Who needs a reason?
Sep. 23rd, 2015 10:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI watched some more MacGyver last night. It went weird for a few episodes, all drugs and prostitution and parents hitting their kids and racism and murder and more drugs. Like the grimdark version. That was unexpectedly upsetting. And then it went back to stories with Russian spies and booby traps and a basic message of 'how about we try not having a cold war' and that's much better.
The part that niggled enough that I thought of it waking up today though was where they spelled out Mac's reason for being a nice guy. Actually, where they gave him a reason.
Mac wanders around finding people who need help and helping them. Sometimes big ways, often small ones. He can do the thing, he does the thing and shows them how, they know a thing and their day gets easier. And sometimes later they turn up and help him, and it's karma in action. It's good. He's good, cause he wanders around doing good.
... also blowing things up with improvised explosives, there's more than one thread in this story, but, focusing on that part...
This one episode pulled together a couple of previously mentioned incidents in his bio and said in explicit therapy speak that this is why he does what he does. We knew his dad died in a car crash, but this episode said he feels guilty about it and like he should have done something to fix it so he goes around fixing things whenever he can.
And it bothers me.
It bothers me because why did someone think that someone needed a reason to do good?
Do good because doing good is good to do. If nothing we do matters then the only thing that matters is what we do. People shouldn't suffer. The smallest act of kindness is the greatest thing in the world.
And I mean, who can walk past a crying child and not want to help? Well, probably some people, people are varied. But, there is unhappy, if you can fix you have a feeling of want to fix.
Compassion in action.
The thing is that with the explanation Mac's actions are framed as all about his own suffering. His guilt, his pain, his regret. He's running around doing things that rationally can't fix the thing that actually hurts him. He's hung up on a particular moment in time, like Batman in the alley, and it's all attachment and obsession.
Without that explanation then just by observing him he's a man motivated by the suffering of others. They hurt, he helps. Simple. Rational. Effective. And an example of the golden rule in action. Compassion, caritas, love.
I can see why some drama writer without the same philosophical underpinnings as me would think that the emotionally motivated story was 'better', because you get these moments of drama and feels and woe. I can even vaguely recall textbooks suggesting this kind of stuff. Give them a twisty rubber band of emotion driving them and you get a whole bunch of expressions to act. I'm sure that sounded better to someone.
But it says, basically, at its core, that someone needs particular and specific reasons to care.
It's just wrong.
Of course from another angle it's just showing that there's specific expressions of suffering in everyone's life, and that this understanding of suffering deepens their empathy and understanding, which guides and motivates them to act with compassion.
But that reading is difficult from the particular therapy speak expression in the story.
Too many stories give the hero some particular twisty bit of awful, something to give them some driving angst. But that makes everything they do about them and their feelings. Some people just look at the world, see suffering, and set out to make it better.
The part that niggled enough that I thought of it waking up today though was where they spelled out Mac's reason for being a nice guy. Actually, where they gave him a reason.
Mac wanders around finding people who need help and helping them. Sometimes big ways, often small ones. He can do the thing, he does the thing and shows them how, they know a thing and their day gets easier. And sometimes later they turn up and help him, and it's karma in action. It's good. He's good, cause he wanders around doing good.
... also blowing things up with improvised explosives, there's more than one thread in this story, but, focusing on that part...
This one episode pulled together a couple of previously mentioned incidents in his bio and said in explicit therapy speak that this is why he does what he does. We knew his dad died in a car crash, but this episode said he feels guilty about it and like he should have done something to fix it so he goes around fixing things whenever he can.
And it bothers me.
It bothers me because why did someone think that someone needed a reason to do good?
Do good because doing good is good to do. If nothing we do matters then the only thing that matters is what we do. People shouldn't suffer. The smallest act of kindness is the greatest thing in the world.
And I mean, who can walk past a crying child and not want to help? Well, probably some people, people are varied. But, there is unhappy, if you can fix you have a feeling of want to fix.
Compassion in action.
The thing is that with the explanation Mac's actions are framed as all about his own suffering. His guilt, his pain, his regret. He's running around doing things that rationally can't fix the thing that actually hurts him. He's hung up on a particular moment in time, like Batman in the alley, and it's all attachment and obsession.
Without that explanation then just by observing him he's a man motivated by the suffering of others. They hurt, he helps. Simple. Rational. Effective. And an example of the golden rule in action. Compassion, caritas, love.
I can see why some drama writer without the same philosophical underpinnings as me would think that the emotionally motivated story was 'better', because you get these moments of drama and feels and woe. I can even vaguely recall textbooks suggesting this kind of stuff. Give them a twisty rubber band of emotion driving them and you get a whole bunch of expressions to act. I'm sure that sounded better to someone.
But it says, basically, at its core, that someone needs particular and specific reasons to care.
It's just wrong.
Of course from another angle it's just showing that there's specific expressions of suffering in everyone's life, and that this understanding of suffering deepens their empathy and understanding, which guides and motivates them to act with compassion.
But that reading is difficult from the particular therapy speak expression in the story.
Too many stories give the hero some particular twisty bit of awful, something to give them some driving angst. But that makes everything they do about them and their feelings. Some people just look at the world, see suffering, and set out to make it better.