Etiqueta: the good place

thisallegra:

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.

The whole premise of their redemption of Michael and his actions in late season 2/3 is that the system is wrong – not only does the group not deserve to be in the bad place as individuals – but that the system itself is wrong. If these are all people who could be ‘good’ – then judging them based on a life cut short before they could learn to do better given their awful starter issues (anxiety, emotional neglect, physical and emotional neglect, and stupidity (sorry, I love Jason but he’s spectacularly dumb)) means that the system itself is wrong – which is Michael’s argument to the judge and why we have season 3.

But hey at least the system got Columbus right!

closet-keys:

the thing I really like about The Good Place is that it thematically revolves around ethics and what makes a person good or bad (both in the sense of– how do we define good and bad, and in the sense of–what aspects of someone’s formative environment and social group influence how they will treat other people). 

and the conclusion that the show comes to over and over is both that it is possible to become a better person, and because it’s possible we owe it to each other to keep trying to be better– for all eternity if we must. 

there’s no end to it, and (should I make a prediction) no real “good place” where you’ve gotten to the finish line and “won” at being a good person. it’s an eternal commitment to other people. 

you create your own good place, because whether you’re in a good place or a bad place is defined by how people treat each other. when your community has collectively learned to respect, value, and help each other, you experience the peace and support that you might have once imagined in the abstract being awarded to the truly “good”