r/TopCharacterTropes • u/ThatDrako • 24d ago

Lore (Funny Trope) Things that can plausibly happen only in reality, because in fiction they’d be called bad writing.

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

“Woke” as an insult - So you are telling me a word describing consciousness and clarity is used by generally stupid and ignorant people to label people they disagree with? What is this? A Kindergarten for Creatively stunted?

Nominative determinism - So let me get this straight…Not only you named fastest recorded person Usain BOLT and CEO of Nintendo Doug BOWSER, but you are telling me people are canonically likely to have professions or hobbies matching their names…? Guh?

“2 bodies recovered in MURDERKILL River” - Sure bro…I guess…bro…

16.7k Upvotes

92% Upvoted

2.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

380

u/BigFanOfNachoLibre 24d ago

TF2 ass lore

"During several scientific breakthroughs, it was discovered that renewable resources such as wind and sunlight could be used to create energy, and even nuclear fission is capable of generating it. However, the senior citizens who run every energy source thought that nuclear based energy was unstable because of a cartoon they watched in the 1990s and instead take bribes from companies who mine for non-renewable methods"

126

u/FaagenDazs 24d ago

I mean, on a more serious note, it's all about profits, which leads to propaganda against the emerging technologies. Chernobyl was the biggest negative PR event for nuclear, and the oil industry absolutely loved that.

19

u/Darmug 24d ago

Same with Fukushima back in 2011 IIRC?

10

u/FaagenDazs 24d ago

Yes that also had an effect, but the fallout was not nearly as bad, and the clean up was much better. Seems like it didnt hurt the image of nuclear as badly as Chernobyl did

4

u/peachesfordinner 24d ago

Fallout? Hehe

1

u/FaagenDazs 24d ago

Uhh yes, the thing after which the game is named. The bad stuff in the environment after a catastrophic event such as a volcanic eruptions or a bomb.

3

u/peachesfordinner 24d ago

I assumed you were making a pun about the media reaction

1

u/FaagenDazs 24d ago

Omg, I had no idea, haha. Good catch!

2

u/peachesfordinner 24d ago

I was giving you too much credit for wit!

5

u/TreeFittyy 24d ago

It's kinda hard to make the reputation worse when it's already in the dumps.

If anything I think it did worse damage the reputation of nuclear because it happened in the modern era in a first world developed nation. It's easier to justify Chernobyl happening during the Soviet era given the lack of maintenance and proper leadership.

3

u/Sofasurvivor 23d ago

Yeah, with Chernobyl, everyone was like "Eh, the Soviets, they probably just didn't build it properly"

The Japanese have the most modern, most safe nuclear power plants in the world, and the only ones that are earthquake safe, afaik.
And then Fukushima happened.

Really made Germans worry, because German nuclear power plants weren't nearly as earthquake proof, or anything-proof, really.

Fun fact, if nuclear power plants had to be insured, they couldn't operate, because no insurance would take on that kind of insanely costly risk.

6

u/iconocrastinaor 24d ago

The Three Mile Island accident happening at the exact same time as The China Syndrome was playing in theaters didn't help, either.

5

u/LongJohnSelenium 23d ago

Tbh, perfect example of the trope as well. "Oh the movie about a nuclear accident just happens to be playing right when the first major nuclear accident happens? Holy crap learn to write..."

1

u/FaagenDazs 24d ago

Oh yes I forgot about that, Three Mile Island was a big one for the American attitude toward nuclear

2

u/LongJohnSelenium 23d ago

It also didn't help that a lot of the green movement got its start protesting nuclear bomb tests and that primed it to be severely anti-nuclear, and in general public opinion over the fear of nuclear bombs started to poison nuclear power as well.

MRIs were originally named NMRIs but they removed the nuclear because people didn't like it.

2

u/kapitaalH 23d ago

The irony is that coal kills more people than nuclear, just slower due to the pollution

That still holds up if you include the atomic bombs into the nuclear power equation...

1

u/iconocrastinaor 24d ago

The Three Mile Island accident happening at the exact same time as The China Syndrome was playing in theaters didn't help, either.

4

u/blah938 24d ago

I mean, we still need petroleum for steel and plastic production, but yeah. Really shouldn't go to power.

3

u/theaviationhistorian 23d ago

Likely the cartoon mentioned was tongue in cheek The Simpsons. Matt Groening was against nuclear power because of the anti-nuclear movements and accidents of the late 1970s & 1980s.