Basic Trope: Either a boss demotes a worker by ripping the insignia off the worker's uniform or a worker quits by taking off the insignia themselves and giving it to the boss.
- Straight:
- Right after Bob quit his job, he turned in his badge.
- Mr. Boss fires Alice by removing her badge because she's lazy at her job.
- Exaggerated:
- Mr. Boss removes every single emblem and decoration, including buttons, off Alice's highly decorated uniform.
- Mr. Boss strips Alice completely naked.
- Downplayed: Mr. Boss tells Alice on a Friday afternoon to turn in her badge on Monday morning.
- Justified:
- Bob is wearing a valor medal he's not entitled to wear, so Mr. Boss removes it.
- Bob was Impersonating an Officer.
- Bob is fed up with his Bad Boss and wants to show it as emphatically as possible.
- Inverted:
- Alice is promoted, so she gets a new set of insignia pinned on.
- Alice is part of an elite order which has a tattooed insignia and their own unique armor. They leave her with just the insignia as a mark of shame.
- Subverted: Mr. Boss tugs on the insignia and tells Alice to take it off.
- Lieutenant Alice rips off her insignia, General Bob is shocked and thinks she is quitting before she clarifies that there is a sniper about and advises that he remove visible rank identifiers as a fellow high priority target. He quickly follows suit.
- Double Subverted: Then impatiently rips it off anyway.
- Parodied:
- When Mr. Boss removes Alice's badge, he accidentally also removes her shirt.
- When Mr. Boss removes Alice's badge, he accidentally also removes her shirt, trousers and underwear, leaving her nude.
- Mr. Boss strips Alice completely naked and forced to stand at attention in the courtyard for her ex colleagues to gawk and sneer at until the bus taking her home arrives.
- When Bob is dishonorably discharged from the Army, all uniform items, including the GI issue underwear, are forcibly removed.
- Mr. Boss struggles trying to pull off the incredibly well-attached insignia.
- Zig-Zagged:
- Alice and Mr. Boss take it in turns to try to remove her insignia.
- Bob has bad George Jetson Job Security and The Ghost General rescinds his discharge, so his commander tells him to put his insignia back on. Then he is discharged again, this time for good, and told to remove his insignia.
- Averted: Alice is asked to turn in her uniform instead.
- Enforced: It was Based on a True Story where Alice really did go through this for refusing to follow immoral orders.
- Lampshaded: ???
- Invoked:Mr. Boss: Where's your badge?Bob: Here in my pocket.Mr. Boss: Put it on.Bob: Okay.
- Exploited: Mr. Boss does it to have Bob killed, either in a mission or a suicide.
- Defied: Bob outright shoots Mr. Boss and puts all the badges onto himself.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed:
- Mr. Boss frequently ripping off the badges from Bob is the driving force of Bob betraying the company.
- Mr. Boss rips off Alice's badges for her offenses...which, as it turns out, she was completely innocent of. As a result, everyone else loses respect for Mr. Boss and his authority collapses.
- Reconstructed: However, Mr. Boss has a legitimate reason for demoting Bob, even if it means Bob would turn against him.
- Implied: Alice and Bob's former uniforms are hanging up somewhere and have loose threads where the insignia used to be.
Back to Insignia Rip-Off Ritual
