History Recap / AmericanDadS6E16BullyForSteve

* BrokenAesop: Reconstructed for laughs. For all of Stan's talk about wanting Steve to stand up for himself and learn to fight his own battles, [[{{Hypocrite}} Stan himself never learned to stand up to a bully]] he had at Steve's age, a Greek boy named Stelio Kontos -- Stan lucked out on having to deal with Stelio because the Kontos family ended up moving away. Even as an adult (''and'' working as a top field agent for the CIA), Stan's still unable to fight back against Stelio after Steve, realizing that he'll never be able to just avoid his dad, hires Stelio to beat up Stan until he agrees to stop bullying Steve.

* AnAesop: Wanting to toughen someone up doesn't give you a right to abuse them.

* VicariouslyAmbitious: As with many cases, Stan seems to be living his childhood traumas through Steve by making him gain a backbone against his bully. Steve puts him on the spot about it by bringing in Stan's own bully to put an end to it, who Stan utterly fails to stand up against.

-->'''Stan:''' You can't have Roger dress you up just to avoid me.
-->'''Steve:''' Do you have any idea how long makeup took?! I was in the chair at 4am!
* LaserGuidedKarma: Steve gets back at Stan by paying his childhood bully Stelio Kontos to beat the ever-loving crap out of him as revenge for all the abuse the latter gave his son.

* {{Hypocrite}}: For all Stan pressures Steve about standing up for himself, he never stood up to his bully, nonchalantly revealing he just moved away. Steve isn't even remotely surprised anymore.

* BrokenAesop: Reconstructed for laughs. For all of Stan's talk about wanting Steve to stand up for himself and learn to fight his own battles, [[{{Hypocrite}} Stan himself never learned to stand up to a bully]] he had at Steve's age, a Greek boy named Stelio Kontos--Stan lucked out on having to deal with Stelio because the Kontos family ended up moving away. Even as an adult (''and'' working as a top field agent for the CIA), Stan's still unable to fight back against Stelio after Steve, realizing that he'll never be able to just avoid his dad, hires Stelio to beat up Stan until he agrees to stop bullying Steve.

* HypocriticalHumor: For all Stan pressures Steve about standing up for himself, he never stood up to his bully, nonchalantly revealing he just moved away. Steve isn't even remotely surprised anymore.

* FightingBackIsWrong: Played with and subverted, where Steve is having bully troubles and Francine tells him that fighting back is not the answer...until she finds out that said bully is her own husband.

** It's also justified to a degree; Steve is utterly ''incapable'' of fighting back the conventional way, as Francine's training proved, so even if he did try standing up for himself, he'd end up more hurt than the offender. This is why he plays to another option, and has Stelio kick Stan's ass until he agrees to back off.

* ParentSexualitySquick: Stan and later Francine have zero qualms making double entendres about having sex with each other to Steve, much to his chagrin.