’13 Reasons Why’ Made Me Cry {Again}: Why We Need To Think a Little Bit More Before We Act.
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I’ve just cried my way through the finale of the current season of 13 Reasons Why, much like I cried my way through last season’s finale.
If you haven’t seen it, I strongly urge you to grab a box of tissues and work your way through the two seasons. It’s not easy viewing, but it is important viewing.
And, just like last season, I’m left with a whole lot of thoughts about the themes in the series, but one of the main things that struck me this time is how careless people can be with each other.
Now, I know the program is about teenagers, but a lot of their emotions, inner struggles, and confusion is the same as a lot of what we go through as adults. The only difference is, we (supposedly) are better equipped to find solutions.
Kids Being Adults and Adults Being Kids
The fact is that those kids are dealing with adult situations. And before the comments start that “It’s only a TV program,” the situations they showcase in the series are very real. If you don’t believe me, ask a rape victim. Or the parent of a child who chose to kill themselves, or someone struggling with the reality of bullying.
The nastiness of the bad guy in the series was difficult to watch, the nasty acts performed by some of the kids was also hard to watch. But nastiness is blatant.
When you’re nasty enough to think about raping someone, and then to go through with the act, that’s deliberate. You have deliberately set out to commit that evil. And you know that act will have consequences. You may not care about those consequences, and you might not think you’ll ever have to face them, but you know they’re there.
When you’re careless, you don’t know what those consequences will be. It never occurs to you that there will be any consequences. And while I firmly believe that you are not responsible for how other people react to things, I do think that, as a society, we need to think a little bit more before we act.
We need to be aware that comments, looks, actions that we don’t care enough about, to give a second thought to, may be huge to whoever receives them. Just because it means nothing to us doesn’t mean it’s not important to someone else.
Where Does Responsibility Begin and End? (spoiler alert)
Most of those kids in the program believed that they were partly responsible for Hannah’s death. Whether you believe that or not, I think we would probably all agree that Bryce Walker was horrible. He did a nasty thing. Deliberately. And he didn’t care.
But the others didn’t. Their behavior wasn’t nasty, it was careless. They didn’t deliberately set out to hurt Hannah, and nobody expected her to kill herself. The result of Hannah’s very deliberate act was an enormous amount of pain for everyone else, and those who were careless with Hannah’s feelings only hurt themselves when her death revealed the damage their carelessness had caused.
If all that pain could be avoided by just giving a second thought before opening your mouth, wouldn’t it be worth that second or two of your time?
I know, I know, they’re teenagers, and teenagers don’t always think before they act.
Neither do adults.
Isn’t it time we did?
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Fiona Tate is a ‘wordcaster’ who spends her days making magic with the written word. She guides women who are childless by circumstance (she refers to them as Valties — Valued, Valkyrie, Aunties) to find new passions and purpose in their lives. Fiona’s own passions include mental health issues, women’s rights, and her crusade to teach the world that women who are childless not by choice still have a lot of value to give and a lot of love to share. She lives in a small seaside village in New Zealand, and prefers to be addressed by her full title: Countess Drusilla Steele.
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