Editing Why We Can't Have Nice Things

[[File:whywecanthavenicethings.jpg|thumb|300px|<center>[[Trope Codifier]] on the [[Internet]].</center>]]
:"''Stupid museum! Why must you be so full of rare and precious cultural treasures!''"
::-- '''Lemuel,''' ''[[Dragon Tails]]''


You've probably heard your mother say this once or twice. This [[Stock Phrase]] turns up whenever clumsiness or stupidity once again wrecks something, especially something monetarily valuable or precious. It can also be applied to plans, historically significant things, or emotionally significant things.

[[Why Fandom Can't Have Nice Things]] is a [[SubTrope]], when the "nice things" in question are relationships with the artist. See also [[Bloodstained Glass Windows]], [[Rushmore Refacement]], [[Broken Treasure]], and [[Priceless Ming Vase]].


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=='''Examples'''==

==='''Animation'''===
* One of the Japanese ''[[Transformers]]'' incarnations had an archaeologist beg Optimus to avoid destroying the dig-site. Guess what Optimus and the others did to it.
* During his introduction episodes, [[Soul Eater|Death the Kid]] ended up destroying an entire pyramid by accident. It was symmetrical, but the pharaoh living there, on the other hand...
* [[Fruits Basket|Shigure]] can't even have a [[There Was a Door|door]].
* The [[Kuroshitsuji|Phantomhive]] house staff, excluding Sebastian, often does more damage than they're supposedly worth. The [[Ninja Maid|maid]] constantly breaks things and mixes up wood and shoe polish, the [[Chef of Iron|chef]] can't do anything but burn food and cause explosions, and the [[Badass Adorable|gardener]] frequently mixes up fertilizer and herbicide. There's a [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass|reason]] Ciel keeps them around, though...
* In an episode of ''[[Justice League]]'', Superman punched his (invulnerable) opponent right through the Great Pyramid of Giza.
* Over the course of the original ''[[Ben 10]]'' series -- a single summer vacation -- Ben and his family managed to destroy priceless artifacts in a Washington museum, burn that boat stuck at Niagara Falls, ''and'' blow up Mt. Rushmore.
* ''[[Kim Possible]]'' "Oh No Yono": When Monkeyfist breaks into a museum, he has his monkey ninja throw and attempt to drop valuable artifacts so that our heroes will have to catch them and he can get away.
* ''[[Futurama]]'':  "Thank you, mysterious heroes! The value of the Gemerald you saved is slightly greater than the cost of the damage you caused to this museum: A net gain for our great city!"
* Taken seriously for once on ''[[Teen Titans (Animated)|Teen Titans]]''. In one of Robin's nightmares, he fought Slade to prevent him from destroying several statues. He managed to subdue him, but Slade wasn't unhappy about it--"Everything you care about, you destroy." Robin looked around at the ruins of the statues, which suddenly bore the visages of his friends, then pulled off Slade's mask and saw his own laughing face. 
* Carefully averted by the ''[[Gargoyles]]''. Demona flung a [[Priceless Ming Vase]] at Goliath, who caught it carefully, set it down, and ''then'' gave chase.
* In the opening scenes of ''[[Duck Tales|Duck Tales: the Movie]]'', Launchpad manages to land his plane without crashing (though it ''is'' upside-down). However, in doing so, he utterly demolishes several ancient ruins.
*: '''Launchpad:''' ''Coulda been worse. It coulda been something new!''
*  In a episode of ''[[Fairly OddParents]]'', Timmy's Dad constantly says "Why can't I have nice things?!" after seeing all the stuff Timmy wished up from the [[Fictional Counterpart|Wall-to-Wall Mart]].  [[Running Gag|He then starts saying this about everything else.]]
* In ''[[The Simpsons]]'', Lisa uses the exact phrase when Homer decides the grammar robot she built for her science fair would like some beer.

==='''Film'''===
* ''[[Godzilla]]'' has the habit of destroying various landmarks in Tokyo, both historic and modern.
* [[James Bond]] fights a bad guy in an Italian glass museum in ''[[Moonraker]]''. It goes like you'd expect.
* [[Jackie Chan]] has subversions in several of his movies. Somebody tosses a priceless Ming vase at him. He knows it's priceless. And so he spends the entire fight beating up the bad guy while doing [[Juggle Fu|aerobatics with his own body and the vase]] so it doesn't break. It's a martial arts prowess [[Dish Dash]], essentially.  When the fight is over, he carefully puts the unharmed vase back... upon which something ''else'' will break it.
* ''[[Mars Attacks!]]'' has the aliens destroying earth landmarks for giggles.
* Played with in ''[[Indiana Jones|Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade]]'', where Henry Jones inadvertently brains his son with what appeared to be a Ming dynasty vase. He was initially more concerned about the loss of the artifact than the damage to Indy's skull (hey, he ''is'' an archaeologist), but on closer examination was relieved to discover it was a fake.
* Parodied in ''[[Team America]]''. The titular team blows up all sorts of important landmarks every time they face off against the villains. 
* In ''[[National Treasure]]'', [[Nicolas Cage]] has to steal the Declaration of Independence to prevent the villain from getting his mitts on it. Throughout the movie, he treats the document with due respect and at the end of the movie returns it to the authorities, none the worse for wear.
** There's an awesome scene where he's holding the Declaration, in its frame, and the bad guys break in and seem him just about to get in the elevator. They shoot at him, but luckily, as previously mentioned, [[Chekhov's Gun|the Declaration is under bulletproof glass]], and Ben gets into the elevator, smirking.
* In ''[[Iron Man (Film)|Iron Man]]'', during one of the rocket boot tests, Tony ended up landing on one of his [[Cool Car|very nice cars]].  Everyone with a remote interest in cars cringed.
*: '''Stark:''' ''OK, this is where I don't wanna be. Not the car, ''not the car!

==='''Newspaper Comics'''===
* In one ''[[Get Fuzzy]]'' cartoon, Bucky breaks a baseball player figurine presumably owned by Satchel. In typical Bucky fashion he wasn't even being clumsy; he just knocked it over because he didn't like the way it was 'looking at him.' Satchel is clearly upset. Rob tells the cat and dog that "See. This is why we can't have nice things.""

==='''Real Life'''===
* Part of the reason why photos of [[Osama bin Laden]]'s corpse will not be released to the public is because of fears that it will be used as [[Garbage Post Kid]] bait.
* At [[Romania]]'s National Arena football stadium inauguration, an artist was hired to sing the national anthem. The "problem" was, the anthem incidentally has the current President's name in it (Traian/Trajan, [[The Emperor|the Roman Emperor]]). The artist (or most likely, those who hired him) considered this could be interpreted politically so [[What An Idiot|they decided]] [[Bullying a Dragon|to remove only those lyrics]]. Shit hit the fan, hard, media, etc. Next ''friendly match'' the needed to have the national anthem played, had all four lyrics (until then it was a cutum to have sang only two lyrics, to save time) which took over 5 minutes to be played. [[Hilarity Ensued]], and the sport commentators [[Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment|shat up and said nothing]]. The next official match, only the melody was song, without any lyrics. Commentators this time said [[Blatant Lies|it was better this way]] - this is probably going to continue for a while, or worse, new variants will be tried. Now [[Fridge Horror|imagine how the anthem will be butchered (or even changed) when the current President ends his second term.]]

==='''Television'''===
* The Doctor in the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "City of Death", when Duggan is about to smash a chair over the butler's head:  "Duggan, what are you doing?  Put it down!  For heaven's sake, that's a Louis Quinze!"
* In the ''[[Angel]]'' episode "Disharmony", vampire Harmony rips a page out of an ancient book to dispose of her gum, causing Wesley to flip out.
*: '''Wesley:''' What'' are you doing?!?! This book is twelve centuries old!!''
*: '''Harmony:''' ''[[Completely Missing the Point|Okay, so it's not like I messed up a new one.]]''
* The final episode of the reimagined ''[[Battlestar Galactica]]'''s first season features a shootout between Starbuck and a Cylon in a museum on Caprica, destroying plenty of priceless artifacts in the process. This is made even worse by the fact that due to the fact that Caprica's been nuked to hell at the beginning of the series, this might be the only museum of its kind in the entire ''world'' that's still standing.
** Through the early seasons, Captain Adama was working on a model sailing ship, but after an incident, he took out his anger by slamming his fist into it. The problem was that this was an ad lib by actor Edward James Olmos, who ''thought'' it was just a prop they provided him. It turned out to be a ''really'' valuable model lent to the production by a museum.  Thankfully, it was insured.
* This line is used occasionally by ''[[Mythbusters]]'' after they've blown up a car, or any other expensive machinery they've gotten their hands on. Considering that it's implied they often have to go to great lengths to acquire certain vehicles (for example, when the only snow plow they could find for a myth was one that was broken and a nightmare to fix), it's surprising this isn't said more often. 
* For [[The Daily Show|Jon Stewart]], this was his comment after a story about [http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-december-15-2010/the-more-pedophiles-know Barbie dolls potentially being used by pedophiles].
* In [[Archer]], episode "Job Offer", Malory Archer throws a hissy fit when her son leaves ISIS, breaking all the nice things in her office. They use the line again at the end of the episode, and in the next one, Dial M for Mother, when Archer bleeds on [[Running Gag|the carpet]].
* In an episode of ''[[Everybody Loves Raymond]]'', Ray and Robert get into a hilarious fight that involves Bugles, an ugly sweater, and a lamp at Frank and Marie's house. Said parents walk in in the middle of the fight. Marie notices the broken lamp and quotes the trope.

==='''Theater'''===
* The characters in the musical ''[[On the Town]]'' (and its somewhat different film version) take a trip to the Museum of Natural History, which ends with them demolishing a dinosaur skeleton.

==='''Video Games'''===
* The final shootout in ''[[Mafia]]'' happens in an art gallery (the whole level is actually called "[[What Do You, Mean Its Not Symbolic|Death of Art]]").  A  cop whom the protagonist later tells about this actually goes ballistic about how many art pieces were destroyed in it.
* In ''[[Fallout 3]]'', there are two related quests. Both involve going into the ruins of the Museum of American History to recover artifacts. You can either sell them to a group of slavers who have taken over the Lincoln Monument (and want to destroy them, so they won't be used to help rally slaves) or you can [[Right Makes Might|kill the lot of them]] so a group of former slaves can move in (they will also buy the artifacts off you, and enshrine them instead). Notably, one of the pieces of equipment you can find is Lincoln's Repeater, which is a pretty useful gun.
** Also, in a way, the town of Megaton is the subject of this in "The Power of Atom" quest. The city of Megaton is a ramshackle, yet functional, bastion of humanity in the wastes, and is a monument to human survival, as it is a city built in the crater of an unexploded atomic bomb. And then you can decide to blow it up, and kill everyone in the town, for [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|land magistrate Allistair Tennpenny]] because he finds it an eyesore. Not that it's anything but barely discernible in the wasteland...
* In ''[[God of War]]'' Kratos gains experience for smashing things. This includes a lot of vases, as the game is set in Ancient Greece. In his defense, they're not priceless antiques to him. On the other hand, he'd probably act just the same if they were.
* They ''are'' priceless antiques in ''[[Tomb Raider|Tomb Raider: Underworld]]''. That does not stop Lara casually kicking them to pieces in hopes of finding power-ups.
* In the beginning of ''[[Uncharted|Uncharted 2]]'', Nathan sneaks into a museum to steal an oil lamp containing a map to the next PlotCoupon. The first thing he does upon getting said lamp is smash it to pieces on the ground.
* In the ''[[Legend of Zelda]]'' series, the average player doesn't think twice about countless pieces of family heirloom pottery Link destroys in order to take people's money, [http://i56.tinypic.com/2rzdxci.gif as exemplified here].

==='''Web Comics'''===
* Lampshaded and averted in [http://dragon-tails.com/comics/archive.php?date=020129 this] comic from the superhero arc of ''[[Dragon Tails]]'', where Lemuel looks around the museum for something to throw at the heroes to slow them down while he runs away.

==='''Web Original'''===
* In the sixth episode of ''[[Echo Chamber]]'', Tom wears a [[Fun T-Shirt]] that says this, and depicts [[Up to 11|the Hindenberg crashing into the Titanic]].
* In one of the earliest stories in ''[[The Butlerverse]]'', a team of supervillains invades the Smithsonian's Museum of Natural History intent on stealing a crystal sculpture that had been dug up in Equador. Naturally, the battle between the bad guys and the good guys destroyed ''lots'' of irreplaceable artifacts, and ended with the leader of the villain team, an alien being called [[Eldritch Abomination|Shadowspawn]] getting away with the sculpture while his teammates were all captured. As soon as he could, Shadowspawn shattered the sculpture in order to free up the base, which was a powerful magical artifact and his target all along.
* ''[[This Troper (Web Original)|This Troper]]'' may have been the final nail on [[Troper Tales]], as well as discouraging a lot of honest tropers in adding to that section altogether out of fear of being mocked. Though [[Or So I Heard|some say]] it's [[Actually Pretty Funny]].
** Before that, [[Troll]]s adding [[Blatant Lies]] on Troper Tales, which signed [[The Beginning of the End]] for that section.

====Troper Tales====
{{main|Why We Can't Have Nice Things (Troper Tales)}}

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[[Category:All Tropes]]
[[Category:Memetic Mutation]]
[[Category:Stock Phrases]]
[[Category:Why Fandom Can't Have Nice Things| We, Trope]]