Basic Trope: A character who foresees something bad happening is ignored.
- Straight: Cassie stumbles upon some evidence of a future crime. She turns it in to the cops, who tell her to buzz off.
- Exaggerated: Cassie finds a truly massive amount of evidence, enough to put anyone tangentially related to the crime behind bars for many, many years. The cops all ignore her.
- Downplayed: Cassie stumbles upon some evidence of a future crime. She turns it in to the cops, who tell her that while they would like to believe Cassie's good track record, they can't really do anything unless there's more evidence.
- Justified:
- Cassie has a rich history of Crying Wolf.
- Cassie shot the messenger.
- Cassie is Just a Kid.
- The police are corrupt.
- She has a criminal record.
- She doesn't have enough evidence.
- She has Cassandra's curse.
- Her story just sounds so weird enough that people reasonably don't believe it to be true.
- Cassie presents the evidence in the worst possible way, understandably making the police skeptical.
- Inverted:
- The police go straight to Cassie, taking even her most absurd lies at face value.
- Consummate Liar
- Subverted:
- The cops, after receiving the evidence, congratulate Cassie on a thorough investigation.
- What Cassie stumbled on is... not really that dangerous, and in fact is just that: a ludicrous story.
- Double Subverted: ...But they're still not going to do anything about it.
- Parodied:
- Cassie is a D.A. or some other job that policemen would normally listen to. However, they ignore her.
- Cassie points out a crime that is happening right in front of the police, but they still won't believe her.
- Zig Zagged:
- Cassie ends up triggering a station-wide argument over whether or not her story is worth investigating.
- Alternatively, continuing from Double Subverted, the cops that said they won't do anything about it are fired, and Cassie gets hired as a cop.
- Averted:
- The police decide to listen to Cassie thoroughly.
- Cassie, knowing no one would believe her anyway, decides to skip town instead before the bad stuff starts happening.
- Enforced: "We need some conflict, so let's make it to where the police don't listen to this smart kid!"
- Implied: Cassie walks into a police station. Minutes later, she walks back out with a despondent look on her face.
- Lampshaded: "Why are you ignoring me?!"
- Invoked:
- Libby walks up to Da Chief, who happens to be her father, and tells her that that Cassie girl isn't to be trusted.
- Cassie is aware of this trope applying to her and uses it when she makes a Sarcastic Confession.
- Exploited:
- The criminals are enjoying the Refuge in Audacity.
- Cassandra Gambit.
- Defied:
- Cassie forces the police to listen to her.
- Cassie realizes that the truth would be really outlandish if someone else were to tell it to her out of the blue, so she first collects solid evidence to back her story up before going to authorities.
- The police decides to at least send one or two people to check, as they knew Cassie generally had a good track record. It it's nothing, then all they wasted will be a couple of man-hours. It it's actually something, they'll know sooner than later. Either way, it's better safe than sorry.
- Discussed: "Shouldn't we listen to Cassie this time for once, just in case?" "Nah."
- Conversed: "Oh, look, now they're just going to ignore what she says."
- Deconstructed:
- Since no one listens to her, Cassie goes crazy and decides to stop helping. Many people that she would have saved will now die.
- Cassie gets herself in danger and/or killed when she tries to fix the problem herself, since she's just an otherwise ordinary person that the police were more equipped to handle. Furthermore, people start to lose faith in the police when they learn that they were given knowledge of the crime beforehand, but chose to do nothing.
- Reconstructed:
- She decides to do it on her own, or perhaps hire a private investigator. That way, it doesn't matter if people don't listen.
- After some time, people begin to find evidence supporting Cassie. They suspect Cassie was telling the truth. Later, someone stumbles across Evulz in the very act of plotting his crime, confirming Cassie's claims. Everyone apologizes to Cassie for not taking her seriously.
- Played For Laughs: Cassie warns the police someone will try to rob the bank. The police officer she talks to fervently denies that anybody would do that, all while the robbers are committing the act twenty feet behind him.
- Played For Drama: After the crime that Cassie predicted occurs, she gives a blistering "The Reason You Suck" Speech to everyone who wouldn't listen to her.
Why are you ignoring me? If you don't go back to Cassandra Truth, something bad will happen!
