'' meet one who cares.
* Internet forums. That is all.
** Often inverted, though. If you're not complaining with everyone else, you're '''WRONG!'''
*** It's not wrong, in that case - it's {{WhiteKnight}}ing, because you ''dare'' defend something from criticism, even if the criticism is of a WallBanger quality.
* This troper found out the hard way that pointing out the irresponsibility people show in some of the videos (like when a guy pays his young son five bucks to electrocute himself on an invisible fence) gets you being labeled as "boring" or "a liberal". Erm...yeah
* This holds true for any animal other than a human. Chances are, if your flock/herd/school/whatever you call a group of your species is suddenly agitated and quickly moving in one direction, failure to follow suit ''will'' result in being devoured. Except for the times they're heading for the slaughter-house. We'd tell you to use your best judgment, except your probably a cow.

* [[DevilSurvivor Poor Yuzu]]. All she wants is to escape the hellhole that the locked-down Yamanote Circle has become, what with all the demons and [[YourDaysAreNumbered the Death Clock]] and [[BreakTheCutie cutie-breaking horrors]]. She tried [[RefusalOfTheCall refusing the call]], but nobody would let her -- [[IJustWantToBeNormal she just wants her life back]]! But, if you actually ''try'' this... [[spoiler: You either cause humanity to fail their [[SecretTestOfCharacter test]] and lose their free will, or, by defeating everyone trying to ''stop'' your escape, inadvertently allow demons to escape and usher in a CrapsackWorld.]] She just can't win...
** This troper thinks this is less 'the complainer is always wrong' and more 'the complainer is just being kind of selfish'.
*** '''Kind of'''? It's established nearly from the beginning that everyone in the lockdown will die in a matter of days and the heroes are the only ones with the ability and will to change the future. "Getting out of there" entails abandoning thousands of people to certain death in an attempt to save yourself. That's not just ''kind of'' selfish -- the fact that Yuzu is probably too scared and confused to realize the true ramifications of it and can be convinced not to is the only thing that keeps it out of CompleteMonster or MoralEventHorizon territory.

* ''{{The Busy World of Richard Scarry}}'' (based on the books [[InCaseYouForgotWhoWroteIt of, uh, Richard Scarry]]) has the brothers Pig Will and Pig Won't, who somehow manage to embody this Aesop using only two people. As their names suggest, one agrees to ''every'' request or offer, and the other refuses every offer. No matter what their giggly hippo babysitter asks them to do, Pig Won't's refusal ends up making him miserable... somehow. Even when it's a simple preference not to play a certain game. One wonders how, exactly, Pig Will would cope with being so "agreeable"/mentally pliable in the outside world, without the protection of a benign authority figure.
** In the book this was based off Pig Won't would '''''always''''' say "I won't", without even thinking about it. So one day when their father asks who wants to go with him to visit the fire station, Pig Won't declares "I won't". At the fire station, Pig Will gets to play with the dalmatian, wear a fire suit, play with the fire hose (with adult supervision), and it all ends with an all-you-can-eat hot fudge sundae orgy! When Pig Won't sees all the fun Pig Will had, he immediately becomes Pig Me Too. The moral's supposed to be: "Don't just blindly disobey your folks, because you might miss out on some pretty cool stuff!", but reeks more of "Obey all orders without question, and you'll get a treat! You know, a ''treat'', like a dog gets for not shitting on the carpet!". When Pig Me Too enters the real world and stops getting treats for obeying, he's going to feel like a dumbass.
* Subverted in ''{{Transformers}}''. Gears complains about '''everything''' but the other Autobots actually like having him around because they find his complaints amusing and his behavior never leads him to trouble. In fact, the one time he was content and helpful it was because the Decepticons were controlling him.
** Played straight with Starscream, whose constant complaints about Megatron's leadership often gave the Autobots an opening for victory. The complainer is always wrong even when the group is evil.

[[quoteright:300:[[ICarly http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/FreddieICarly_4989.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:300:Sometimes not going with the group will result in being beaten with a Tennis Racket.]]

->''"Oh, we are the Buddy Bears, we always get along\\
Each day, we do a little dance and sing a little song\\
If you ever disagree, it means that you are wrong\\
Oh, we are the Buddy Bears, we always get along!"''
-->'''-- Buddy Bears theme song, ''{{Garfield and Friends}}'''''

** The ''intended'' Aesop of that episode was likely "[[GreenEggsAndHam don't be afraid to try new foods]]," and the classroom scene was probably to emphasize how good everyone thought this vegetable was, so why still insist you won't like it? Good point, [[BrokenAesop bad approach]].

* An episode of BarneyTheDinosaur had each of the children wanting to do something ''different'': when the question of "What shall '''WE''' do today?" came up one wanted to swing, one wanted to listen to music, one wanted to paint a picture, and so on. Let each child do what he or she liked? Unthinkable. No, instead we'll '''Take Turns''' -- we'll ALL get on the swings, then we'll ALL paint pictures, then we'll ALL listen to music, because it's wrong and impossible to do something or even want to do it unless we ALL do it. Because what '''you''' want to do is meaningless unless '''WE''' want to do it.

* This is intentionally subverted by ''Blue Man Group'' in their shows. Despite the total uniformity in appearance between the Blue Men, there's an undercurrent of nonconformity dwelling beneath the surface and occasionally breaching for air. In their pantomime skits there's one Blue Man who does something different than the other two; that's why there are three, it's the minimum number you need to have an in-group and a dissenter. In most skits, it's the one doing something odd that gets the rest of the group to change.

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<<|StockAesops|>>
<<|ExampleAsAThesis|>>

** Really most of the time Jimmy is always right and will always be the one to solve the problem, [[TheJorEl but no one ever trusts him]] because [[InsufferableGenius he's such a jerk about it]] and half of the problems were caused by him in the first place.

* The most annoying thing about TheSistersGrimm books is that the main character embodies this trope by the ton. Sabrina says "I don't think we should believe this daft-acting old woman who claims to be our grandma and believes fairy tales are real." Yeah well, She's wrong and her little sister is right. Sabrina says "You know, maybe we shouldn't hang out with a guy who's losing control over the BigBad Wolf that posesses him." That may sound sensible, [[spoiler: and she does end up getting possessed by the BigBad Wolf herself]] but so far as her grandmother and sister are concerned, she's being the bitch to end all bitches. Even something that ought to be sensible, like "I don't think my little sister should be trusted with really powerful magic just yet," results in Sabrina being treated like she's an idiot who can't see that her little sister's is all grown-up. At the age of seven. Sometimes Sabrina is genuinely wrong, because she has lots of trust issues and makes bad calls. However, sometimes Sabrina seems to be wrong just because sensible behaviour has been flipped on its back as part of a conspiracy to ensure that she always is.

* This holds true for any animal other than a human. Chances are, if your flock/herd/school/whatever you call a group of your species is suddenly agitated and quickly moving in one direction, failure to follow suit ''will'' result in being devoured.

* Parodied in comic strips when it comes to family vacations, since the complainer is often in the ''majority''. Basically, the father alone chooses where the family goes on their trip, everyone else is forced to endure a horrible vacation, and then they let the father have it at the end. ''FoxTrot'' and ''{{Calvin and Hobbes}}'' were the leaders in this.

This is a surprisingly common [[AnAesop theme]] in children's shows, especially in the 1980s when MoralGuardians (in the USA) promoted it as the primary "pro-social" moral. The essence, as summed up in [[http://www.povonline.com/cols/COL145.htm this article by Mark Evanier]], is this: ''the group is always right; TheComplainerIsAlwaysWrong''. Thus, [[WarpedAesop you should always agree]] with your friends and go along with whatever they want to do without argument -- unless it has to do with [[DrugsAreBad drugs]], of course. In extreme cases, ThePowerOfFriendship can even be contingent on making the holdout agree with the majority. The problems with mindless conformity encapsulated in the JumpOffABridgeRebuttal never come up, since, you know, everyone jumping off a bridge together is ''social'' and LonersAreFreaks.

* Parodied heavily with the ShowWithinAShow "The Buddy Bears" from ''{{Garfield and Friends}}''; obviously, the page quote comes from this. Not coincidentally, the head writer of ''{{Garfield and Friends}}'' was Mark Evanier. One episode featured Garfield, sick of having to deal with them, [[AppleOfDiscord manipulate them into a situation where they COULDN'T agree]]: [[spoiler:pizza toppings]].

** The best part about the Buddy Bears? According to [[http://www.newsfromme.com/archives/2006_12_11.html#012563 another part]] of the site linked to at the top of the page, the writer who had to write the ''Dungeons and Dragons'' episodes with this trope enforced on them, wrote the Buddy Bears to skewer this trope.

** Though the series as a whole tends to have a general theme of "Jimmy is always right and will always be the one to solve the problem." It takes special episodes for other characters to even have significant roles in solving a conflict. Part of the reason [[TheJorEl everyone always thinks Jimmy is wrong]] is because he is a complete {{Jerkass}}.
* In the JusticeLeague episode "Panic in the Sky", {{Batman}} was the only one who refused to surrender himself to the authorities. If he didn't go to confront Amanda Waller, the rest of the League would still be imprisoned and Luthor would have completed the powerful and immortal android he was going to transfer his consciousness to and make himself a living god.

* Poor {{Inuyasha}} can't get a break at all. Every time he says something isn't right or distrusts people like Koga (wuth good reason) he gets SAT and his "friends" laugh or call him stupid. Some friends!
** On an added note, regardless of how petty his disagreement is (in one filler, he refuses to eat curry, which was established early in the series that he despises curry for its spiciness) he will still get just as much of a sitting and group nagging as if he had done something severely wrong (in that same filler, it was apparently all his fault for hating curry, and he was nagged into taking responsbility...even though he was the one slammed into the ground - much the same treatment he receives any time he is "supposedly" cheating on Kagome). Made even worse when he usually has a point to his argument: in earlier series he was more than comfortable in killing anyone who was willing to attack them, although he was always "wrong" as Kagome (and anyone else) would think it's worth trying to spare the person if they're human. Considering this is the Feudal Era of Japan, which is reported to be one of the most horrendeous wars Japan had experience, killing anyone trying to kill you would be LOGICAL. Of course, sparing these people led to someone getting injured (when a toad demon takes over a lord, sparing him allowed the demon enough time to stab a one-time character and to eat the souls of a number of females trapped in eggs) or said person would die from their own greed due to a {{KarmicDeath}} (when they versed the ink-painter, although he was spared from being killed, he still died by offering his own blood to the ink). This sends [[FamilyUnfriendlyAesop a particular bad message]] when you realise Inuyasha is the half-breed in the series who suffers from ''discrimination'' for being born ''different'' from all the pure-breds in the series, and that his friends (while they accept him as for what he was born) are pure humans - and pure demons if you're counting in Shippou and Kirara - making Inuyasha again an "outsider" of his own group of friends.
* Much akin to the Inuyasha example, this trope seemed to become a running gag in ''{{Sonic X}}'', a recurring situation would come in which Knuckles would object to a team mission plan, usually leading the gang to use peer pressure and goad his ego and bravery until he gave in (just for {{Comedic Sociopathy}} humor, even normally sweet characters like [[{{Moe}} Cream]] or unrelated background ones would join in bullying the poor guy). This was only worsened by the fact that a lot of times he turned out to be right to doubt their plans (like the idea of gambling a chaos emerald in a baseball game that Eggman surely wouldn't cheat in) yet oddly Knuckles rarely ever called them out on it. Also let to {{Moral Dissonance}} since the gang also spent a lot of time explaining to Knuckles how he shouldn't constant fall for Eggman manipulating or tricking him into working for him.

[[quoteright:300:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/FreddieICarly_4989.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:[[ICarly Sometimes not going with the group will result in being beaten with a Tennis Racket.]]]]

* Members of the Tea Party Movement in the United States have clearly stated-- since ''2006'' that they are sick of being taxed by a government that insists on using their funds for frivolous expenses. Result? They are accused of racism and "taking food from the mouths of children." Someone needs to explain to me how a belief that I should keep more than 65% of my paycheck makes me a racist because I'm a little puzzled about it.
** Well it doesn't help that many believe that the tea party moment [[http://www.theyoungturks.com/story/2010/3/31/0218/31644/Diary/Tea-Party-Hypocrisy is seen as very partisan towards Republicans and that many tea partiers didn't complain about Bush's mistakes, but are all on Obama's mistakes]] YourMileageMayVary on that though.
** Even if the above was true, partisan towards one political party does NOT mean racist. After all, this played out before during the Clinton push for Universal Health Care.
*** The "taking food from children" thing is because some of the things they call frivolous other people call important. As for the racism part, I've got no idea.
* The anti-war protesters got it worse. What does it mean when you oppose sending brave men and women into a battle for what you to believe to be an unjust cause, taking attention away from finding the man responsible for the deaths of 3000 countrymen? Apparently it means you HATE AMERICA.

* Although, part of it probably also had something to do with encouraging children to be [[LonersAreFreaks sociable]].