Apathy Killed the Cat

"Apathy is death."
—YOUR ENTIRE PARTY, Knights of the Old Republic 2

Remember that old saying, "Curiosity killed the cat"? It seems that many fictional characters have taken it so close to heart that it may as well be a pacemaker.

Whenever "normals" from the real world end up discovering they're in a Speculative Fiction and/or Supernatural world, they inevitably run afoul of some Applied Phlebotinum, Negative Space Wedgie or magical phenomenon... and show no curiosity as to how it works, why it's there, or any other thing that people would immediately wonder about.

Of course, in some cases, the characters are afraid of messing with something they don't understand. Most of the time though, they don't even ask the simplest questions that anyone would be dying to know; or, you know, might lead to them not screwing up things further. The plot cannot have that, however.

Specific instances of this outside technology also include alien societies in general, ignoring their discoveries in science, philosophy, art, culture in general, even local flora and fauna unless it's the deadly carnivorous plant variety. This often leads to (or results from) a Planet of Hats treatment. Other possibilities include the discovery of an afterlife (Judeo-Christian or not), the existence of souls and ghosts, and in general discovering a partial or full answer to one of the deep questions humanity currently wrestles with.

Then again, Curiosity Killed the Cast.

Compare Misapplied Phlebotinum and Forgotten Phlebotinum. See also It's Probably Nothing, Somebody Else's Problem, and of course Dying Like Animals, which this attitude often supports. Contrast Achievements in Ignorance, for when this is neccessary.

Examples of Apathy Killed the Cat include:

Anime and Manga

  • Naruto. God, Naruto! I mean, a world filled with jutsu and he cares to learn only THREE (Toad Summoning, Rasengan and Shadow Clones) and improve himself in only the second. Not to mention the fact that, despite seeing the power of Elemental-based Ninjutsu (He even nagged Kakashi to teach him Chidori after Naruto saw Sasuke use it), he never actually cares on learning his own elemental power until Kakashi mentioned it, 2 years in as a ninja. Averted completely by Sasuke, who creates, uses, and recreates his own jutsu many times and tries to explore them to their full potential. Given, he is the analytical, cold, and rational type, while Naruto is the emotional, soft, and irrational type who just kicks and goes with the trail the ball makes. Made worse if you note that he is host to a demon that gives him virtually unlimited chakra, so one would expect him to explore it, rather than acknowledge and ignore it afterwards.
    • Or maybe he doesn't care to explore his chakra because he's afraid of succumbing to his Super-Powered Evil Side.
    • Played straight with Sakura, pre- and post-time skip. After all her talk on wanting to get stronger and stop depending on others, she barely has any jutsu to fight, with her Super Strength being her ONLY battle-useful strength. Mind you, this is a world with people who can blow you away from blocks away with fireballs, wind gushes, earthquakes, thunderstorms and other such destructive powers, and Sakura, being the apprentice of one of the greatest ninjas of this world, cares only for medic skills and Super-strength. Like, even Kabuto, the Evil Medic Ninja, is more effective in the battlefield than she is. Which is probably why she ends up as a Damsel in Distress whenever she tries to do anything important.
      • Being less effective than Kabuto isn't any disgrace; he turns out to be one of the deadliest fighters in the entire manga. The problem is that Sakura has barely learned enough to be better than the average nameless fodder ninja. For example, she's the only one of the main trio who didn't bother to learn her Sannin master's summon jutsu.
  • Yeesh, Bleach. Honestly. Ichigo asks no specific questions on the afterlife at all.
    • It seems very obvious the afterlife is dedicated to destroying purifying giant monsters. How else would you expect it to work?
      • Or, you know, how one of them ate his mother. Now, given Rukia's explainations on Reincarnation; being eaten by Hollows doesn't destroy a soul (only Quincys did that) or else there would be an imbalance; so shouldn't he at least ask where she is? Is she trapped inside it? Is she a hollow now? Shouldn't he try to find out if she needs purifying? Did he ever find out that his father killed the Hollow that killed his mother? ...yet all Ichigo ever does regarding Rukia's explanations is criticize her art skills.
        • It's pretty obvious what happens when a soul is eaten by a Hollow: that soul becomes part of the Hollow, at least until the Hollow is purified. That's explained very clearly, so Ichigo knows exactly what happened to his mother's soul.
          • Sure. It was eaten by the Grand Fisher that got away from him. Has he ever asked what happened to it? (It got killed by his father, but he doesn't know that.)
          • And whom would he ask? His father had Obfuscating Stupidity going, so he wouldn't answer. He dropped it, but right now the are kind of busy with all that battle against the Big Bad.
      • He's been seeing ghosts so long he's a little blase about the afterlife?
    • He's actually got a little semi Catch Phrase running on this theme, in call-and-response with his sword: "Retreat and you will age. Hesitate and you will die."
  • Haibane Renmei- Rakka is born (from an egg) into a strange isolated prison town ruled by creepy, aloof clerics, sprouts wings, is given a halo that mysteriously hovers on her head, has to obey arbitrary rules (e.g. she can only buy used items) and doesn't question any of it.
    • She does have Laser-Guided Amnesia about her previous existence, so it's quite possible that she has no way of knowing if any of this is weird or not. This isn't so strange considering that the entire setting of Haibane Renmei is a rip-off / homage to the dream world in Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, by Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami, which the protagonist doesn't question much either. (The bird skeleton in the well is another homage / rip-off of a scene from another of his books, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by the way.)
    • In addition to all of the Haibane having amnesia about their previous existences, the series spends the first five episodes largely just to introduce the setting and characters. And then it turns out that the older Haibane have their own predicament to worry about (and they certainly aren't apathetic about it) and have varying degrees of acceptance of their environment.
    • She's got no one to ask. The only people who might know something are the Toga and the Communicator, but neither of them really responds to questioning.
    • Probably the best justification is that all of the Haibane ended up there because they were all too naive, rudderless, timid, resigned or depressed before their deaths to enter the true afterlife. Fatalism might very well be their Hathalo.
  • Potemayo - Nobody seems to be too interested in the bigger questions about Potemayo and Guchuko- what they are, where they come from, and why they're appearing in people's refrigerators.
  • In To LOVE-Ru, approximately no one (other than Rito, on occasion) seems to care that aliens exist and show up on Earth on a regular basis, or that Lala's father apparently rules the entire galaxy, including Earth, and that he's threatened to destroy it.
  • Contestants in Gantz are so self-absorbed that they never ask critical survival questions, even internally, never note anything potentially threatening until it's on top of them, even if they've already seen how lethal it can be.
  • Magic! Flying whales! Demons! See also: vampires, robot girls, immortality, Petting Zoo People, telepathy, time dilation, the entire magical world itself and more. However, don't ask what the hell is going on. You might get turned into an ermine or something. Chisame is the only character to show the slightest interest... by running away from the answer. Welcome to Mahou Sensei Negima everyone!
    • And of course, everybody ends up finding out about it anyway.
    • The other major exception is Haruna; when she finds out about magic, she threatens to torture her three best friends for not telling her sooner.
      • She sort of did.
  • Haruhi Suzumiya: Kyon. Just....holy crap, Kyon. In less than a week he discovers the existence of aliens, espers, time travellers, and (according to one theory) God and it annoys him and he avoids any and all exploration of the ramifications unless forced otherwise by The End of the World as We Know It. And even then, he only does the minimum that he has to.
    • Kyon is almost unbelievably lazy. Also an Unreliable Narrator. It's still ridiculous though.
    • To be fair, he does ask questions. It's just that he either gets no answer (Mikuru), an answer that doesn't make sense (Koizumi and Yuki), or an answer that makes sense that has 'unreliable!' written all over it (Koizumi and Mikuru, Yuki claims it). Oh, and the anti SOS Brigade puts all three together.
      • Also, he is extraordinarily genre savvy, to the point that when he pass the first couple of reveals, his reaction goes from mild surprise/annoyance to "checked, checked, checked". In fact, his ability to cope with the increasingly weird situations is (in Itsuke's opinion) what makes him special.
  • Completely averted in Death Note. The reason Light is able to get away with so much crap (and drive the whole plot) is because he does ask all the questions. He figures out things that even the Shinigami didn't know, despite having centuries to learn. And, unfortunately, uses this knowledge to kill tens to hundreds of thousands of people.
    • He even asked the afterlife question we all thought he was ignoring all along, they just don't show us until he's dying. Unfortunately, he's a lot less pleased with the thought of The Nothing After Death while bleeding out than he was while plotting world domination in his bedroom.
      • And the fact that he elected to ignore Ryuk's promise to kill him eventually is more denial than apathy.
  • Revolutionary Girl Utena is all about people not asking basic questions about what's actually going on. No matter how fanciful or surreal, after the initial shock, people just accept the nonsense as all a part of the "power to revolutionize the world." Granted, the answers really are near impossible to attract without being told directly (the audience has the benefit of flashback) and most of it was just theatrical shenanigans but even the lead asks a variety of questions in the very beginning and then just gives up trying, establishing the status quo of the episodes. To her credit, Utena realizes this near the very end of the series and tearfully regrets it because that kind of indifferent behavior (towards Anthy, especially) was exactly what she had been criticizing about the other duelists.


Comic Books

  • A rule in most comic book universes where the Fantasy Kitchen Sink is prevalent and anyone can be Pals with Jesus. This is particularly bad in DC where much of Vertigo Comics deals with the supernatural. You'd think that there'd be at least some intersection between characters who know about the afterlife and characters willing to say "I have positive proof that Christianity is false, because the afterlife you get is based on what you believe".
    • Problem is, as soon as you bring up the issue of whether any or all religions (especially the Judeo-Christian ones) are false, you run a real risk of losing sales.
      • Fridge Brilliance here: if your afterlife is based on your beliefs, then Christianity IS true... along with every major and minor religion, cult, credence, for their respective believers.
    • It's canon in D.C. comics that the after life is pretty much whatever the heck you think it is. That is, until hell comes to Earth and starts eating people, which happens about twice a year.
    • The Sandman's Death (who has become DC's official Anthropomorphic Personification of Death, give or take a few badly attempted retcons) has mentioned in some sources that she has no idea where people go after she takes them.
    • One DC comic character was questioned as to how he could be an atheist in a world where divinity is manifestedly real. His reply indicated that in a world with Superman, wizards, and multidimensional alien invasions, the mere presence of something supernatural did not prove it came from an all-powerful divinity.
      • This gets worse. During Crisis on Infinite Earths (and on sporadic occasions thereafter) a large number of Earth's heroes were actually present at Creation, and saw a great big hand creating the universe. Heck, the Guardians of the Universe have it on tape. Whether the universe was created by an intelligent being simply shouldn't be in question.
        • That proves little to nothing, giving that any mortal can go A God Am I once in a while... Hell, even Hal Jordan/Parallax recreated the Universe once, and he was just a human.
    • Therefore there is plenty to believe, very little to revere.


Film

  • Roger Ebert got into an amusing rant about the film Over Her Dead Body and the fact that no one seemed to consider the staggering theological implications a real live ghost (or should that be a real dead ghost) would mean.
  • Indiana Jones has been presented with absolute incontrovertible proof of the truth of the Old Testament and the New Testament (and arguably the Bhagavad Gita). This seems to have had absolutely no effect on his lifestyle, career or (dis)belief in the supernatural.
    • Dr. Jones doesn't disbelieve in the supernatural, he just wouldn't be accepting each cheap explanation at face value, because c'mon, he is an archaeologist, and if he goes around accepting that each of world's marvels has been constructed by a god/alien/mage/ etc, he could just make short of it and retire.
  • Christopher Lloyd's character in Suburban Commando seems to have no questions or comments when it is revealed that his tenant is an alien bounty hunter. The most he registers is mild annoyance at the fact that he WAS FROZEN TODAY!
  • In the movie Wanted it didn't seem to faze anyone that a loom has been ordering the deaths of otherwise unknown people by producing names via medieval binary. One would think that upon learning of this a normal person would want to see if a name was always the result or if it was just a random side effect of a constantly operating loom. Not to mention check to see if the people named always did something wrong or if the all knowing loom had just gotten lucky once.
    • The movie does address this by saying that the man who killed Fox's father and scarred her was on the loom's hit list and wasn't killed. The loom apparently also realized that Morgan Freeman's character was putting "innocent" names on the list to use the Brotherhood as hired assassins, and puts all of the Brotherhood's names on the list. So it apparently is magical and sentient. Which makes one wonder why it deemed them all guilty when it was just one man manipulating them and Fox was so astoundingly loyal to it she put a (single) bullet through all of their heads? The whole mess is really one of those things you shouldn't think of too hard, considering the quality of the rest of the movie.
      • Perhaps the loom decided that the Order should no longer exist because it was too powerful and too easily misused.
    • This is not just binary, but ASCII: At the middle of the movie, when Sloan shows the loom and then his first contract to Wesley, we can read part of the target's name, that is [...] R (01010010 = 82), T (01010100 = 84), D (01000100 = 68), E (01000101 = 69), A (01000001 = 65), N (01001110 = 78), etc.. The fact this encoding was used by medieval monks centuries before its standardisation in 1963 leads to amusing conclusions...
  • Both Bruce Almighty and Evan Almighty run into this trope where the protagonist meets God and, even once they are convinced it is really God, do not ask any of the questions one might expect (in fact they ask very few questions of God at all).
    • When they do, though, God tends to be a little evasive, so they might just figure that it's pointless to try.
  • Teen Wolf: Nobody seems to be too interested in the existence of werewolves other than how well they can play high school basketball.


Literature

  • In Bernard Werber's Thanathonauts series, the world promptly forgets about the initially worldshaking discovery that there is indeed an afterlife (and that it is quite bureaucratic at that). In another series, little is expounded upon the ramification of a porcine direct relationships to humans.
  • Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling tried to save herself from having to create a coherent magic system by having her viewpoint character tune out whenever theory is mentioned. It worked in the sense that she was able to avoid talking much about how magic actually works, but it does give the reader the impression that Harry is an incredibly apathetic child about this magical world that he suddenly finds himself living in. Also, she tends to delve back into magical theory towards the end, with the plot of the last book hinging on obscure magical theory.
    • There is also the question about why there would need to be a whole aspect of "muggle studies" when a decent number of wizards and witches were born to muggle families. If there are muggle-born magic users, wouldn't they be able to just bring them a book on how cars work?
    • It's even WORSE when Rowling hand waves things from the muggle side. We keep being told that humans just naturally refuse to think about magic at all because they are afraid that they would be labeled as crazy. But in the real world people look for UFOs and ghosts all the time and don't seem too worried. In fact we know that the leaders of the world ARE told about wizards, but are simply too apathetic to think about this potential threat/power source.
    • It seems to be an accepted fact in the wizarding world that talented young children can do magic without using a wand, but once they are given their wand and commence their magical education this ability ceases. No real explanation is given, and the useful possibilities are never explored.
      • Word of God says that this is because children do magic spontaneously and have very little control over it. The wand gives them more control.
    • We're told that the Weasleys are poor; REPEATEDLY and that they tend to be made fun of because of their threadbare clothing. Spells can turn cats into teacups...there are classes for turning cats into teacups; but nothing for tailoring?
  • In Orson Scott Card's novel Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus society possesses a time viewer that is cheap enough for graduate students working on research projects to use. However, it is mentioned numerous times that Christianity, Islam, and other religions still exist, even though proving or disproving those religion's veracity would be the first thing most people would use a time viewer for. And there isn't a rule against investigating religion or anything, because one character made a name for himself by investigating the historical events inspiring the legend of Noah.
    • All religious revelations are conveniently ambiguous. (Except Columbus's, which is definitely mundane.) That still leaves the question of miracles, though.
  • To quote from Fred Clark's series on Left Behind:

Here you have God appearing center stage. A direct, incontrovertible divine miracle witnessed by millions. Absolute, doubt-destroying, skeptic-shattering proof of the existence of God. There's freaking divine flame in the sky. Yet it produces nary a ripple of wonder, awe or spiritual searching. Alone among the millions who witnessed this event, Buck Williams is slightly prompted to be more "spiritually attuned." The people in this novel are not human.

  • The whole premise for several of the works of José Saramago -- Death with Interruptions and The Stone Raft come to mind—is to avert this trope: an extremely simple but fantastic setup is provided (death stops operating in a country; the Iberian Peninsula splits off at the French-Spanish border and begins to sail aimlessly around the North Atlantic) and the whole rest of the story analyzes the sociological upheaval it causes.
  • Twilight has Bella's father's motto; "need to know basis". He probably figures out about vampires, but doesn't want details. Seeing how the Venturi would kill him if he knew it makes a lot of sense. It wouldn't take much to figure out that vampires probably would be lethal to humans in the know.
  • Averted and played straight several times in an early Star Trek: Voyager novel. When Neelix leads Voyager to a planet full of wrecked ships (needed for critical spare parts), Torres and Kim promptly began an exhaustive examination of the one powered vessel. Neelix, not caring and deciding that he is useless, decides to take a nap. This sends the ship (a passenger time machine) back in time. Later, we meet an operative who's job is to scare away any "Planet-Hoppers" (The term this people use to refer to the "crazy" races that use dangerous space travel instead of safe time travel) from the abandoned eras of the planet. His main weapon is strange events that the intruders don't care to investigate properly.
  • In The Otherworld humans occasionally witness surreal incidents and do nothing. In one such instance the witnesses were, in all fairness, stoned, but in Bitten Elena's fiance watches her turn into a wolf and when she questions him on it later he claims he'd passed out long before she arived and transformed.
    • Of course, it's also stated that he was viciously attacked, beaten, left on the floor like trash, and watched as another man was also brutally beaten, then drugged and dragged off for trying to defend him. Then his fiance came back, freaked out, and changed into a wolf—something that is considered in-universe to be extreme Body Horror. When Elena presses him for the truth, he snaps at her, and it's made clear that he did see everything; he's just dealing with it by telling himself it wasn't real.
  • Wolfram Von Eschenbach's Parzival fails to achieve the Holy Grail even though it's meant for him because he follows advice to not be too curious and doesn't ask about the Fisher King's injury. The poem is based on Chretien de Troyes' unfinished poem, in which Perceval's failure to ask about an entire procession of miraculous oddities because he's trying to be proper also results in the continued languishing of the Fisher King and his kingdom.
  • Arguably the main reason HP Lovecraft's The Thing on the Doorstep ends in tragedy—the villain's plot to take over the body of Edward Derby plays out over months if not years with obvious warning signs of what's going on, yet despite the narrator and the victim being ostensibly best friends neither actually does anything until it's finally way too late.


Live Action TV

  • In Doctor Who, various companions fail to question changing history, whereas some address the problems from the start (Barbara Wright). "Why do we need to save history? I come from the present, so I know history went right," or "If you can't change history, why could you save me? I'm history to you!"
    • This was lampshaded in the 1975 story "Pyramids of Mars". When they're in 1911, Sarah Jane asks the Doctor why they need to save the future when they've already been in 1980 and it didn't need saving. The Doctor answers the question by taking the TARDIS to 1980 and showing her that the Earth has been destroyed. Only if they set things right back in 1911 can the "real" 1980 be restored.
      • Sarah Jane was also the first to ask about the absence of language barriers. Bizarrely, this tips the Doctor off that something is wrong with her.
        • Questions like this have been asked since the 1960s (see The Aztecs and The Reign of Terror).
        • In the new (2005–present) Doctor Who series, the Doctor's companion Rose Tyler asks about the language issue, and the Doctor finally offers a Plot Device explains that the living heart of the Tardis translates alien speech telepathically for the travelers journeying in it, even when they're away from the Tardis for a while.
    • At least there's one odd thing they never fail to remark on: "It's bigger on the inside!"
      • And the Doctor gets rather miffed when people don't remark on it.
      • This is actually lampshaded more often than not since Martha (Where the 10th doctor mouthed the words as she spoke them). Donna is more pissed off that the Doctor "kidnapped" her, and although Amy's eyes definitely said it, all she actually said was "I'm in my nightie!".
        • Lets not forget that Rory never said it, leading to some nasty comments from the Doctor.
  • In The Lost Room, a character gets a key that takes him into a hotel room that exists outside time and space. Walking out of the room takes you to any place in the world with a door. Why, why, why didn't he start experimenting with things like climbing out the window to see what happens? This is especially glaring considering that other characters do things like put things in the room, then close and open the door (making them disappear) and check if the room has electricity and running water (it does).
    • A room that can eat things (such as the protaganist's daughter) is not something you want to poke at quite so much.
  • Star Trek is famous for not asking the alien cultures they visit about local laws and rules. Especially when they send crew members on shore leave, you would think it might be smart to ask about local laws and taboos just to make sure no one accidentally violates them.
    • The notorious PrimeDirective would give them an incentive to avoid asking those questions. The less they know about the culture, the less intentional their interference in it becomes, and the better excuse they can make to a court-martial.
    • In one episode, the planet they visit has is described as being like Garden of Eden and they arrive to see it as nice, relaxed and so are naturally put off guard about the possibility that there may be randomly applied death penalty for even a tiny infractions (though they do find out about it through casual conversation, albeit a little too late). In retrospect, it does make the initial comparison double sided.
      • A little? Most of the time, the blunders the crews make would not have happened in the first place if the aliens had said 'by the way, we punish doing this by death - tell your people not to do this, okay?' And the fact that they NEVER make exceptions for ignorance of the local laws because these are offworlds... One example involves B'Elanna Torres of Star Trek: Voyager nearly suffering neurological damage because they were removing violent THOUGHTS, which are illegal on this planet (their hat being telepathy). B'Elanna is part KLINGON - violence is the brim on their hat.
    • There are multiple explanations for this, and they vary depending on the specific show you are watching. Kirk's Enterprise was an exploratory vessel, most of the places they were going were not explored or had very little know about them. The red shirts sacrificed are the people the (future) history books will cite when they say "Planet 56793-d: Breathable atmosphere, rocky terrain, salt vampires". Picard's Enterprise had this as less of an excuse, though they did encounter new territories and cultures. The ones they were even mildly familiar with were probably cataloged in the ship's computer, and served as intercom messages before departing. Even so, laws change, and the files may be dated. And regardless of which ship you are on, the fact remains that if you go to a foreign country/planet, and break a law, "I didn't know" doesn't tend to work. Still doesn't explain why they don't ask for a copy of all local laws and have a computer program flag any capital punishment or where the punishment is two or more orders of magnitude harsher than Federation average.
  • Just about everyone in The Prisoner apart from the main character. "Questions are a burden to others, answers a prison for ourselves". Brrr. They do have some incentive to avoid questions, what with the giant suffocating bubble lying in the wings.
  • Lost. Oh dear god, Lost. There are far too many individual instances to count but the most Egregious is in season 6 when the cast fails to ask Faux-Locke any questions once they find out he's the smoke monster. Jin and Jack (plus Sayid and Claire) are the only ones who get something of a pass here. Jin is clearly outwardly terrified of him and Jack asks but he dodges the question.
  • In Warehouse 13, Pete hasn't read the Warehouse's manual, and even the characters who have are still finding out new things about the Warehouse- they were surprised to find an entire Bed and Breakfast inside, for example. Justified in that the Warehouse is impossibly large (stretching on farther than the eye can see) and Artie doesn't like to share information.


Tabletop Games

  • Almost a policy in Warhammer 40,000, where you most likely don't want to know. "Only the awkward question; only the foolish ask twice."
    • Well yeah; in a setting where "Thought begets Heresy, Heresy begets Retribution" and "Blessed is the mind too small for doubt" it's probably best not to ask a lot of questions.
      • "An Open mind is a like a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded." When anything from a book to ink can lead to an Eldritch Abomination showing up, people quickly learn to stop asking.
      • And one of the creeds of the Officio Assassinorum: "Ask not for whom they seek, lest it be thyself."
      • "Knowledge is Power. Do not waste it on the masses."
      • Those that do question are often... unstable. "There is music at the limits of my hearing. There are daemons at the edge of my vision. There are ghosts in the machine."


Video Games

  • One of the arguments that Marche is a Villain Protagonist in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance is that he automatically assumes Ivalice is a fake world without asking a single question to test that idea.
  • It's used to an extent in Persona 4 to pull out a surprise twist, should the player start questioning why he (the protagonist) managed to obtain his persona-summoning abilities WITHOUT having to face his inner demons.
  • In Half Life 2, Gordon Freeman seems perfectly happy to join up with the first faction he meets without asking simple questions like "Who are you fighting?", "Why?" or "Do you have any kind of plan?". Or saying anything at all, actually. There is a bit of a Hand Wave in that said faction does consist largely of his former coworkers and friends.
    • The other faction also tries to kill Gordon before he's made any decisions at all. Which would tend to streamline the decision-making process tremendously.
    • The G-Man's comments at the end hint Gordon might be without free will, contracted to the faction he fought for by the G-Man.
      • Seeing how none of the other characters seem to mind it might also be that Gordon does speak, but the devs left what he said to the players imagination for immersion purposes.
        • It's worth mentioning that his lack of speech has been lampshaded at least once.
  • In Silent Hill 2, when James sees his first monster, he promptly whacks it with a board and wonders briefly what it is. After that, he never questions anything else about the decidedly messed up town he's in. Justified because he's completely nuts.
    • Henry of Silent Hill 4 suffers from the same lack of reflection on the circumstances he's facing. Could be justified in that he's been through extended isolation, sleep deprivation and malnourishment to the point that he could be prone to and apathetic to hallucination, but this is simply a projection of conditions only alluded to in the beginning, and never touched on through the story. Heck, the first person he runs into, a woman named Vasquez(?), assumes it's all a weird dream and comes on to Henry. Most of the other people who end up in the Other Side have similar confused and muted reactions, if at all, as the crack head doesn't seem to even see the monsters.
    • Subverted in Silent Hill 3. Like those before her, Heather assumes the monsters to be either demons or illusions, only to be rebuffed with the famous line: "Monsters? They look like monsters to you?" Of course, Vincent is a Manipulative Bastard of a psychiatrist/cult leader, so he may just be trying to mess with her.
  • In Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, No character on Mother Base cared what happened to Paz after she fell out of the Metal Gear you built. Except an army of players, of course...
  • Notably averted in Final Fantasy X ... Tidus' questions about things that everyone knows or takes for granted is what begins to truly convince Lulu that he's not from Spira.
    • It also serves as an excellent example of why this trope exists, since most players found Tidus' constant questions to be incredibly annoying.
      • Most Players. Perhaps that in itself is a real life example of this trope?
  • Justified in Rule of Rose. After being given a storybook by a strange boy, Jennifer inexplicably finds herself aboard a ghostly airship filled with nasty children. You'd think that she'd ask someone where she is and what's going, but between the Unreliable Narrator and the Thirty Mind Screw Pileup, the player only gets a secondhand view of Jennifer's character. Hell, since the game is likely a hallucination, a dream or the afterlife, it's also possible Jennifer knows the answers already.


Web Comics


Western Animation


Real Life

  • College students often do this during lectures, including ones where they are outright told that half of the material is lies.
  • Some self-professed members of political parties, religions, scientific communities, etc. barely know anything about their or the opposing party's beliefs, and are basically the reason the Strawman Political exists.
  • We live in a society filled with amazing technology of great power and sophistication. Use of these machines grants capabilities unimagined by our ancestors. Yet many people have no interest in learning how these things work, despite the fact that the answers are often listed in easy to understand guides available to anybody who wants them.
    • On the downside, documentation usually sucks. Too often it's rushed out by someone so familiar with the product that they're completely out of touch with how most people would want to use it.
  • Bill O'Reilly's approach to science is akin to closing one's eyes, sticking one's fingers in one's ears and going "La la la la la I can't hear you la la la!".
  • Former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi:
  • A trope is you! Do you know how your computer works? You might know it involves ones and zeros, maybe some HTML and Java, but that's it.
    • Averted! The majority who use computers are curious enough to gather a lay understanding, but believe it or not, just like automotive mechanics and the physics of the combustion engine, knowing the details are not crucial to your survival! Not knowing won't kill any cats.
      • Unless you get captured and interrogated by a Serial Killer who really, really likes computers and really, really hates cats.
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