Don't You Dare Pity Me! - TV Tropes

"Every last one of them... They have the gall to take pity on me... and they don't even know... how much they're hurtin' me by doin' it."

• In Marvel's Age of Apocalypse alternate history, Quicksilver learned that his father had been kidnapped by his worst enemy, his half-brother had vanished, and a virtual stranger had also been captured. He had to decide to rescue the stranger. When his girlfriend Storm tried to sympathize, he refused to talk with her because if he thought of what he was doing, he would not be able to do it.
• This is one of the biggest berserk buttons for the titular heroine of Albedo: Erma Felna EDF, as pitying her can enrage Erma to no end, a trait shared with the author of the comic.
• Captain America: When the Super Soldier Serum starts to break down in the early 90s, Cap refuses to tell the Avengers because he doesn't want them pitying him, overlooking the fact he's not the team leader at that time, and withholding a vital health concern out of pride, which can (and does) endanger him and the team.
• After DC Comics's Damage is seriously scarred in battle, he is resentful, bitter, belligerent, and unwilling to join any other heroes. The Justice Society of America manages to slowly integrate him into their team. Then his character takes a sudden turn for the sunnier when his scars are healed. Until his step-brother Atom-Smasher derides Damage for essentially being "Vanity Smurf with superpowers". Damage's face was healed by Gog, so Damage spread Gog's message, all the while showing off his "perfect face". This leads to a Kick the Dog moment when Damage destroys Atom-Smasher's (originally Damage' and A.S.'s father's) house full of priceless memories because he didn't want to be "linked to a dwarf". When Gog dies, Damage's face gets re-scarred and is this all over again.
• In Doctor Strange and Doctor Doom: Triumph and Torment, Doom takes advantage of a contest to put Strange in his debt and get his assistance in rescuing his mother's soul from Hell. While they are successful, Cynthia von Doom witnesses her son being a Manipulative Bastard, dresses him down, and escapes to Heaven without any chance of reconciliation. Strange, moved by pity, reaches out to Doom, but Doom coldly rebuffs him.
• Emmie & Friends: In Just Jaime, Jaime trips over a water bottle in homeroom before they're let out to go to Field Day. Maya runs over to help her out of impulse and Jaime — still sore about Maya just kicking her out of their Girl Posse on Celia's orders — snaps at her and says "Why should you care? Leave me alone!"
• Monet St. Croix has a case of this toward Sabretooth during Uncanny X-Men (2016). Creed is very protective of her, constantly coming to her aid and/or asking if she's all right. Monet isn't happily receptive. the exchange after Creed has just saved her from a possessed Morlock.

  Sabretooth: You all right?
  Monet: I'm fine. Of course, I'm fine. Don't forget who you're dealing with, Creed. What makes you think I needed you to come swooping in like a knight in tarnished armor?
  Sabretooth: Pheromones. I've known you long enough, frail. I know when you're afraid. There's no shame in it. Everyone—
  Callisto: I hate to interrupt whatever's going on between you two, but if you could get your heads in the game. They're escaping and taking more Morlocks with them.

• Guardians of the Galaxy: In the team's earliest days, Major Victory tended to be like this a lot, on account of being stuck in his spacesuit (otherwise he'd age to death in seconds). Not a good combination with four other guys also suffering from the severe trauma of seeing your species nearly wiped out, and it nearly leads to a brawl between Vance and Charlie-27 when he gets fed up with it.
• In one MAD "Lighter Side of" feature, a man politely rejects help carrying groceries to his car, saying he has to learn how to do some things on his own. It then turns out that he parked in a handicapped spot illegally, which he regrets because of the attention, and said this because he is not handicapped.
• Ms. Marvel (1977): In their second fight, Death-Bird reveals her berserker nature made her kill one of her sisters, something she actually feels pretty bad about (although whether it's the murdering her sister or the fact she was exiled for it is... unclear). When Ms. Marvel tries expressing sympathy for it, Death-Bird goes absolutely berserk on her, since while she does regret the deed, she's fully aware of what she is and what she does. And what she does is kill.
• The Outsiders: In Batman and the Outsiders #13, Katana is tracking a poisoned and delusional Batman. She stops to save a civilian's life and thus, loses Bats. So she expresses her regret to substitute commander Black Lightning, prompting the following conversation:

  Black Lightning: Don't go committin' Hara-Kiri or anything over it, Katana! You've been through a lot lately!
  Katana: Don't pity me because of the death of my husband, Lightning! I won't have that!
  Black Lightning: Sorry! But any of us would have done the same thing!

• The Ray: The Ray foolishly caused his father to go into respiratory arrest and saved him with mouth-to-mouth. The father immediately berated him for his stupidity, but the Ray ignored him in his relief that he was alive, which was so great that he started to cry. His father realized it, stopped the scolding, and tried to put his arm about him. Ray angrily shrugged it off. (A second attempt was more successful.)
• Red Robin: Most of the reason Ives hides his cancer diagnosis from his friends and classmates for so long is that he doesn't want any pity or special treatment for it from them and would prefer to just be treated like another teenager.
• The Sandman (1989): Orpheus says this to the Griffin gate guard of his father's kingdom after his wife dies.
• In Sonic Universe, could be Scourge the Hedgehog in issue 29. The pitiers sing "Always Look On the Bright Side of Life" and state that they're only doing this because they feel bad that they're happy he's getting hurt, not them.
• Star Wars Expanded Universe: Obsession: Asajj Ventress tells this to Obi-Wan as she battles him, and notes that he no longer has pity in his eyes as she dies. (Or does she?)
  • In Star Wars: Legacy, the Jedi healer Hosk Trey'lis' last words are forgiving his murderer, and saying that he pities him for crossing over to the dark side to survive, and for the man he must once have been.
  • Vader's Quest: When Nevana offers Bobek advice on how to remove leeches that got stuck on his arm during Jal’s prank, he angrily replies, "Who asked you?"
• Supergirl: In the Many Happy Returns storyline, Rebel attacks Supergirl but she is feeling depressed and doesn't want to defend herself. When Rebel complains about it, Kara apologizes and says she can try to fight back if it'd make him feel better. Rebel grumbles he doesn't want her pity.

  Supergirl: I'm... I'm sorry, Rebel. I could... try to fight back. If it'd make you feel better.
  Rebel: Oh, please. I don't want your pity.

• Teen Titans: The one thing Beast Boy can't stand is when people pity him.
• In the short-lived Warrior comic, when the title character returns from the hospital, his butler gives him his wheelchair in order to help him relax. Warrior flips out at this and tosses the wheelchair into the stratosphere.
• The Avengers and the X-Men fight against an alien invasion of Skrulls and Badoons in Central Park, and a woman and her children were caught in the crossfire. The father then arrived at the scene, and Cyclops said that he was sorry. The man took his gun and killed him, as well as many other heroes who were there. And that was just the beginning. The name of the story? The Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe.
• In Young Justice, when Slo-Bo begins to go blind.

  Slo-Bo: First person who pities me, I kill. Not frag. Kill.

• Encanto: Alma furiously screamed one in rage, while brutal-intensely arguing with Mirabel as Casita is nearly about to collapse.
• Kung Fu Panda: Shifu apologizes to Tai Lung for having failed him as his father, which actually stuns him for a second. But the moment passes, and he angrily rejects it.

  Tai Lung: I don't want your apology. I want my scroll!

• In The Prince of Egypt, after Ramses' son dies along with the other firstborns in the last plague, Moses tries to comfort the grieving Ramses. Ramses swats his hand away demanding that Moses leave.

• AVP: Alien vs. Predator has Charles Bishop Weyland, a wealthy elderly industrialist, who funds the mission to a newly-discovered pyramid under tons of ice. He later reveals to the protagonist that he's dying of lung cancer and wants to leave his mark on the world. Later, as the survivors are running from a Predator, Weyland tries to have a You Shall Not Pass! moment. The Predator scans him, sees his deformed lungs, and just walks right past the old man. The pissed-off Weyland attacks the Predator with a makeshift flamethrower. Now, the Predator won't ignore him and goes all stabby on the guy.
• Broker: So-yeong gets mad when detective Lee asks if she was forced into prostitution, and angrily asks detective Lee if Lee is pitying her.
• In Chocolat, Armande turns out to be hiding the fact that she's diabetic from Vianne, the chocolate shop owner. After Armande's daughter reveals this, chews Vianne out for giving her sweets, and leaves in a huff, Vianne asks the old woman why she did not let her know. But Armande won't let anyone boss her around about how she lives her life, and as she leaves, says "Don't you dare pity me!" She dies the night after a sweets-filled birthday party Vianne caters for her, but this is seen by the film as preferable to living out her life in a nursing home.
• In The Crossing Guard, Jack Nicholson's character falls into a spiral of despair and anger after his daughter gets killed by a drunk driver while crossing the street. He delivers this to his wife when she expresses her pity for him.
• Defied by Ravi in Deewaar. Instead of turning down a job he was just offered and saying that the other man who applied for it needs it more, he asks how much he would be paid and says it's not enough before walking out. He needn't have bothered; the other man sees through it immediately (though the employer doesn't, so he was spared some embarrassment anyway) and is grateful.
• Fatal Attraction: Alex snaps this at Dan when he tries to give her the brush-off.
• Michael Myers from the Halloween series is perfectly willing to kill people for no real reason. However, Michael really goes out of his way to kill people who dare to pity him as brutally as possible.
• Friends with Benefits: Dylan explains after she learns that he hadn't told Jamie his father has Alzheimer's because he doesn't like the pitying looks which people give to him over it. As she then does.
• In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry uses Snape's Legilimency charm against him, revealing that in his childhood, James Potter, Sirius Black, and Peter Pettigrew caught him off guard and put him through a Humiliation Conga while Remus Lupin looked on and did nothing. As soon as Harry leaves Snape's mind, the scowl on his face says it all.
• In the Heat of the Night:

  Gillespie: Don't you ever get just... a little lonely?
  Tibbs: No lonelier than you, man.
  Gillespie: Oh, now, don't get smart, black boy. I don't need it. No pity, thank you. No, thank you!

• In the Name of the Father: Giuseppe rebuffs Joe's condolences over him and Gerry doing time for his crimes. It's not so much because he hates pity necessarily, but that it comes from an IRA member who has murdered numerous people. He says to save his pity for the people he's killed.
• Listen to Me: Donna doesn't like to be pitied because of her having a disability, treated differently, or called "handicapped" etc. On the other hand, she doesn't like people ignoring the limits it places on her (like being unable to dance) though she's intent on overcoming these eventually.
• Lockout. After Snow's friend Mace dies, Emilie tries to console him and he roughly rebuffs her.
• In The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Gandalf offers forgiveness to Saruman, after Isengard is destroyed. His response?

  Saruman: Save your pity and your mercy, I have no use for it! [launches attack]

• Subverted in Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior: Max is clearly suffering from a traumatic loss, and could probably do with a little pity and understanding. Papagallo deliberately tries to re-open his old wounds.

  Papagallo Tell me your story, Max. C'mon, tell me your story. What burned you out, huh? Kill one man too many? See too many people die? Lose some family? Oh, so that's it. You lost your family. That makes you something special, does it?"

• In Midnight Cowboy, where Dustin Hoffman's character refuses all attempts to help him over the course of the movie. Moral? He dies on the bus to Florida.
• Annie tells Kate not to pity her in The Miracle Worker, despite the fact that Annie had grown up in an almhouse, because it made her strong.
• Explicitly spelled out in the final battle between Liu Kang and Shang Tsung in Mortal Kombat: The Movie:

  Liu Kang: All those souls and you still don't have one of your own... I pity you, sorcerer!
  Shang Tsung: *spits out some blood* Save your pity for the weak!

• In Disney's less-popular 1992 musical Newsies, Crutchy states, "I don't want nobody carryin' me. Never, ya hear?" when Jack and David go to break him out of the Refuge.
• In Pride & Prejudice (2005), Charlotte Lucas announces she is marrying Mr. Collins (after Lizzie turned him down) and reacts this way when Elizabeth pities her:

  Charlotte Lucas: My dear Lizzy. I've come to tell you the news. Mr. Collins and I are... engaged.
  Elizabeth Bennet: To be married?
  Charlotte Lucas: Yes of course. What other kind of engaged is there?
  [Lizzy gives her a look of shock and pity]
  Charlotte Lucas: Oh, for Heaven's sake! Don't look at me like that Lizzy! There is no earthly reason why I shouldn't be as happy with him as any other... I'm twenty-seven years old, I've no money and no prospects. I'm already a burden to my parents and I'm frightened. So don't you judge me, Lizzy. Don't you dare judge me!

• From The Producers:

  You have exactly ten seconds to replace that look of disgusting pity with one of enormous respect.

• The blind woman and the serial killer in Red Dragon:

  Woman: If there's anything worse than pity, it's fake pity. Especially from a walking hard-on like Ralph Mandy.

  Killer: I have no pity.

• Parodied in Scary Movie 2 with Dwight, a man who uses a wheelchair and gets offended every time someone offers to help him with anything. He does this even when it would be ridiculously hard to do by himself, like crawling up two flights of stairs. When The Vamp offers to "help him out downstairs" to get his keys, he responds by auto-fellating himself.
• In Waterloo Bridge, Myra freaks out when Roy tries to offer her money for her back rent.
• In When Harry Met Sally..., Sally's reaction to Harry's explanation for why he had sex with her is...less than favorable.

  Harry: But you looked up at me with these big sad eyes; "Don't leave, Harry," "Hold me a little longer, Harry..." I mean, what was I supposed to do?!
  Sally: What are you saying, you took pity on me?! Fuck you! *SLAP*

• Nessarose from Wicked: Part I uses a wheelchair, and is frequently frustrated by able-bodied people (some well-meaning, some not so much) treating her like she can't do anything herself. Her father is extremely controlling and overprotective of her, treating her like a child, so she's excited to get away to Shiz University and start over... and her first day there, a teacher grabs her wheelchair and starts pushing her while cheerfully ignoring her protests. Part of why she likes Boq is because he doesn't feel sorry for her.
• In Young Man With a Horn, Amy (Lauren Bacall) slaps Rick (Kirk Douglas) and says this as they're breaking up.

• The lyrics of Rick Astley's "Cry For Help" are about a man getting frustrated because his girlfriend is the poster girl for this trope.
• Kiss of Fire:

  I can't resist you, what good is there in trying?
  What good is in denying you're all that I desire?
  >Since I first met you, my heart was yours completely,
  If that's a slave then it's a slave I want to be
  Don't pity me!

• In The Lonely Island's "Threw It On The Ground", the protagonist visits his local hot dog stand and is offered a free hot dog, prompting him to launch into a tirade about being given free things out of what he perceives to be pity.

  I go to my favorite hot dog stand
  The dude says, 'You come here all the time! Here's one for free!'
  I said, 'Man, what do I look like, a charity case?'
  I took it, and THREW IT ON THE GROUND!
  I don't need your handouts! I'm an ADULT!
  Please, you can't buy me, hot dog man!

• Inverted in Amon Amarth's The Hero. A dying mercenary rejects the sympathy of those tending for him because he feels that he does not deserve it.

  I don't deserve their sympathy
  I know who I am
  My soul is death and misery
  I am an evil man

• City and Colour's "The Grand Optimist" exhibits a mild form of this:

  And now the wound has begun to turn
  Another lesson that has gone unlearned
  But this is not a cry for pity, nor for sympathy

• I'd rather be hated than pitied in Naked by Spice Girls.
• 1960's British duo Peter & Gordon had a song of unrequited love called "Don't Pity Me".
• "Misery Loves My Company" by Three Days Grace rebuffs Condescending Compassion:

  I don't need your condescending
  words about me looking lonely
  I don't need your arms to hold me
  cause misery is waiting on me!
  

• In Interstitial: Actual Play. When Scott tries to defend Edith against Doctor K sniping at her for wanting to leave to other worlds, Edith snaps at Scott, claiming she can handle things herself.

• Rudyard Kipling's "The Comforters"

  So, when thine own dark hour shall fall,
  Unchallenged canst thou say:
  "I never worried you at all,
  For God's sake go away!"

• Ric Flair went into WWE's Wrestlemania XXIV about 10 years past his prime, rapidly decaying in the ring and laboring under a decree from Vince McMahon that meant that the next match he lost would be his last. Knowing this, he challenged "Mr. Wrestlemania" Shawn Michaels to a match at the show. And when Michaels showed pity for his opponent in a promo a couple of weeks before the show and hinted that he might not bring his A-game, Flair called him out on it, demanding that Shawn give him everything he has, because, win or lose, he wanted to come out of the show with his honor and integrity intact. This carried over into the match; Flair was obviously unable to put up an actual fight, but he refused to simply lay down and be beaten. Shawn felt he didn't want to retire Flair (apparently legitimate) as Flair stood there, wobbling, fists barely up and yelling at him to "pull the trigger". Shawn's response? "I'm sorry. I love you." Superkick. The whole situation was then given an Ironic Echo treatment two years later, when Shawn was trying to end The Undertaker's undefeated-at-Wrestlemania streak because, as he said, "If I can't do this, I don't have a career anymore." At one point, Shawn was pulling himself up to his knees, using Taker as the ladder, and you could hear him yell "Stay! Down!" Shawn played this trope to the hilt by mocking Taker with his own signature throat-slit taunt and then slapping him in the face. The match ended very quickly after that.
• Triple H seemed to have this attitude a few times after crushing defeats.
  • When Brock Lesnar almost re-breaks his arm at Summerslam, the refs & EMTs come to help him get up, but he shoves them away & leaves the arena on his own.
  • After a brutal beatdown by Umaga, he has to be helped from the ring but shoves everyone away after getting his feet to the ground. Unlike Summerslam, he's legitimately injured and has no choice but to accept the help when he collapses after a few steps.
  • His beatdown from Kevin Nash yields the same response. Hunter is being helped to the back but rasps for them to get off & pushes everyone away. The EMT & doctor tell Hunter to let them help, but he insists he's okay. Like in the previous example, he collapses after a few steps & is told again to let them help him.

• In one episode of Just a Minute, the panelists started challenging new player Linda Smith and, when asked what the challenge was, saying "I just think she should get another bonus point" (which you get if you're incorrectly challenged). Linda's reaction? "Can I just say I don't find this patronising at all?"

• Zia from Dawn of a New Age: Oldport Blues rejects pity for a variety of reasons: she doesn't feel that it's genuine, talking about her feelings makes her uncomfortable, and she thinks that she can handle her own problems by herself.

• Winged elves in Dungeons & Dragons are a rarely-seen subrace of elves with large, beautiful eagle's wings. They take great pride in their wings, and a winged elf who loses their wings in a battle or accident is pitied by the other members of the community. However, elves do not accept pity from anyone, so such an elf usually leaves their community and becomes a loner.

• In Grease, when the other kids find out Rizzo is pregnant and offer to help her out, she reacts like this.
• Hamlet:

  Ghost: My hour is almost come,
  When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames
  Must render up myself.
  Hamlet: Alas, poor ghost!
  Ghost: Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing
  To what I shall unfold.

• I and You: Caroline hates how gently people treat her due to her probably-terminal illness, saying that it's fake kindness rather than people actually getting to know her and really care about her. At several points in the play, she orders Anthony to leave when she thinks he's being nice to her out of pity.
• In the Act One Finale of La Cage aux folles, Albin the drag queen sings "I Am What I Am", defending his way of life. It includes the lines:

  I am what I am
  I don't want praise, I don't want pity
  I bang my own drum
  Some think it's noise. I think it's pretty.

• Aldonza's "I Am" Song in Man of La Mancha

  Don't you see what your gentle insanities do to me?
  Rob me of anger and give me despair
  Blows and abuse I can take and give back again!
  Tenderness I can not bear.

• In the final song of The Phantom of the Opera the Phantom sings his tragic backstory to Christine, but after that short moment of vulnerability, he gets angry again.

  Pity comes too late!

• In Wicked, Nessarose asks Boq if he took her to the dance only because he feels sorry for her: "It's because I'm in this chair, and you felt sorry for me...." It's not the actual reason — Glinda asked him to do this, and she specifically cited the chair as the reason she'd find it attractive, so, close enough.

• DEATH BATTLE!: In DEATH BATTLE! S07E04 - Genos VS War Machine, after destroying his entire body in an attempt at Taking You with Me, Genos' disembodied head rejects Rhodey's apology, coldly saying, "Don't talk to me..." Rhodey obliges by subjecting the cyborg to a Finishing Stomp.
• Dreamscape: Being belittled or underestimated is one of the few things that gets under Keela's skin.
• Melvin's Macabre: When Melvin finishes his Reason You Suck Speech towards the collectors in "NOSTALGIA" by stating that he feels sorry for them, their leader Jeremiah angrily shouts at him to shut up
• RWBY:
  • Jaune Arc, which is a major plot point for him. As the only son in a family of daughters, he wants to be like his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather and become a Huntsman. However, he's uncoordinated, clumsy, weak, gets motion sickness, has absolutely no idea how his Aura works, and, worst of all, he lied on his entrance papers to get into Beacon. When Pyrrha tries to help him, he snaps at her for doing so. However, after being blackmailed by Cardin after he overheard everything, he finally grows a bit of a backbone, swallows his pride, and asks Pyrrha for help.
  • In Volume 6, Blake promises to protect Yang from Adam. Yang is offended; she doesn't explicitly say why, but since she's a badass Action Girl with abandonment issues, it seems like she doesn't like the implication that Blake is just there out of guilt. Later, Blake amends her declaration by saying they're protecting each other, and Yang is clearly moved.

• In Bugged Run, Chrys angrily rejects Ariel's offer of a better Pokémon after being defeated by her in a battle, flashing back to other times throughout their lives that Ariel has taken pity on her.
• In Cucumber Quest, Peridot denies that she's taking the MacGuffin because she needs Almond's pity or something.
• DMFA:
  • In Abel's Backstory, Abel learns that another character's mother and father left him/died. Abel begins to say something along the lines of 'Sorry, I didn't know.' when he is cut off by the other person who complains that he wasted enough time pitying himself and wanted no more.
  • Comic #2060: Regina Darkblood has a sudden mood swing in the middle of geeking out over the fabrics in a Being-run dress shop, lamenting that none of that matters to "real" demons, then beating herself up for "crying like a deadweight baby. "When her uncle Aleph (Dark Pegasus) tries to calm her down, she cuts him off:

    Regina: NO! DON'T YOU SAY IT!

    You don't get to tell me I'm not! You don't get to act like you understand! You did everything right! You'll always be considered a demon! No matter what you do! You'll never have your friends all leave you because you were no longer important! You— You'll never have someone tell you they love you only to reject you the moment you fail to meet their perfect little mold!! You'll never!! I'm a failure of demon! A reject! Worthless! Anything I do doesn't matter at all because I'm a loser who can't rampage!

    And... I... I hate so much! All of them! him! I hate him! And...

    And! I hate that despite all that I still want them to care about me again!

• In Errant Story, Sarine throws this in Jon's face when he tries to comfort her. A few pages later...
• A fairly mild example shows up in Girl Genius when Colette rejects Violetta's sympathy for having a difficult family, because Violetta's family is much worse.

  Violetta: Whoof! And I thought my family was bad.
  Colette: Your family is bad. Mine is noisy and embarrassing.

• This scene from Gunnerkrigg Court.
• Near the end of Galatea's origin story in The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob!, this is her reaction when Bob finds her shivering alone in the rain in an alley.
• In Lavender Jack, Jack eventually realizes that the Black Note had no intention of surviving his own plan. Although Jack feels sorry for him upon learning this, it just makes the Note angrier.

  Note: Ah. There it is again. The aristocrat's pity, and the hidden sneer that slides in with it. Oh, I can only imagine how nice it must have been. Growing up in a world that wanted you in it.

• In Not a Villain, Danni behaves like this towards Kleya on several occasions when Kleya tries to help her out: after she loses during the Death Match tournament, and when after she's booed by the crowd on her way to enter the Game.
• In Pacificators, it's strongly implied that Muneca Powell cannot handle people pitying her, as seen in when she screamed at Daryl to Get Out! after accidentally discovering her secret. Afterwards, she begged Daryl not to tell anybody.
• In Precocious, Autumn violently rebuffs Max when he attempts to turn his extravagant birthday party into an actual pity party for her.
• In PvP, Reggie combines this with N-Word Privileges^note  and Insistent Terminology, when he complains about people using euphemisms for disabilities.
• In Sabrina Online, Sabrina learns a bit about her boss, Zig Zag, and her Dark and Troubled Past (molested as a child by her father, among other things). When Sabrina tries (awkwardly) to offer sympathy, Zig Zag launches into a tirade about how that kind of pity is exactly why she doesn't tell anyone about her past: She is who she is, refuses to use any Freudian Excuses, and hates it when someone tries to on her behalf.
• Schlock Mercenary, Lt. Der Trihs, after being reduced yet again to a head in a jar, says "I don't want pity. I wants arms and legs."
• Vampire Girl: Mildly subverted with Levana towards the beginning of the comic, as she believes no one can help her curb her thirst for blood, let alone no one would help a vampire in general.
• Lamar of We Are The Wyre Cats particularly hates being pitied for his disabilities.

• Analyst Bronies React: Keframe had a Twilight plushie complain about how she was so bored and had nothing to do. When Thespio tried to comfort the plushie, she shouted that she didn't need his pity.
• In The Antithesis, Qaira Eltruan is a cold and callous militant leader on the outside but suffers from self-hatred and guilt on the inside. Leid Koseling attempts to help him through his internal struggles along with the malay addiction (a type of drug similar to heroin) he suffers at the beginning of Decus, but he is at first very reluctant to accept her help. In fact, he feels threatened and insulted by Leid's attempts to aid him and often becomes angry over the fact.
• A Cracked article called 5 Insane Things I Learned as a Foreign Aid Worker mentions that the citizens of the developing world dislike being pitted and will react negatively towards dramatics (such as crying when you just met). It later goes on to justify this reaction to pity by talking about the whole "heroic savior" mentality actually causes even more problems.
• The Nostalgia Chick has a big breakdown in Spooning With Spoony after being raped by the titular character. The next episode later, she's dragging Nella everywhere to dance and shooting laser beams at her with delight. Two years later, she flinches and tries to hide her face when she's near Spoony and it's obvious she's nowhere near over the rape.
• Sherwood Forest: Will tries to comfort Shaima when they first meet, and she tells him "I don't want your pity." It's worth noting that not only is she in a really bad mental place, having just been kidnapped and dragged across the globe, but the guy who did this was also Will's foster father. No matter what he said, she wasn't going to respond well.
• In Tales of MU, Sooni's slave-cum-friend Kai endures extreme abuse from Sooni, including frequent beatings (once nearly to the point of death) and being forced to dress up in ridiculous cosplay. Whenever any of the main characters try to show any sympathy for her, she reacts with rage. It's later revealed in a bonus story that Kai comes from an extremely impoverished background and always dreamed of getting an education, and although Sooni as good as kidnapped her (with an implied reward to her family) Kai is willing to accept anything as long as it means she can continue going to university.
• Twig has Sylvester, who doesn't know how to deal with genuine human compassion directed his way as he reads it as pity, which makes him dislike the person in question because he hates the idea that they understand his situation as a Child Soldier Human Weapon for an Academy of Evil.

• In Corpse Party D2: Fatal Operation, this applies to Naomi, as well as the Big Bad Machi's main motivation for "living again". Why? Seiko's mother pitied her, even when Machi was killing her.
• Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc:
  • During Hifumi Yamada's Free Time Events, he mentions how he believes that some girls are only "nice to the fat nerdy kid to feel good about themselves," and he mentions how he angrily drove them away. Naegi doesn't think this is a very nice thing to do, making it something of a deconstruction of this trope by showing how people who reject acts of kindness come across to others.
  • Toko Fukawa's serial killer alternate personality, Genocider Syo, warns (or threatens, take your pick) Makoto not to pity her, as having dissociative identity disorder has its advantages, namely the fact that she can remember things that Toko can't, and vice versa.
• In Doki Doki Literature Club Plus!, when Yuri and Sayori are just getting to know each other, Sayori tries really hard to make Yuri happy as with everyone else — by reading a rather difficult book with her — and this makes Yuri think Sayori's not treating her like a normal person but going out of her way to help the socially unskilled weirdo. It escalates when Yuri's reaction (together with Sayori's own feelings of inadequacy) makes Sayori try even harder the next day, which of course feels even worse to Yuri, leading to a brief enraged "I don't want your pity!" reaction, although Yuri immediately feels awful about it and knows she's not communicating what she's actually thinking and feeling.
• During the summer, the protagonist of Double Homework tries to hide what he’s actually been doing while he’s been out of school. Johanna helped by feeding all his friends a story that he was training somewhere. However, Dennis figures out the truth and ends up leaking it over the internet.
• A flashback in Fate/stay night reveals that Shinji's Start of Darkness was at least partially due to this. He was originally content with being a descendant of a magus family, even though he lacked magic circuits, until Sakura apologized for taking his place as heir and showed pity for displacing him. Any other action would have been fine, but pity enraged him.
• In Heart of the Woods, Tara acts this way during the ending in which Morgan sacrifices herself to defeat Evelyn. Despite clearly being in pain, she feels uncomfortable with Madison's pity, and tries to act as though everything is fine, which only serves to widen the rift between her and Madison.
• Kakouton in Juuzaengi reacts in this way every time the heroine shows concern towards him.
• Katawa Shoujo:
  • Surprisingly, Hanako Ikezawa. She is well aware that her being The Woobie is why Hisao is initially interested in getting closer to her. She doesn't like the idea of him and Lilly seeing her as a child that needs protecting. For the most part, she doesn't say anything about it until her bad ending, where she explodes in rage when Hisao tries to coddle her and throws him out of her room while screaming at him for being her white knight.
  • Similarly, Emi Ibarazaki has a similar distaste for "white knights", but is much more outspoken about it. The key to getting her good ending is to have Hisao realise and then successfully explain that he's not with her out of pity, but out of genuine love.

    Emi: So you want to fix me, Hisao? Wanna swoop in on your white charger and save the day? Stop the nightmares, the phantom limb pains? Restore what's lost? Well, you can't. Nobody can. Nobody will.

  • Hisao himself feels this way in Lilly's route, becoming annoyed when she tries to mother him.
  • Lilly also feels this way on a lesser scale. She laughs when people quickly apologize over using expressions that include "see" in them and later says, in all seriousness, that she doesn't like being pitied. She's also aware that she has been overprotective of Hanako in the past and tries to remedy this — not listening to her advice will get you the Neutral or the Bad Ending.

    Lilly: If you'd pitied us, I would have been quite offended.

• Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney:
  • Edgeworth to Phoenix in case 3-5, after he faints because of an earthquake and the defendant escapes from him; echoing the same reaction he had in the 4th case of the first game, where his aversion to earthquakes is explained. Fortunately, his adopted sister Franziska is around to literally whip some sense into him.
  • Phoenix himself says it to Edgeworth in 2-4 when the latter offers to have the police look for Maya, who's been kidnapped.
• Tyrion Cuthbert: Attorney of the Arcane:
  • Eris towards Tyrion near the end of case 5. He pities her because, as a demon, she envies humanity's ability to choose between good and evil while she can only be evil, and is never even satisfied or fulfilled by the evil actions she performs. Eris responds by trying to kill him, for the first time in the entire game.
  • In case 5, Tyrion tells Beatrice that he can still try to dispute the Blood Contract she has, and free her soul. She tells him that it would be next to impossible, as the document is airtight and has little room for interpretation.

    Tyrion: ...I'm sorry.

• American Dad!:
  • Stan Smith is telling Steve about his first love:

    Stan: Well son, as you grow older you’ll find that the hurt fades away- WHY AMY!? WHY DON’T YOU LOVE ME!? *bawls*
    Steve: It’s gonna be okay, dad.
    Stan: DON'T YOU DARE PATRONIZE ME! AMY! AMY! *continues bawling*

  • In another episode, Klaus does this when Hayley accidentally dissuades Stan from putting Klaus in a human body, which then leads to his bowl capsizing, causing Hayley to try and help Klaus again:

    Klaus: You know what? Don't. You've done enough. [to self] Don't let her see you're suffocating. Don't give her the satisfaction.

• Avatar: The Last Airbender:
  • Toph Beifong hates it when people think she's disadvantaged because of her blindness due to her overprotective upbringing. She gets a bit better at distinguishing between pity and friendly help after talking with Iroh in "The Chase" though.
• CatDog: In "The Unnatural", everybody makes fun of Cat cause he's really bad at baseball. After a while, Cat starts to cry, and when Dog tries to comfort him, he orders Dog to "just turn away".
• Inverted in DuckTales (2017)'s Season 1 finale, when Magica rants about pitying Scrooge when she realizes that his Heroic BSoD is real, yelling "How dare you make me pity you?!"
• Joe Swanson from Family Guy. For example, when he falls down in one episode as a result of Peter stealing the wheelchair ramp in front of the Swansons' house, he turns down an offer for help, saying that he "needs to retain his independence". Somewhat justified in that he still is quite capable of getting around despite being handicapped.
  • One of the stories in Three Kings had Joe's character go on to invent a wheelchair-based rugby game called "Don't-Feel-Sorry-For-Us-Ball".
• In the Fantastic Four: World's Greatest Heroes episode "Doomed", Dr. Doom displays this in his usual Large Ham fashion:

  Reed: In a way, I pity him.
  Dr. Doom: No one pities Doom! I will have your head for this, Richards!

• In an episode of The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy has Pud'n talk about his not-really-a-pirate relative. While the teacher was perplexed, Pud'n hugs the boot he brought and says that he didn't want sympathy.
• The titular protagonist of Pelswick hates it when other people express pity for him for being in a wheelchair, both because he's completely self-sufficient and not nearly as much of a burden as people make him feel like, and because their pity usually tends to make situations worse for him, such as school officials forbidding him from going on a camping trip for "safety reasons". This was very much a case of Write What You Know; creator John Callahan was rendered quadriplegic in a car accident and quickly developed a distaste towards what he saw as abled society's patronizing attitude towards disabled people, with the same theming appearing in his more adult-oriented series, Quads!, which features an entire disabled main cast.
  • Somewhat ironically, one episode of Pelswick has his bully Boyd temporarily confined to a wheelchair after an accident. Pelswick feels sorry for him and attempts to talk with him about it, only Boyd to give this response.
• In one episode of Rocket Power, Reggie meets a handicapped snowboarder and lets her win a race by wiping out on purpose. Afterwards, they call Reggie out for this and declares that she just wants to be treated like everybody else.
• Rugrats: All the men of the Pickles family apply to this.
  • Grandpa Lou hates hearing that he is not competent to watch the babies. A prominent example is the first movie when Didi points out that he slept through Pearl Harbor.
  • Drew is not fond of Stu calling him out on his parenting and career lifestyle.
  • Stu is probably the biggest example. He absolutely hates when people call his inventions anything bad or being called a bad parent. Early in Rugrats Go Wild!, even though he feels guilty about stranding the family and friends with his crappy boat, he just uses his intentions of "family time" as an excuse for not getting an ocean liner.
• The Secret Saturdays: In Season 2, when Zak discovers the truth about Francis and his father and what their agency expects of Francis, Zak is clearly sympathetic, and when he starts to say something, Francis goes from visibly somber to hissing momentarily that he doesn't want pity, an obvious defense mechanism.
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars: In the episode "The Lawless", Obi-Wan tries to talk down Darth Maul by showing him compassion and acknowledging that Maul didn't choose to be evil, but was forced into it due a lifetime of being abused and used as a pawn by others. Tragically, this has the opposite effect, as it only makes Maul even angrier and causes him to murder Duchess Satine just to make a point.
• On Ultimate Spider-Man (2012), Peter chases off Flash from bullying his newest victim, then tries to introduce himself. Any gratitude he might have received is ruined by that since the two already knew each other and Peter just couldn't remember him.

  Peter: Oh! Oh, Alex! Right! Duh! My bad.
  Alex: Forget it. Forget me. Unless somebody wants my homework or to save me, I'm invisible to all you popular kids.

• The rallying cry of the autism rights movement. It was started by Jim Sinclair with xyr^note  essay "Don't Mourn for Us."
  • Many people with disabilities, in general, take this viewpoint nowadays. See for example the Piss on Pity movement.
• Randy Newman's acceptance speech on receiving his Academy Award for Best Song after countless nominations began with the line, "I don't need your pity."
• Group Captain Sir Douglas Robert Steuart Bader, CBE, DSO & Bar, DFC & Bar, FRAeS, DL, legless fighter pilot and hero of World War II was equal parts this, Handicapped Badass and The Determinator. Once, when lecturing at a boarding school, a schoolboy asked the great hero if he could carry his bags. Bader's response? BUGGER OFF!!!
• Freddie Mercury kept his HIV/AIDS diagnosis secret throughout the late '80s until shortly before he passed away in 1991 partly because he was afraid people would buy Queen albums only out of sympathy. (The other reason was that he was an intensely private man and felt that it was none of the public's business.) This still hasn't stopped people from criticizing him for hiding it until the end.
• For blind Puerto Rican singer and guitar player Jose Feliciano, having someone try to help him walk around seems to be quite the Berserk Button due to this trope.
• According to her daughters Liza Minnelli and Lorna Luft, Judy Garland was often irritated at the idea that she was a sad, tragic, melancholic figure with no happiness in her life. Despite the hardships she went through, she tried to keep a sunny disposition and always tried her best to rise up from them. Reputedly once when she was about to be interviewed, she littered her hotel room with pills and alcohol all over the floor and tables. When Liza asked why, she replied, "I'm just giving the reporters what they want to see."
• Sex worker rights organizations resent the view that they are all victims who need to be rescued, feeling this actually makes things worse for them in a lot of cases.
• Many individuals who were born out of wedlock and/or raised by single parents dislike the very common assumption that their lives must, therefore, have been worse for it, with an unwanted pity following this.
• Hyper-independent people might often feel this way, as they've had to endure relying only on themselves for vast majorities of their lives, meaning someone offering them help will upset them.
• Richard Turner, regarded as being one of the greatest card mechanics ever to have lived, refuses to let other people pity him or go easy on him due to his blindness. When his karate instructor offered to award him an honorary black belt, he refused and insisted he be tested just like any student, resulting in his going ten rounds of full-force brawling with a fresh opponent each round (and getting his arm broken in the process).
• In 1968, Swedish soprano Birgit Nilsson underwent an operation (officially for "gallstones"), and four months later, she was back on stage, singing Brunnhilde at the Vienna State Opera. Only many years later, in 1995, did she reveal the real reason for her operation: she had been stricken with cancer. She had never talked about it before because she, in her own words, "couldn't bear being pitied."
• The disputed tale of Alexander the Great and Diogenes the Cynic has elements of this. In the story, Alexander approached Diogenes with his entourage and offered to grant him any wish he desired because he respected him as a philosopher. Despite standing in front of a man who had conquered 6 countries and was halfway through his conquest of Persia, Diogenes simply and rudely asked Alexander to step aside because he was standing in front of the sun. While Alexander's entourage found the interaction hilarious, Alexander stated “If I were not Alexander, I would want to be Diogenes.” causing Diogenes to allegedly reply "If I were not Diogenes, I too would wish to be Diogenes." The tale of Diogenes and Alexander is commonly perceived as a lesson on who is happier; the man who has everything but has so many social conventions to abide by and so many expectations to live up to, or the man who has nothing but is free from societal expectations and conventions. While enlightening, the more likely explanation is that Diogenes was fully aware that Alexander the Great was just using him as a charity case and chose to mock him instead of feeding his ego. Alexander the Great was an egotistical man who named 70 cities after himself and wanted to use Diogenes to further show off his wealth and power.