#that Rand is such a polarizing character but also in his position what could he have done differently and it been better?

[trashlie]

Rand the Damned

Something that has become really apparent to me about ILY, especially the more I have these deep dives into the characterizations, is that ultimately, ILY explores characters who are trying to survive. Nearly every character in ILY is clearly someone trying to survive their circumstances, and while some are very obvious (Shinae, Nol, Kousuke) others you need to examine differently in order to see they, too, are trying to survive (Alyssa, Rand, Yui). Something I feel that ILY does especially well is the interpersonal relationships based on both context and circumstances, and why certain characters are able to better get along with each other and others continue to butt heads. For instance, Nol and Kousuke have always struggled because Nol was never able to see what Kousuke's real battle is - that his quest for Rand's acceptance has been but a small part of his psyche. Without understanding how Kousuke has been manipulated, gaslit, and literally drugged, how could Nol ever begin to understand why Kousuke treats him that way?

Abuse and trauma alters peoples' brains. It's not something that you just... one day wake up from and move on. We will spend our whole lives trying to unlearn our unhealthy behaviors, our coping mechanisms and that's for those of us who haven't experienced such brain-altering abuse and trauma. A very common theme of ILY remains repeating cycles - that people who never get to heal, or don't heal in a healthy way, will continue to perpetuate their cycles of abuse, of their trauma, of their unhealthy learned behaviors. Someone who grows up feeling like they are not allowed to express emotions, feeling like they must tiptoe around others' emotions is going to struggle to open up about their feelings, to feel like their emotions are valid, that they're allowed to feel and talk about what they feel, and thus, their relationships with others are impacted. What happens when they are close to someone who feels like they are being deliberately locked out and left in the dark? How do you resolve issues when you feel like you have to pack away your feelings and pretend you're fine, everything is okay?

This is something that permeates ILY at all corners, because it's fundamental to every interpersonal relationship - that we unwittingly pass on the hurt that has hurt us, that our experiences alter our perception, alter our behavior, alter the way we handle things. When I talk about Everyone x Therapy, this is what I mean. Nearly everyone in ILY carries some kind of hurt, some more deeply than others. This includes even the characters we as readers perceive as hurtful: Sangchul, Rand, Yui. Perhaps even Gun Kim, but frankly that is something I cannot bring myself to get into and I think we lack enough information to examine (but even in his case we can look at his father and glean how Gun would turn out the way he did).

Perhaps this will eventually become a series, where I sit and examine some of these characters more closely, as I have with Kousuke and Alyssa. But at this time I'm focusing on Rand, because I find him to be an incredibly polarizing character depending on the take you have. How dare you sympathize with someone who has been such a terrible father tends to be the main gut reaction, but as with all parents of ILY, there is no such thing as a good, perfect parent. At the end of the day, parents are people also trying to navigate their lives with the extra responsibility of someone else they're meant to take care of, to look after, to raise, with few resources and no guidebooks. The one thing ILY has taught me is to re-examine my own life, my relationship with my parents and the ways they hurt vs helped me, and their circumstances. Ultimately, we will always be victims of our circumstances, the results of our experiences.

So! Let's talk about Rand!

Firstmost and foremost, I want it to be clear that I'm not writing this in an effort to make people care about Rand or make him into someone's favorite character, but instead just to help people better understand him and his motivations. Too often I think we fall into the trap of believing that we can only like good characters and that liking those who hurt others or cause harm makes us bad people. But ILY is a fictional story. No one is being hurt. What I think ILY provides us, though, is a deeper understanding of real people and the ways that all people are complex, no matter how shallow they seem. This isn't about making Rand into a favorite character, but instead it's about examining Rand's circumstances.

When we examine characters through a lens of survival, it helps us to better understand their motivations and choices, as well as what is at risk and what they stand to lose which heavily factors into their motivations and why they make the choices they do. There's a lot we still don't know about the nature of Rand and Yui's relationship: were they ever lovers; did she ever fool him into thinking she was something else; was it always a business arrangement? This leads us to further questions, like did he meet Nessa before or after he married Yui? Because so much of ILY is about these cycles and parallels, we can look at Rand and assume that maybe, much like Nol has tried to do, Rand denied himself something he wanted in favor of something else, something he thought he needed more. As a businessman, it's easy to see how perhaps he and Yui were an arranged marriage, something not for love but instead for mutual benefit (and this feels even more plausible given how likely it is that Yui herself was not allowed to inherit the company but instead needed someone who would be adopted into the family via marriage and treated like a true Hirahara and needed him in order to have any role in the family business that she coveted). If Rand knew Nessa before, perhaps he told himself that what he felt about Nessa was a thing that would pass, something he could live without. Perhaps he convinced himself that the ends would justify the means, that his life would be better if he made this choice and denied himself something else he wanted. Love? Love can come and go. You can move on from anyone, anything.

But it's clear to us that Rand never moved on from Nessa. Long after he lost her, he carried her with him in that Bible. He may have told Shinae that it didn't hold luck for him anymore, that it hasn't for a long time, but that doesn't mean it stopped mattering to him. In a time when Nol needed it most, Rand gave up something that had brought him comfort in solace, in hopes that it can provide something of comfort for him, too.

What has been something of a safety raft for Rand to cling to as he treads the waters of survival has now been passed to his son, and I think this is as good a time to examine Rand through this lens of survival, and to better understand why he has made the choices he has and further, that I fear no choice Rand could have made would have been the right choice; it never existed, he was always damned if you do, damned if you don't.

A special interest of quimchee's appears to be female-enacted domestic violence. This has come up a couple times before, and is a theme she's talked about before on streams about wanting to explore, but I think we are seeing that quietly explored in ILY as well, though it's not the forefront of the story. Yui as a character very much is one who leads a reign of reign of terror, who so confidently believes that she is the hero of the story and everyone who stands against her opposes her, and thus are an obstacle to be taken out. Now, I still intend to write at great length about how I view Yui and what are her motivations and drivers, but the watered down summary is: I believe Yui was once the victim of abuse in addition to having always felt like she is lesser simply for being born a woman and bears a grudge against men and deeply resents them for what they are so easily afforded that she is not, that she was never given the opportunity or the space to heal and internalized this to believe that people deserve what happens to them, that those who are incapable of fighting back are deserving of what happens to them. This is integral in understanding Yui and how, yes, Rand's hands have always been tied by her.

I think when I say this, people think this immediately excuses Rand from the hurt he's caused, but it is so very important that we examine the ways that Rand's hands are tied, so that we can understand how nothing could really have been different, to understand why (in his eyes) he is doing the best he was able to. Again, an underlying theme is that people very much are often the victims of their circumstances. Yui herself even touches on this, noting that she is aware she is afforded opportunities, privilege, that most aren't. She herself also takes advantage of circumstances, in order to better orchestrate what she wants. For instance, consider the way Kousuke was left isolated - she took advantage of her husband's unhealthy work/life balance and further drove a wedge between him and his son so that Kousuke would forever feel like he is working towards an (unobtainable) goal, so that Rand would always be greatly out of reach, so that they could never become equals, be peers, so that Kousuke would always feel that feeling of inferiority and then she learned to utilize that inferiority as a weapon against Nol as well as to further isolate Kousuke, leave him dependent upon her.

Yui knows what she's doing, and Rand's circumstances are very much the base of this analysis.

What was the nature of their relationship? Was it simply a business arrangement Rand thought stood to benefit him? Or, a possibility I explore a lot more lately, was it possible that Yui tricked him in some way, took advantage of a more sympathetic nature perhaps Rand once possessed? I don't think we necessarily need to know yet what the circumstances are, because what matters is where that left Rand.

The mukoyoshi theory becomes ever more important the more we learn about these characters, and as we view their situations through the lens of this theory, we start to better understand the dynamics it's created. Supposing this theory holds true - and I believe it must, since we have canonical proof now Rand has taken the Hirahara name as his own - it sets the following precedent: through marriage to Yui, Rand has been adopted into the family as though he himself is a true Hirahara born of their blood, and as it appears that men are afforded more rights/opportunities, in some way Rand holds more rights in Yui's family than Yui herself does. She could not inherit the family company herself and instead had to marry someone else in order to carry on the lineage, had to give birth to a son to carry it on from them. I'm not going to get too deeply into this, because I think this is for another post, but again, this precedence is important because we need to understand why Yui would resent Rand for reasons beyond his affair, why from the very moment he married her he was likely trapped in her web, and why his circumstances were always against him.

Truly the greatest "mistake" Rand likely made was marrying Yui, but we're well beyond that now.

Yui very much is a controlling, abusive partner and it's clear to us now how she's been manipulating and abusing far longer than Rand's infidelity existed. We can see in Kousuke's early memories that the agitation between Rand and Yui in their clashing parenting styles had already become a thing that was wearing him down, that she gloated from her throne where she maintained the upper hand. Yui possesses incredible finesse when it comes to how she orchestrates things, how she nudges the truth, how she hardly has to do any heavy lifting for things to fall right into place. There's a whole essay that could be written on Rand's role in both the company and as a father and the crux of it always comes back to: he was damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. As part of the mukoyoshi concept, Rand has a duty to the company he has inherited, to the family he has been adopted by, to oversee things to ensure things run as well as they can. But as a husband and father, he has an obligation to his family. We see it often in businessmen, in people of the corporate world whose entire livelihoods depend on their career that they must make a choice. At this time it appears as though Yui's father regards Rand favorably, but would he have if Rand had chosen to downsize his responsibilities? Had Rand chosen to be around more as Kousuke was being raised? Especially if it's as we think with the Hirahara family, where childrearing is seen as a woman's role, that this is what Yui should be focusing on and that Rand, the mukoyoshi, had a role to fulfill separate of that?

When Yui told Kousuke that they are different from others, she was not wrong. We cannot view Rand through the same lens we would a man of lesser stature than him. We have to view him through his circumstances.

And his circumstances lead us here: to a man whose wife has probably been playing mind games with him from the get go who is trying his best both as an obligation to the family and his company and also to himself. We get enough glimpses into Kousuke's past to know that it's not that Rand had no interest in his son's life. In fact, Rand on many occasions is seen trying to instill something in Kousuke, trying to help him be aware of both his opportunities and privilege as well as the limitlessness of all that he could grow to be. I can only speculate, but with what we know, I have no doubts there was a lot of clever orchestration on Yui's part as to Rand's availability. They're both chairpersons of the company, and yet one of them was far more tied up - the one of them who is seen as more valuable to the family and company.

I want it made clear: what exists between Rand and Yui (and Kousuke) predates the affair and Nol. Yui was never a scorned lover who took things out on her lover's mistress and son. Had Rand never had an affair, he would still have been in this predicament with Yui and Kousuke, would have always struggled to reach his son as Yui continued to drive that wedge, to orchestrate their differences, to run interference. It was always Yui's intention that Rand be someone so completely out of reach of Kousuke that he would always be stuck vying for his attention, always trying to reach and surpass him, always so hungry or that approval that never came through. It just happened to be that Rand’s affair yielded another child, a potential heir (because it’s through Rand’s blood that the company goes), that she married this commoner man and afforded him everything she’d coveted and he embarrassed her, threw it all in her face, and made her look bad, created a threat to Kousuke’s position. But she already resented him, I think. She already had every intention of using Kousuke to take back what she believes is hers.

At some point, Rand must have grown exhausted, and maybe he gave up. Was that right, was that fair, when he had a child? When giving up hurt that child? When it comes to Rand, I think a lot about the safety demonstrations on airplanes, when they tell you not to try to help others (like your children) until you have helped yourself, until you've got your flotation device, your oxygen mask. If Rand himself is drowning, with Yui running laps around him running him ragged, how can he possibly help Kousuke? How can he possibly keep walking out into a hurricane, getting buffeted and thrown backwards by the wind, using all your energy just trying to catch up, much less ever getting where you need to be?

And that's the thing. When I say Rand's hands are tied, I don't mean it to absolve him - I say it to explain him. That Rand was always losing, that Yui has always had the upper hand. Rand has spent all of his time simply trying to catch up, much less ever getting to make an attack, much less ever getting to be a father.

I think a lot about the fact that at one time, Rand and Yui were separated, but they clearly never divorced. Why? What did he stand to lose if they did? I don't even mean just in his livelihood - though he certainly stood to lose a lot, and what happens to a mukoyoshi if they divorce, what assets would he lose? But more importantly: Rand stood to lose Kousuke. Even married to Yui he cannot protect Kousuke, but to be outside her reach? How much worse could it have been? Kousuke is already so incredibly isolated but we also know that Rand has tried to be Kousuke's father, that he has tried to reach out to him in ways that never reached Kousuke because of the interference Yui ran, because of the mindset that she had instilled in him as a young child that became such an inherent belief to him, because his love was commodified so that nothing he did or said to Kousuke could ever get through to this brain-washed child.

Another aspect of Rand's circumstances that are worth exploring is: he grew up an orphan. He was never adopted, he aged out of the system. Rand never had anyone to rely on, anyone to convey that warmth and love to him as a family might. He aged out and then took his life into his hands and became a self-made man with only his own back to rely on. Think about what that does to a person. Think about the way that might warp their perception of people and kindness and love. Maybe this was why it was so easy for him to choose a marriage for convenience. Maybe this was why he could pass up on the opportunity for real love. Maybe from a young age Rand was disillusioned, thought the world had nothing to offer him - the parallels between him and Nol are honestly staggering. Wouldn't it be so easy to make the choices he did, only to come to regret them later? To get a taste for something you thought impossible, or maybe something you thought you could give up, and be haunted by it?

It's not hard to surmise that Nessa must have been his true love, the one he could not quite give up, the one he couldn't let go of no matter how many years it had been since he made his choices, since he lost her, since everything went so wrong. And I think that as a result, it means that no matter what, his relationship with Nol would always, always be complicated. Nol would always be a reminder of what he had and what he lost - both in love and also in himself.

The parallels are truly staggering, and they extend far beyond the Rand Yui Nessa/Nol Alyssa Shinae cycle repeating itself. The kind of man young Nol described Rand as very much sounds like Yeonggi, like the kind of person Nol presented himself as. Yeonggi wasn't a mask just for Nol's friends - this was who everyone saw him as, including his family. Yeonggi was a means of staying off peoples' radars - never being so bad that he is in trouble, never being so great that he's also in trouble (with Yui and Kousuke). He was pleasant, got along with people, never caused trouble if he could help it. Not once was he roped into the family company - for better or for worse. He joked and laughed a lot, he seemed to always be there for friends. He was so much of what Nessa once saw in Rand.

Was it just that Nessa was the only person who drew that out of Rand? Or was it more of a parallel to Nol, that no matter how hard his life, these were integral core parts of him? Was he, at some point, taken advantage of? Did he trust the wrong person, reach out to someone undeserving? Was his kindness and friendship misconstrued by someone with far more nefarious intentions than he expected?

Something I can't help but think about a lot is the way that Rand always says what he means, but in cryptic ways, in ways Nol - and even often readers - cannot see through, that we have to reread again later. He never explains himself, never says what he means, and what is Nol to do with it, when everything Rand says comes off like a criticism of him no matter what? Much like Rand, Nol is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. Does he please Rand or does he protect himself? Ultimately, they both have Nol's survival in mind, but one looks far less like it.

Consider Rand's words to Nol at the Kim formal - I don't deny that Rand said truly awful things. Does he fully mean what he says? Probably, in more ways than he can explain. When he tells Nol that he should be at Alyssa's side before someone less pathetic than him catches her attention, it feels both like "Do not leave her alone in a place like this with people like this because she will naively trust the wrong person and end up in a dangerous situation" and also "Behaving like this will drive away people like her". Is this the advice Nol needs? From his perspective, no. From his perspective, Rand finds him pathetic, finds him frivolous, thinks he's childish for being so lonely that he seeks out friendship at any opportunity, thinks he acts out just to spite him.

But from Rand's perspective, perhaps he thinks he is preparing Nol for this life - the family, the company, their social circle - the only way he can. He cannot reach out to Nol. He cannot be a father to him, lest Nol get punished more simply for existing. Rand knows all too well. He knows all too well what Yui is capable of - what she has done - and knows that in order to protect Nol, he had to create a buffer, the distance. In a way, it's like he sacrificed his right to be his father in an effort to keep him safe. For better or worse, Nol belongs to this society, too. He, too, needs to be aware of those around him, know who he can trust. In Rand's perspective, maybe Nol DOES look like he's foolish, going around trying to befriend people who might really be someone looking to take advantage of his kindness, who might be in Yui's pocket, who might be someone who doesn't have Nol's well being in mind. In staying with Alyssa, he's also keeping Nol out of harm's way, because he's not getting involved with anything.

Even though what happened to Shinae at the formal was clearly about Kousuke, Gun, and possibly Rand, it did still ultimately involve Nol. It did still ultimately get him involved and hurt - he wound up arrested and blamed for a crime he didn't commit and later took the blame for in court. Rand isn't entirely wrong: when Nol gets involved, it leads to more trouble, because Yui will take any and every opportunity to make his life worse. Even though this wasn't her ultimate goal (and it could be seen that Nol pleading guilty is not what she expected because Nol needs to be around and near Kousuke in order to be effective against him) it still worked to her advantage that it further plays into Nol's image that the public holds against him, that ensures Yui will be believed over Nol.

Rand isn't wrong: Nol underestimates Yui greatly, because he believes everything is about him and doesn't see how much worse it is, how much more of a monster she is, that this isn't about the illegitimate bastard son being a blight against her marriage, that it was always about so much more. And unfortunately we have seen that Rand is correct about other things, too - about how Nol's emotions get the best of him and while the "shove your feelings down and repress them" route is also not correct and healthy, we can see and at least understand why Rand operates the way he does, why he worries the way he does about Nol.

When I say Rand's hands are tied, I mean this: I mean that Rand has never had the opportunity to be a father to his children because Yui has deliberately run interference between him and one and if he shows any sign of affection, any sign of preferential treatment, any indication that he is trying to protect the other, it would make things worse for him.

He knows this.

Rand probably has an inkling about the night Nol was taken away - the first time he lost Nol. More than anyone else, Rand knows who Yui is, but has always been powerless against her. Without any proof of what she does, what can he do? How do you tell people that she is abusive when she doesn't lay a hand on you? When people make jokes of male domestic abuse survivors? How do you get people to see something that barely exists - because Yui doesn't have to get her hands dirty, because she never has to be direct. How do you make people see it?

When I say Rand's hands are tied, I mean whatever choice he makes would never be perfect, would never be right. What if he did it, left Yui and went to be with Nessa and raise Nol. What would change? Kousuke would be left even more alone. At least until now Kousuke felt that he wasn't good enough to receive Rand's care (even as Rand gave it) but what if he was convinced he was abandoned? And anyway, would Yui have stopped had Rand left her? I doubt it. It was never about the infidelity. If anything, it might have been worse. How dare this man, this commoner, come into her family and embarrass her - THEM - this way, to be given everything no one would give her just because he married her and then throw it away for what? Love? For a healthy relationship? To throw away everything she has coveted and worked so hard for? It would be such a slap to the face, an insult to her.

I don't think there was anything Rand could have done that would be "right". Yui would never let him know peace even if he left. If he fought harder, tried harder, maybe she'd have taken him down sooner. Perhaps not - she needed him to get this far so that Kousuke had someone to work towards, so that Kousuke can surpass him - but that doesn't mean she wouldn't have run him more ragged.

Do I agree with every choice he makes? Of course not. But I acknowledge that in his position, his choices are limited. I also acknowledge that in a man like him who has had to repress his emotions (lest Yui have something more to use against him), who has had to deny that he deeply cares (lest Yui continue to use that against him, to leverage it against him), who has been trying his damndest to survive and to help his sons survive when at every opportunity Yui is there to interfere has limited his choices. I understand where his agitation and fear and anger meet and how sometimes they are the same: how he wishes that Nol was never born because none of this would be so bad because if he'd never fathered another child then he wouldn't stand the possibility of being heir there would be no threat - that Nessa might still be alive, that Nol would never have existed to endure the abuse he did. I understand how he can mean and not mean the terrible things because he knows his role in all of this - that this was never about the infidel but it's still about the infidel, that Nol was always in danger no matter where he was. Reading 149 was the first time I really noticed, on a more immediate level - the way Rand speaks in double meanings, and how his fear and anger come out so often in what he says to Nol, because of how much he fears for him, because of how helpless he’s always been to protect him. “Why do you have to be my son?” Because maybe he both regrets that Nol is his son but more than that - what it means for him to be his son, the danger it put him in – that were he anyone else’s son, Yui wouldn’t have cared about him. He wouldn’t be in a position where he ever had to stand before the judge at all, let alone plead guilty for a crime he didn’t commit. “Why am I even trying, all of the effort will just go to waste”. And is he wrong? No matter the outcome, what good is all this effort? Not only that Nol himself can’t read Rand’s mind, but what if it went differently? Yui doesn’t stop - she has no intention and Rand knows it! If not this, it would be something else! “I should have just sent you away to boarding school from the very start.” Again, I don’t deny that a part of Rand probably means what he says, but I think the secondary meaning is still clear - at least if he’d sent Nol away maybe, just maybe, it could have protected him better. Maybe Rand thought keeping him close would be better, where he could see what was going on, maybe he worried he’d be in more danger if he couldn’t monitor him. Maybe a part of him couldn’t help but send away that one tie he had to Nessa - their child - had wanted to protect him for her.

I think that's the difficult thing about Rand. On some level, he acknowledges that thing are worse because Nol exists - but not in a "I hate my child" way but the guilt of a man who knows his child has suffered for his choices, the guilt of a man who knows that two peoples' (three when we include Kousuke, four when we include his own) lives have been ruined because of choices he made. It's not that Rand doesn't love his children - it's that he loves them so incredibly much and he is powerless to help them, that the effort he makes is never good enough that it makes it worse that it can't get through. That's the great tragedy: Rand was always damned if you do, damned if you don't, and it doesn't absolve him of the hurt he's caused Nol, but I also step back and acknowledge: what could he have done differently, that wouldn't have further endangered Nol? On some level, Rand has done what he thought was right. Only in hindsight can you look back and see how your choices were wrong, but even in hindsight you can only speculate, can only suppose. Would it have been better to send Nol away to boarding school, where he could have been away from everything? But that’s the thing with Yui, isn’t it? Her reach seems to extend as far as she wills it and she always gets her way. If she didn’t want Nol to go to a boarding school, she’d still find a way to stop it. And what if Rand had said screw it, stood up to her? Everything Rand did was ultimately to keep Nol and Kousuke alive, even if it was at the detriment of their relationship. He could have more openly defied Yui, but would she have let him get away with it? And who would protect Nol and Kousuke in his absence, if she did away with him sooner rather than later, if he went from being a fun game to an obstacle to be eliminated? 

Rand was always doomed to fail. That is the thing about Yui's trap - she was always set to have that advantage, Rand has always been trying to keep up. There was never a route where he succeeds here, because she always has the upperhand. What could Rand do for either of his sons that wouldn't have backfired? In a way, Rand's game has really been about the long haul. At some point, he must've known he'd never get to be their fathers. He tried! He continued to try. His methods aren't good but he tries to protect Nol, he tries to get through to Kousuke, he tries to give them the comfort he never had the opportunity to, but it's too late, it's all too late, but they are alive and that is what matters.

When Rand shows up after that night of absolute concern and worry, concerned about both of his sons, for the second time he runs the risk of losing Nol. He knows that it's too late, that nothing he can do at this point will help. He knows that at this point it's better to walk away, to leave Nol in the hands of those who can openly love him and openly take care of him, in the hands of those who don't endanger his life for caring. But we know that Rand loves him, no matter how much he has let his fear and anger mix up. We know what it has cost him, what he has lost.

The version of Rand that Nessa spoke of has never shown up. I don't think it's not that he never existed - it's that somewhere along the way he lost himself, the price he paid for perhaps the mistakes he made or the greatness he amassed. Maybe it was both. But he lost himself. He lost his sense of self, his identity. He lost both his sons, in more than one way. Rand, like so many others, is a character whose choices are rooted in his efforts at survival - but unlike others who are struggling to survive themselves, Rand's choices have been rooted so heavily in trying to help his children survive, too. He, more than anyone else, knows how dangerous Yui truly is, knows what she is capable of, knows that this is not only about Nol was never about Nol or the infidel, that it was always about more.

And yes, part of the tragedy is that when it comes to these cycles of abuse, sometimes the abused goes on to abuse, too. Rand closed himself off, repressed his feelings, tried to pretend he doesn't care, tried to hide how much he cared, and it still had ramifications. He did this to protect himself but look how it hurt others. And had done the opposite, it would have further hurt him and them. Something we as an audience come to realize is that Yui is so skilled at her manipulation, her execution of abuse, how she uses everything against everyone. Even her own son tries to hide his interests from her, tries to shut her out of his life because he, too, knows all too well what happens when Yui catches wind of any interest. So Rand closes himself off, he becomes an isolated fortress, an impenetrable island of a man that no one can reach and can reach no one. Maybe it's better, in his mind, that he was a cold, terrible father than one who couldn't protect him.

But the unfortunate truth is: there was so little Rand could ever do to protect them. He failed them, and not for lack of trying, but regardless, it was a failure still. And worse, because he was so blinded to what was happening, because so much of it was happening out of his line of sight, not only did he fail to protect Nol, but he drove him to another unforseen danger, one that he had hoped might be a life raft after all.

In the end, a man struggling cannot do much to save others when eh can barely save himself.

In the end, when Yui ties someone's hands, she does so expertly.

#I Love Yoo #ILY Brainrot #Randulph Hirahara #Yui Hiraha #Nolan Oliver T. Lochlainn #Kousuke Hirahara #Nessa Lochlainn #there's a lot going on in this post and it's mostly me exploring my new favorite subject: that in some way everyone is trying to survive #that Rand is such a polarizing character but also in his position what could he have done differently and it been better? #that this doesn't absolve him of the hurt he has caused but that also as a readers i can understand his choices #and that it sucks #everything about ILY is a tragedy the more you look at it #even Yui is a tragedy I think #and it's just so devastating that these tragedies continue to hurt over and over and over #I understand why people hate Rand and that's fine but #i also hope people understand that Rand has very much had his hands tied all along #that i don't think there was ever anything he could have done differently to yield a better outcome #and that is so depressing

[mrsmess]

Brutal Binaries: Characterization in Gilmore Girls and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Books and literature are important in Amy Sherman-Palladino’s stories, if not as interests among many of the characters then as a system for references. In Gilmore Girls, literature is painted as being Rory’s biggest interest, and Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead is featured as one of her favorite books. Rand’s ideas of strength and weakness appear in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel too and is partly crystalized through Abe Weissman’s line, repeated by Midge in the pilot: “Don’t pick a weak husband!” making it clear that strength of character is an important indicator of value in these stories. It seems fair to assume that there’s an idea of what weakness consists of for contrast. This text is meant to explore what ASP’s definition of those terms might be, using her characters as material.

ASP’s main female characters share or have many overlapping traits: They are charming, not too concerned with propriety, and those who are seem to be in a habit of dominating those social games. They are all flawed in their separate or collective ways but sympathetic, both in the eyes of the viewer and the surrounding characters. They are loved.  

The male characters generally serve as the more destructive or distractive forces in these stories. When the male characters make mistakes, they will normally have more trouble than their female counterparts recovering from them, having their arcs end in tragedy or villainy. Mind you, these terms are used loosely as this kind melodrama rarely plays out in full in ASP’s worlds. She writes the folly of everyday life, will normalize even the darkest narrative turns with humor, and her capacity for writing humanity makes you feel for characters even when you as a viewer long since have lost the will to sympathize with them, and that is a great feat. It is clear that she loves her characters, even the undeserving ones. All the same, ASP often uses binaries, scales, to measure how worthy a character is. Strong or weak. A character might possess strength and be forgiven for a whole bunch of other flaws, but a character being a particular brand of weakness will be unredeemable.

For reference: Rand’s definition of weakness, at least in The Fountainhead, is the lack of self. Keating’s weakness is not that he’s unsympathetic - even if he is, just like Roark – but that he has no vision, no personality of his own, he is defined entirely by others’ expectations and opinions of him. Roark is the polar opposite, he needs the approval of no one, is pure drive towards his visions which generally no one gets but him. It is worth noting that him being wildly unpopular affects his ability to make ends meet, while Keating gains success.

Most of ASP’s heroines are portrayed as naturally possessing strength with a few anomalies, they make mistakes, have to complete their learning curves, but in the end, get back on the right path. The right path is the one leading them to themselves, allowing them to fulfill their visions or individual narratives. To live one’s own life, not someone else’s, is imperative to these characters’ stories. Often the heroine’s journey will be one of choosing between what is right and what is easy. She will occasionally choose wrong, which will be illustrated by her incapacity to maintain her decision, she cannot hold back her inner strength, its tide will rip her from what’s easy, from the status quo, and funnel her closer to what is right.  

There I go, using over-dramatic terms again, not necessarily applicable on ASP’s particular brand of drama; What is right does for instance not necessarily mean morally or ethically right, even though it will often host an aspect of those, but mainly it’ll mean what is right for the character – what enables her to fulfill her true potential. 

These binaries; right and easy, strong and weak, will have representation in the shape of other characters. In MM the scale is made up of Susie, representing what is right, and Joel, representing what is easy. The same parallel can be drawn to GG’s Lorelai, who’s binary consists of Luke and Christopher, and many will argue that Rory’s would be made up of Jess and Logan. The contrast also exists in many other characters, and is sometimes fluent, depending on comparison and on whether they’re main or secondary characters.

The comparison holds more water when we look closer at the different characters. The traits shared by the “easy-path-characters”, henceforth known as EPC’s, are: privilege, playfulness, charm and wit to match the lady’s, impulsiveness and to different extents thrill seeking behavior, while at the same time avoiding confrontations with the heroine. The wealth or materialism is important because it provides the comfort of the easy existence available to Midge, Lorelai and Rory, but there are always strings attached, usually a demand that you compromise part of yourself.

The EPC’s might have an inflated ego or at least a sense of entitlement, paradoxically paired with a low sense of self. This seems to derive from being raised in the lap of luxury while being treated like a mere part of a fancy exterior. They are tied up in tradition, family, and walking their own paths, would be at the expense of their privilege. They have been taught that they are nothing without it which leads to a perpetual sense of being worthless outside that very specific context. This makes them incapable of fully appreciating the impact they have, or could have on the heroine’s life which means that they instead wind up failing her in some way.  

All EPC’s also supply gateways to tradition via marriage. Something the female leads share an aversive attitude towards, for different reasons, in this respect Midge is something of an anomaly because she starts out exceedingly happy in her gilded cage, but outgrows it as the series progress. The marriages depicted as positive or lasting in the stories always consists of a careful and complex balance between the spouses, and is not static, but a living, breathing, changing thing of its own.

Let’s take a look at the other end of the scale, the “right-path-characters”, henceforth known as RPC’s. Their shared traits are anti-social behavior, different degrees of unpopularity, low social status and lack of wealth, or in Luke’s case an unwillingness to flaunt it. All of these “lacks”, self-chosen or otherwise, signals an indifference to public opinion, that in turn may be translated to strength, or ASP’s idea of it, a form of incorruptibility. They share harsh backgrounds, with absent or incapacitated parental figures forcing them to make their own way from early on, and to protect, sometimes viciously and unwarranted, themselves. Their personal integrity is strong, their endurance high. They are aware of how little they matter, their insignificance, in the grand scheme of things, but know, or learn, that they at least can change things for themselves and for the people they care about. 

And that’s another thing: words and actions. The RPC’s will use words carefully or remain silent, they will often let actions speak for them instead – making them an interesting contrast to the always chatty heroine. Honesty is important, even when it’s harsh. These characters make it clear that the approval of others doesn’t matter, meaning that the things they do say can be trusted.  

“You have to pick your friends as if there’s a war going on!” Abe says moments later in the aforementioned scene, another testament to the choices ASP might have her heroines make at the end of the day. Trust is vital, and betrayal is unacceptable. But not that our heroines don’t try to accept, forgive and love. We, as viewers do that too. We try.

Lorelai’s and Christopher’s backstory is the very thing that both makes you root for them and simultaneously see how hopeless it is. On paper it looks great, same wit, same world, a child together, and you could base the fall of Christopher on plenty of things from the original show, if you wanted to. But I won’t get into those now, mainly because the ship has sailed, or sunk, if you will, before we even meet him. He’s not around, he hasn’t been around, and even though he has a good enough excuse - he was a kid – he is a father that in a best-case scenario will have to play the role of step dad to his own child, because he wasn’t there. The last we see of him is in the revival; He’s been swallowed by the business he didn’t want to go into, by a family he didn’t want, and by oblivion, when his daughter asks him not to come to Lorelai’s wedding. It is sad.  

Looking at Joel: He’s a klutz, not realizing what he has in his great wife, taking out his failings on her, he’s ignorant as to his role and responsibility in his own life, and lacks the ability to foresee what his actions will do to both him and his family. None the less, we as viewers see him with the eyes of Midge and might find him endearing. However, the match is impossible. The balance between them is off. She’s so much, as Joel himself notes, he is so little, because of the rash, and childish decisions he’s made so far, and the only redemption arc available to him is realizing and accepting that he is inadequate. He and Christopher have an eerily similar arc in that respect.

The strength it takes to go out on your own, to follow your own path, is a reoccurring theme in these shows. Independence is paramount but not an easy choice, all our heroines face this, as well as the EPC’s, and RPC’s, but with different results. 

It is worth noting that all of the EPC’s double as romantic options, whereas the RPC’s don’t, necessarily. Even though Luke is endgame, there’s a romantic history with Jess, and a hinted undertone romance with Susie (people referring to her as Midge’s boyfriend, as well as season one’s final show-down being between her and Joel), the RPC’s mainly supply support in areas where our heroines doubt or have lost confidence in themselves, functioning as guides of sorts allowing the heroines to thrive from the interactions.  

The point might be that women often are taught define themselves from their romantic lives, something men are rarely expected to do to the same extent, and that the only way to be whole is to figure out who you are, and what you’re capable of without some other half. Seems basic enough, but it is a lesson worth repeating. And if you should opt for the romance after that, ”you want a husband who’ll take a bullet for you!” Abe says. 

#meta #gilmore girls #the marvelous mrs. maisel #potential spoilers #comparative analysis #possible gibberish #literature

[numinous00]

RAWA answers questions!!

This is an “in-cavern” (but not in-character) interview with RAWA 2.0 from a couple of years ago (oct 2015) that I just stumbled across. I’d never seen it before so thought I’d post it here in case anyone else missed it too. It’s mostly D’ni language stuff. Quite interesting.

Click the link - http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=28054&start=15 or the “read more”

(Max): So in short, what was the inspiration or the basis for the D'ni language? Can you tell a bit about the origins of it? I suppose it's very Non-English, but does it for instance have any Arabic, Hindi, Japanese or some Asian influences? Or any correlation to other common languages and speech patterns? RAWA: Hmm... I realize that most will not understand this, but it is very difficult for me to be OOC as 'RAWA v2.0' here rather than IC 'Dr. Watson' when I'm literally 'In the Cavern'. It just feels so wrong. Having said that, it is an interesting story that I don't think has been told before, so we might as well go for it. Just don't tell Dr. Watson or the other DRC members. RAWA: I have always loved languages of all kinds. Just the idea that (somewhat) arbitrary combinations of sounds, and/or symbols could be imbued with 'meaning' is cool. A secret 'code' that groups of people more or less try to adhere to, to imperfectly share information with each other. What I say is not necessarily what you hear, even if we supposedly speak the same language. This is why I joke about taking things literally. Everything I hear, I try to 'hear' as many different interpretations as possible, and pick the most literal to respond to, even if I know they meant one of the other possible interpretations. It drives people nuts. A very simple example: My son: 'Can I have a soda?' Me: 'I believe you are 'able' to, but you are not 'allowed' to.' This comes from years of typing up email responses and having to go through every single word over and over, knowing y'all were going to dissect every syllable. BTW - Don't dissect this, please. It won't stand up to it. I got used to trying to guess what would be misinterpreted and trying to be very specific to address those reactions before they happened. I was not always successful, but I did always do my best to try to be clear, even if the answer was basically, 'I can't tell you that, yet.' Back to the language story. In sixth grade, I had the chance to take just a little bit of German during our lunch breaks. The idea that not just words changed from language to language, but entire modes of thinking fascinated me. Then in high school, I took two years of Spanish. A whole 'nother mindset. New grammar concepts. I don't remember many of the specifics, but the basic concept stuck with me. The rules are pretty arbitrary and could theoretically be just about anything. The important thing is that everyone agrees to abide by them and use them the same way, or no meaning can be conveyed from person to person. What I say is not what you hear if we do not agree on how the 'code' should be encoded/decoded. Some of this is unavoidable, because we bring our own experiences to the conversation. When I say the word "watermelon", my concept of "watermelon" is slightly different than your concept of "watermelon". When I say "watermelon", I remember eating waaaay too much watermelon when I was very young and getting sick from it. I could not eat watermelon again for years, and I still do not really eat it. If you never had a negative experience with watermelon, you probably do not have any of those connotations connected to it. Back to languages, sorry for the bunny trail. My next "languages" were from Tolkien. Wow. Clearly he had waaaay too much time on his hands. Amazing. Inspriring. Then came Hebrew. All just basic stuff, no formal classes, just bits and pieces I was picking up. After that was Tenctonese from a movie called Alien Nation (Mandy Patinkin, 1988). Their language in the movie was very complicated with clicks and pops and they had a script that looked like an EKG heartbeat with dots and wavy lines. I tried to figure out if they did all the work to make it real, or if they just faked it with randomness. Turns out it was pretty detailed. Cool. Then the TV series Alien Nation came out. Still good, but the language in the TV show was a simpler version. Knowing how long it takes to translate, and how hard it is to get actors to say "gibberish" in the first place, I certainly understood. The TV show's version of the language was easy to figure out. Standard English word order for the grammar. Many words were simply anagrams of their English counterparts. I recorded every episode on VHS tape, and watched it back. Keeping track of the subtitles. Learning new words. "Tagdot tay monga su. To tay mish uray." = "Tagdot (a character name) is among us. It is his time." (This is 25 year-old memory. I believe I am remembering it correctly, but I may have messed it up a little.) The point was - they got an "A" for effort from me - that it wasn't just random. When I started at Cyan, Myst's other languages were gibberish. See Achenar's recordings to the Channelwood natives. That was all recorded before I was hired. When it came time for Riven, I asked if I could take a stab at it. It might not be perfect. It might not be pretty. But it wouldn't just be random. I could at least do something like the TV version of Alien Nation did. I had no idea what I was getting into. I was always a good student. I was a pro at English grammar. "linking verbs: have, has, had, do, does, did, am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been", "Types of sentences: declarative, interrogative, imperative, exclamatory", "Pronouns: nominative, possessive, objective", "who/whom?" "11 rules for the comma" No problem. I had a great English teacher, Miss Gaupp. She's 84 now, and still teaches English! Her father lived to be 105. so she might teach a whole 'nother generation! D'ni was mostly based on Hebrew as far as the alphabet structure works. Hebrew uses a dot on some of the letters to change some consonants from a fricative like "v" to a stop like "b". Tongue and lips are in the same basic position, the dot just tells you if you completely stop the air or not. For vowels, Hebrew usually uses an extra letter a yud (y) to make a dipthong. I simplified it a little and used the same dot that is used for consonants, only when it's on a vowel, it becomes a dipthong, usually sliding from the original sound to an "ee" sound. The language using suffixes and prefixes to show number, subject, etc. are concepts I remembered from Hebrew and Spanish. Small words attach together (agglutenative) "And, the, etc." attach to the words they modify. Hebrew and German do this. The number system and alphabet evolved together - this is from Hebrew. The combination of base 5 and base 25 came from the idea: what if I use my right hand to count like tick marks and my left hand to keep track of how many sets of tick marks I have. Their coordinate system (polar coordinates) came from Rand first. I am starting a website where I plan to start releasing more and more information about D'ni. Stuff that has not been released before. It's an ambitious project. It sounds good on paper, but in my current state I am coming up with ideas much, much more quickly than I can ever hope to execute them. My To-Do list gets exponentially longer. We're going to need a lot more "back burners" on our proverbial stove. And once i'm back to work full-time on Obduction, these new projects are definitely going to take a hit. (Zeke): Could you give us a little more background on the bahro (something we dont know about them) and where the bahro concept came from? RAWA: Sorry, Zeke. I still hold too much hope that we will be able to reveal that in a game or novel to just spill it now. RAWA v2.0 may be chattier than RAWA v1.0 was, but I still would rather you experience these things for yourself than simply be told them. (Zeke): Why is Myst island closed off to the public did you plan to have Myst island released to the public at some point? RAWA: In Uru, I expect? Yes, like everything else when Uru was initially designed - we were leaving ourselves a great deal of freedom for future expansion. (Zeke): Where are the D'ni bathrooms? Did they have ages that they went to for the bathroom? RAWA: My long-running, standard answer for that is: "That's why we don't allow you to swim in Myst..." (Zeke): Why was the jump feature so important in this game? RAWA: When you plan a game that is meant to evolve and change and grow over time, you want as many options on the table as possible. As many arrows in your quiver, tools in your belt, spices in your cupboard, [insert your analogy here] as you can get. Especially when it comes to puzzle creation. You wan the flexibility to make completely new kinds of puzzles than were made anywhere in the game before. Don't get me started on the original plans for the pods (Negilahn). Picking things up with your hands, for example. Kicking the traps into place in Eder Kemo. That was never meant to be the final interface. But it worked as a stop-gap until grabbing/ holding/pushing could be implemented at a later time. Then Uru was canceled before it began, and all those grand plans sit unfulfilled. (Acorn1): We know from a recent interview with David Wingrove that a draft of the Book of Marrim exists. But we also know it's been on the back burner for years. You've told us not to give up on it. Is there anything you can tell us about what would need to happen to that draft in order to ready it for publication? RAWA: It's on my bucket list. It won't be great if I write it, but there are several critical bits in it that have to be told, and told right. The rest of the "filler" story, I don't care quite so much about. The outline we worked on with David was good and all, but <shrug>. (Mister Magic): Are there any updates in the pipeline that you can let us know a bit about? RAWA: Which pipeline? MOULa? I'm out of that loop, sorry. Obduction? We are hard at work. I have been in the office several times, briefly. Much to my wife's frustration. On Thursday, Ryan Warzecha literally asked me one question that I had to think about. It completely drained me, and I had to stop to recharge. My RAWA v2.0 joke about the upgrade is more accurate than you probably think. As soon as I try to engage my brain in any meaningful way, I immediately, literally feel myself slow down. The clock starts ticking, and my energy is quickly dissipated. The more of my brain I try to use at once, the faster the energy is gone. So the joke now is that they get to ask me one question per day, and that's it. (Tai'lahr): I greatly enjoyed the YouTube video of you singing, RAWA, so my question is: Is there any chance you could be convinced to submit a song or two to be played during the weekly Uru Karaoke event? RAWA: You're too kind. It's awful. I was too tired to play well or sing well. The lyrics drive me crazy when they "pop" a word down to the next line as they expand. But it did its job - proves I have all the pieces to make -something- work. Now it just needs some love and time. RAWA: More stuff will be placed on my YouTube channel. I've already recorded the next one, I'm just working on the graphics and lyrics. Once that next one's up, I'll go back to redo As a Deer. That was mainly for my aunt. it's her favorite song that i play (cskid13): Can we call the content that is currently being created by the Intangibles "canon?" So, in other words, will their version of Kahlo be the "real" Kahlo, etc.? (cskid13) RAWA: Our philosophy has not changed. What happens in the Cavern happens in the Cavern. We just roll with the punches and try to weave everything into the story as best we can. We certainly didn't plan for any of the Cavern closings, but they are part of the story now. If y'all make Kahlo, it will be some version of Kahlo. If the DRC ever gets funding to come back, they might find an "older" Book that links to another version of Kahlo, just like your Yeesha book does. (maggie696): this brings our prepared questions to an end. We have only one last request - that you would visit us more often RAWA: Hope springs eternal that we eventually have to officially "burn that bridge while we're crossing it" (tm).

#myst #d'ni #cyan #rawa

[lindyhunt]

After Introducing the World to Donald Trump, Can Reality TV Save Us?

On May 31, 2000, Survivor premiered on CBS. And 17 years later, it gave us an American president.

As our first foray into reality TV, Survivor delivered an unconventional approach not just to competition shows but to programming in general. By appealing to our collective practice of voyeurism, the series urged us to pledge allegiances (or the opposite) to contestants like winner Richard Hatch or the polarizing Susan Hawk before abandoning them for a new cast the next season. And that was novel: Game shows acquainted us with “real people” for single episodes, and sitcoms gave us fictional characters, but with reality TV we could finally root for personalities. And where MTV’s The Real World thrived during the 1990s, the new brand of reality TV wasn’t about social discourse—it was cutthroat. Ultimately, Survivor created a type of Fight Club for a PG audience, and we loved every minute of it.

For a few precious years, that’s all we wanted. Survivor gave way to The Bachelor, Top Chef, Big Brother, The Amazing Race, American Idol, The Biggest Loser and America’s Next Top Model and fed off the premise of winning, losing and shaming and championing people we believed we now knew. We aligned ourselves with contestants who reflected our values and goals and condemned anyone who didn’t. Above all, we chose to ignore how real these shows weren’t, playing into the hands of producers who were masters of editing.

Since reality TV was cheap to make, networks soon branched into different genres that strayed from the original competitive landscape.

And masters of programming, too. Since reality TV was cheap to make, networks soon branched into different genres that strayed from the original competitive landscape: We lived vicariously through persons of privilege via The Simple Life, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, The Real Housewives, Laguna Beach and The Hills while we laughed at the lives of the housemates in Jersey Shore, thanks to its abundance of booze, clubs, spray tans and poor decision making. Series like House Hunters and Escape to the Country offered comfy spots from which we could be flies on the wall, while Teen Mom took those same spots and made them less comfortable as we were confronted with a type of reality that many of us choose not to pay attention to.

By the 2010s, reality TV had morphed into its own entity. And despite the contrasts in shows, lineups and premises, it always celebrated one overarching theme: pointing a camera at the sides of humanity we’re not used to seeing. The thing is, the American election made doing that less an extension of entertainment and more of a bona fide horror film.

Despite the contrasts in shows, lineups and premises, it always celebrated one overarching theme: pointing a camera at the sides of humanity we’re not used to seeing.

When The Apprentice premiered in 2004, anyone who believed it would lead to the election of a new president obviously had access to a DeLorean. At the time, Donald Trump had established himself as a larger-than-life businessman and media personality, but his Apprentice catchphrase (“You’re fired”) seemed almost harmless—proof of his ruthlessness but digestible enough that a child viewer could repeat it and earn laughs. Plus, personalities like season one’s Omarosa rose to prominence by their willingness to do anything for the job, which, in turn, served to make Trump seem like a glorified moderator or (gasp) a voice of reason. So as The Apprentice continued, Trump became less like a man and more like a character. And we know what came next.

Trump used sound bites and catchphrases to stoke the fire of an already-polarized political landscape. He stood for everything and for nothing and used his social media platforms as an extension of his “reality” by bullying and condemning his opponents while morphing into what he believed people wanted him to be. By 2016, he was a living, breathing, unedited reality-TV character. And it was our lust for such a faux brand of reality that created the cultural climate he could grow in.

So, in response, reality TV shifted. And while our zest for competitiveness has been ingrained for centuries (spoiler: it isn’t going anywhere), TV began to soften it and introduced series like The Great British Bake Off and RuPaul’s Drag Race where contestants competed but under an umbrella of kindness and empathy—two largely previously unexplored themes.

Where older competition ones often thrived on meanness, current reality TV dismisses it almost entirely by offering a gateway into worlds where competitors not only like one another but have one another’s backs.

These series also began to offer an escape. Where older competition ones often thrived on meanness, current reality TV dismisses it almost entirely by offering a gateway into worlds where competitors not only like one another but have one another’s backs. On Bake Off, contestants rush to save another’s creation before worrying about their own, while Drag Race sees competitors open up about their traumas and difficulties, usually with the support of everyone they’re talking to. Terrace House, another comfort-watch, offers nothing but a home of peaceful cohabiters. Its premise is built entirely on watching several humans merely peacefully exist.

The thing is, reality TV has always aspired to show us a side of the world we don’t get to see outright. In the 2000s, it was brazenly showing off our tendencies toward Ayn Rand-like selfishness and competitive natures. In 2018, it is televised proof that people, despite how it is starting to feel, can be kind, good and decent.

Which is a tall order considering that reality TV, while still beloved, is hardly the novelty it was less than a decade ago. Arguably, social media has replaced certain aspects of it. Instead of watching the way a person is edited onscreen, we get to see who they really are via the art of 280 characters (and by their own hand). Our ideas about what “reality” even means are now skewed, especially since the former reality-TV star president has parlayed stories he doesn’t like about himself into the concept of “fake news.” So, at this point, nothing seems real. And now, despite all of this, reality TV wants us to believe kindness does exist.

So, at this point, nothing seems real. And now, despite all of this, reality TV wants us to believe kindness does exist.

And that’s an ironic gesture that’s also come way too late. As the 2000s ushered in an era built on competition—not making friends—it also began making the worst parts of humanity not just acceptable but entertaining. After all, it’s not the names of “nice” or “kind” competitors that we remember but, rather, the names of those we’ve been set up to hate. The Simple Life, iconic in its early popularity, invited viewers to laugh equally at stars Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie (and at their collective ignorance and privilege) and the farming family they were stuck staying with. Teen Mom, while a sometimes-interesting take on socio-economic and familial difficulties that can come with a young, unplanned pregnancy, is often framed as mere entertainment whose stars end up on the covers of weekly tabloids or in porn. Survivor continues with bigger challenges, higher stakes and more room for the contestants to rally against one another. And even the positive steps that reality TV is making aren’t big enough: The Bachelorette only cast its first black woman lead last year, after more than a decade of setting a precedent with blond and brunette white stars, and in the wake of the latest season of The Great British Bake Off, rumours of tension between judge Paul Hollywood and new host Noel Fielding eclipsed the work of the bakers.

Reality TV may want to save us—but only as long as the ratings keep coming in.

Which we should expect. The reason series like Bake Off, Terrace House and Drag Race feel so precious is because they are. They are bankable proof that even at our most competitive, not everyone is willing to kick someone when they’re down or to cheer for themselves over the well-being of their fellow contestants. But these TV shows are also novel. As popular as they are, they’re still not the status quo. They are just enough proof that not everybody is garbage and not every reality-TV host will be a dark mark upon our history. They are the bone we’ve needed pop culture to throw us so we can still have a fraction of hope. They are what we cling to when our own reality feels like too much. They are another extreme.

They are the bone we’ve needed pop culture to throw us so we can still have a fraction of hope. They are what we cling to when our own reality feels like too much. They are another extreme.

Reality TV has never been an accurate reflection of the state of our world. Its legacy has been to exacerbate the worst and best parts of us while teaching us new ways to use and consume social media, celebrities and political figures. It has always urged us to be the worst versions of ourselves, because that is what is “real,” what is “normal.” And while flaws and complications and complexities and bad decisions and being The Worst are a huge part of being a person, reality TV tends to forget that those traits can be balanced with the good stuff, too. It doesn’t have to be either-or. Most people can just be.

And most people are. The people we see on reality TV are highly edited and reduced to sound bites. They are characters. And that’s because our day-to-day reality isn’t watchable. It’s mundane, it’s tedious, it’s beautiful, it’s any collection of words. So, while reality TV may now be serving us Drag Race and Bake Off as a way to counter the damage it has caused, it’s also on us to recognize our own complicity in the reality-TV boom of 2000 and beyond. Because without our viewership, our own realities wouldn’t have begun to shift in the wake of reality TV’s influence. Which means that the harshest realization of all is that no matter what reality TV aspires to do, the only way we can be saved is by acknowledging what’s actually real—and then saving ourselves from it.