readytoplaygod:the-random-fandom-phantom: thedreadvampy:egyptiann:exigencelost:closet-keys: wh
readytoplaygod:the-random-fandom-phantom: thedreadvampy: egyptiann: exigencelost: closet-keys: why none of them got into The Good Place What I love about this is its acknowledgment that Jason had no intentions at all this is all 100% true but it always made me really mad that Chidi’s “crime” was having a severe anxiety disorder like he needed understanding and therapy, sending him to the Bad Place for something he had literally no control over was incredibly fucked up I feel like a less-surface theme of the show is that they’re all in a situation where they have been forced into bad patterns by forces outside their control - Chidi has SEVERE anxiety; Eleanor was forced by abuse and neglect to adopt a self-centered attitude from early childhood and, like many people with traumatic pasts, responds by not dealing with difficult emotions; Jason was very overtly raised in an environment where he got no education and all his models for behaviour were criminal and/or self-destructive; and Tahani has been raised in an environment where everything is performative and she is shot down for any genuine expression of unhappiness or non-material want. Just as Michael and Janet are made one way but changed by their experiences, the moral of the story is that things outside your control shape you but you can move away from them. That could easily be really insulting, in a sort of ‘just get over it’ way, but the idea isn’t that they change solely because they decide to be better - all six of them change because their circumstances change and give them the OPPORTUNITY to be better, because they’re finally given the support system they lack. I like The Good Place because the whole show has since day 1 been predicated on the idea that black and white moral judgements made in a vacuum are bullshit, and that moral choices are informed by things outside our control, whether that be education, behaviour modelling, unfair treatment or mental health issues. That doesn’t mean we aren’t responsible for our actions but it DOES mean we have to understand morality in the context of people’s varied experiences AND asks for the possibility that if their environment is improved, their ability to function as moral agents also improves. I think another important thing to consider is that nobody had gotten into the Good Place for centuries. No matter how “good” someone was, the system was setup in a way that still docked people points for things outside of their control (quite literally demonizing those who are victims of their environment).Michael used the example of two people from different times giving someone a flower. It’s been a year since I watched the show, so if I recall correctly in simpler times, Person A would receive good points because it was just a matter of picking the flower and gifting it. Person B was docked points because, even though the flower was still a gift, it was a product of harmful pesticides used on the flowers, unethical working conditions, harmful shipping…a number of bad factors outside of one’s control that even allowed this person to buy the flower as a gift in the first place.So ultimately, no matter the intent, people would still be sent to the Bad Place because it is hard to have wholly good actions in a world that isn’t designed to support that (which, spoiler, is why the Judge wanted to just delete Earth and start again). This was one of the reason’s why they had to change the system itself to give people a chance to try to become a better person than they were the day before and to allow kindness to help them grow. -- source link