http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Glurge

This is based on opinion. Please don't list it on a work's trope example list.

SF Debris on the on the Star Trek: Voyager episode " Real Life "It makes you cry — but it puts a gun to your head to make you do it."

Advertisement:

Glurge is the catch-all term for "inspirational" tales which purport to offer uplifting and timeless truths but — for various reasons — are just a bit too hard to swallow. (The word "glurge" was initially coined by a reader of Snopes.com and derives from the sound of someone throwing up).

These stories are presented as modern-day parables, meant to touch hearts and change minds. Unfortunately, they do so by simplifying their message to the point of complete uselessness to any reader who thinks about it seriously. All shades of nuance between good and evil are wholly overlooked in the rush to present a universe in which everything happens for a satisfying reason, meaning that more valuable lessons about hard work, understanding, personal growth and sacrifice are left by the wayside.

"Glurge" is easier to recognize than to describe. This being a super-trope, it typically involves some combination of the following:

Advertisement:

Tropes Are Tools: a work can use any number of these tropes without being Glurge. The hallmarks of Glurge are 1) a questionable message 2) conveyed through a manipulative delivery, which is 3) meant to arouse strong emotions in the reader but 4) fails to withstand scrutiny afterwards (though the reader is supposed to be so stirred that looking at the message dispassionately seems cold-hearted or downright amoral).

Not to be confused with Anvilicious or Tastes Like Diabetes, though those are common features of Glurge. See also Unfortunate Implications, which has more to do with subtext (and isn't clearly stated at the end). Glurge is often caused by Values Dissonance, as things that seem heartwarming and uplifting according to the values of one time might seem disturbing and offensive in another. Oscar Bait often has similarities with Glurge. Believe it or not, some people have the urge for this trope and are Glurge Addicts.

Examples:

open/close all folders

Advertising

There was an ad promoting Proposition 8 (a law which banned gay marriage in California) featuring a cute, little blond girl playing with Barbie dolls. While the ad seemed sweet on the surface, advocates for gay rights would see this as a way of using children (who don't really understand what it is they're doing) to promote homophobia.

The Values.com advertising campaign has verged into saccharine territory. The biggest offender is a 2015 ad centered on a footrace for handicapped children; the first-place runner trips mid-race, the second-place runner stops to help him up, and then all the other runners lock arms and skip across the finish line together.

In 2015, Apple launched a commercial starring Andra Day and Stevie Wonder singing his song "Someday at Christmas". Many found the ad beautiful... until they saw the Apple logo. "Maybe someday we'll live in a world that's peaceful where everyone is free from suffering, everyone will care for each other, and children no longer starve." says Apple, a company that uses slave labor to create their products and hoards an exorbitant amount of money that could help billions of people around the world by barely cutting into their net worth. Merry Christmas! "One warm December our hearts will see/A world where men are free Someday at Christmas we'll see a land/With no hungry children, no empty hands One happy morning people will share/A world where people care [...] Someday in a world where people are free"

Anime and Manga

Comic Books

Jack Chick and his notorious Chick Tracts are full of Glurge. However, they're even better examples of Scare 'Em Straight; pretty much anyone who rejects his very specific brand of Protestant Christianity has to answer to Giant Faceless God and his Pointing Finger of Doom.

Comic Strips

FoxTrot has an In-Universe example. One of Jason's The Family Circus strips involves the father sparing the black widow that fatally poisoned Dolly, saying, "at least one will live." Paige doesn't get it, and walks off, at which point Jason protests that it's supposed to be heartwarming.

Fan Works

The My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fic Bubbles gives a sad backstory to the Memetic Bystander Derpy Hooves, here portrayed as an Inspirationally Disadvantaged foal who has a loving father but an abusive mother. The wording of the story is childish and cutesy, focusing on Derpy's innocence and ignorance. The climax of Bubbles has Derpy's mother trying to poison her daughter . After that fails she abandons Derpy in the forest , where the story ends.

Films — Animation

Films — Live-Action

Literature

Live-Action TV

The Hallmark Channel has made a small industry out of Glurge-filled made-for-TV movies, known as A Hallmark Presentation. Most often these films are about someone who is overwhelmed with working in the big city, and are forced to live in a small town, which they end up finding more satisfying than their past life. Usually a ridiculously hot love interest drops right into their laps to help the process along, along with a few quirky but bland small town friends. The only real obstacles the protagonist has to overcome are getting off on the wrong foot with the love interest, or some petty rival, which in real life could be fixed by talking to the love interest like an adult and ignoring the rival. Everyone is just sort of cutesy and non-threatening overall. If the main character is a woman the movie will emphasize that starting a family is more fulfilling than having a job. Then December rolls around and Hallmark replaces their normal movies with special Christmas ones, which are the same except the overworked person is so overworked that they don't know the true meaning of Christmas, which they learn by moving to the small town and experiencing a little Christmas magic.

The Lone Gunmen: "Like Water for Octane" is a story about the Lone Gunmen struggling to expose the truth about a revolutionary engine which doesn't use petrol, only to decide that the world is too stupid to be trusted with the truth and that the trio should appoint themselves custodians of that technology. The episode seems entirely sincere in this belief, which makes it seem like the production team have somehow misunderstood their own characters. The Lone Gunmen collectively decide that the world does not need to be freed from its addiction to gasoline. Who wrote this episode, Jeremy Clarkson?

Viewers of 7th Heaven are force-fed Christian morals like a baby. The version of Christianity was the vague, feel-good sort that could best be described as "spiritual masturbation". You don't mention Jesus as anything more than a really hoopy dude, because people might feel bad, And That's Terrible.

The Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "Faith" is a look at the darker side of glurge: the Victim of the Week is a benefactor who planned to stop supporting a girl who suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease and survived abuse to write an inspiring book about her experiences. He planned to stop because he found out she isn't real, and her "foster parents" are con artists. And this is actually inspired by Anthony Godby Johnson , supposed "author" of A Rock and a Hard Place.

And this is actually inspired by MADtv's parody skit "Nice White Lady" subverts the "inspirational teacher saves inner-city students" story that shows up in so many movies by pointing out the racism underlying many such stories. MADtv's inspirational teacher doesn't do much to inspire her black, Latino and Asian students except make random speeches and utter platitudes — but she doesn't have to, because, as the title says, she's a nice white lady.

Touched by an Angel: Sending the message of God's love is awesome, but mixing it with this trope ain't exactly a good idea. The original unaired pilot was more cynical with one angel Monica calling humans "god's sport" and Tess smoking.

Parodied in The Middle. In the first Mother's Day episode, Sue Heck, who often tries out for things that she never makes it into, finds an inspirational fridge magnet with a dolphin flying a kite that says "Think of the thing you can not do and then do it." However, since her father Mike doesn't buy the fridge magnet for her (since Frankie may not have wanted it for Mother's Day), Sue steals it, which is basically contrary to her nature and makes her feel very guilty. So much for the inspirational message.

Music

Theatre

The Merchant of Venice: Much has been said about William Shakespeare's morality tale that pandered to the Christian audience of its time. The message of the play if taken at face value is that all Christians are good honest men who are the innocent victims of avaricious, bloodthirsty, downright evil Hand Rubbing Jews, but will ultimately triumph over them. Many modern interpretations however, paint the story as a deliberate Satire of the anti-semitic tales of the age; they argue that it appears utterly contrived when viewed critically, and it is often interpreted to be a harsh criticism of Christianity in disguise.

Video Games

Mass Effect 2 has a hilarious parody of glurgy chain e-mails called "IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU!" It involves a terminally-ill drell (desert-dwelling green-skinned humanoid) lying in the ocean, praying to the Enkindlers, and being told that it wasn't the water but the Enkindlers who were keeping him afloat, then waking to find himself cured. Bonus points for making no sense in the context of the Enkindler religion, which is essentially deist. Hell, the religion actually knows the Protheans are precursor aliens, it just chooses to revere them for uplifting the Hanar.

Visual Novels

In Dream Daddy, for fans who didn't consider Joseph's Good Ending a good ending in its own right, or an Esoteric Happy Ending at worst, it's almost always considered this instead. The fact that the devs gave an interview that explained they chose not to give Joseph a "Good Ending" because they didn't want to give the impression of breaking up marriages as a good thing really didn't help some fans see Joseph's Good Ending in any better terms.

Web Comics

Web Original

Web Videos

Western Animation

Real Life