Well, most recently was something that happened today, with my roommate, Abdul. We had a discussion about how characters, good and bad, can be relateable. I agree that even a terrible murderer who is the worst villain in some show, yes they can have a part of a back story that is relateable, it is meant to be written that way... But, we diverged on whether or not horrible people in movies and TV can be good people.
According to Abdul, the scum that walks the earth and murders and rapes with no reason, they can be "good people", as long as you can relate to them. My opinion is that if you wantonly commit horrendous crimes, you are NOT a good person, despite if I empathize that you were sexually abused as a child, like I was. (Do you see me killing people? No.)
To offer examples I am going to have to give some spoilers of Breaking Bad, and then Walking Dead. End spoilers will be written when done.
SPOILERS
A character who is a main character in Breaking Bad falls into crime because he is trying to get money for his family, while he still is able to... In the process he eventually becomes a cold killer, who doesn't even blink at death any longer-even almost killing a kid-, and he becomes selfish and self-involved in what he is doing. He reaches a point that he no longer needs money, and he is merely involved in crime, violence, and harming others, even his family, merely because he enjoys it.
I say that he has become a bad person. My roommate says that he is still a good person because once he was good. The character is extremely like my father, though. My father was a wonderful parent and person before my mother died, but after she died he changed. He became cold hearted and distant, he became so self-involved with his new life, he forgot his family and children... Himself and his happiness and his new love's happiness was all that he focused on. I no longer think of my father as a good person, because he isn't. That good person died in both the TV character mentioned above, and my father. I can sympathize with them both though.
The lead ring-leader bad guy in Breaking Bad was another person professed as being "good" by my friend, Abdul. This was a person who would use children to help sell drugs, order the death of said children, and would purposely try to manipulate things to set up massacres. Abdul countered that the people dying were involved with the drug selling even minimally... but who cares? Killing people is ...killing people. So killing a little boy who is selling drugs makes it okay because he was selling drugs? He also enjoyed to psychologically and emotionally torture this old man who had killed someone he had deeply cared for many years ago. Eye for eye, doesn't mean justice, man... (Ragtime quote)
So Abdul says that the ring-leader is a "good" person, once again because you can relate to traits and life events here and there. How does relate-ability turn into morality? It seems to be a more common way of thinking in my generation and age group. I become disgusted by acts of characters, but still recognize that sure, they had a hard past, but they'll get defended tooth and nail. I'm even an actor and a writer, so I know how to get into the head of messed up characters, I've had to do it for performances and for writing. This character as a young man, he seemed to be good, but obviously became obsessed to get revenge one day... and he felt that he eventually got it.
Walking Dead's second leading man Shane (have to be a little less vague here) who is best friend to Rick-the leader of the group- in both comic and show- he is a horrible person... but you can really relate. The wife of the leader, you can relate to, too, and she carries a burden of sin, too.
Shane lies about his best friend being dead to his friend's wife, Lori... then begins sleeping with her, taking emotional advantage. Then later when she's pregnant, and it's obviously his, he is upset that he can't be with her. He grows jealous of his best friend becoming a more responsible leader of the small survival group that they are in, when the power was not thrusted away, Shane did not know what he was doing. He us envious of losing his love, his leadership, and begins to act out. Finally his best friend's little boy isn't even allowed to be alone with him because he is acting so chaotically, the little boy he was a father to until his best friend returned.
The comic and the show diverge on how he dies, but I like how he dies in the comic more. He eventually raises a gun to Rick's back, his best friend! and takes aim. He knows that if he kills him, he can get his family back, his leadership back, his power back, and he'll get his baby when she's born... but then he is shot from behind by the little boy who is the son of Lori... and the boy is devastated that he had to shoot a real person, and not a zombie, to save his dad... he had to shoot his uncle.
I think that Shane was a terrible person to lie to Lori way before he ever even raised a gun to his unarmed best friend's back. But, Abdul? Yeah, good person... because there is character depth. How is there morality in trying to destroy the life of someone who used to be your best friend.. when the world is falling apart. They've managed to remain a happy family, and he's trying to destroy it... that is just horrible.
END SPOILERS
So does that mean everyone who commits infidelity, or contribute to it, is a bad person? No, it doesn't. People can make mistakes, especially if under stressful conditions. Getting into the grey area of such extreme jealousy that you begin to plot killing another, assuming another person's life, and kidnapping another's child; this is where problems begin.
There was another point that came up and it made me snap like a taut piece of fiber, strung snugly and stretched well beyond where it should be stretched... In one of the examples of terrible people actually being good people I had provided an example of bad behavior that was rather bothersome to me: forceful sex.
My roommate said "Well it didn't count as rape at first!"
I was floored, "'No, stop it!'" I mimicked the character, forcefully but calmly repeated the scene, "Doesn't count?!"
"Well, no, not really." he replied. "I mean it has to be more than that!"
"So when she went like... 'No, stop it!.. Hold on! No, no...'" I was still not reaching the point where the character has lashed out physically, "Did that count as unwanted sex yet? I mean she was saying no and stop, that's rape, right?"
"No that's not really rape, that was just rough sex," Abdul replied coolly.
So it wasn't until she screamed "Stop it!" that it would have been rape to him. Being a rape victim, I am aware that if you fight too much being raped can be more painful because a guy may try beat the shit out of you, or forcefully have sex with you. If you were in a robe and fought too much, you might need stitches from the damage that could be done. Submission after some physical and verbal fighting isn't agreement....
But to Abdul, apparently it is. Consent is assumed, even if a girl fights and repeatedly says no, and asks for it to stop. How many more men think like this? Has Abdul raped girls? He thinks that rape is okay, obviously...
edit: Sharia law in the UK, supports rape.
Abdul grew up as a Muslim, but he is no longer one... but I wonder, maybe this is why he thinks rape is ok.
"...Take also al-Darsh’s successor as president of the ISC, the aforementioned Maulana Abu Sayeed, who remains one of the organisation’s three trustees to this day. A cleric who sits in judgment over the marital disputes heard in its courtrooms, he made headlines in 2010 by telling an influential blog that men who rape their wives should not be prosecuted, because ‘sex is part of marriage’.
‘Clearly there cannot be any rape within the marriage. Maybe aggression, maybe indecent activity,’ he said.
Abu Sayeed added that women who say they have been raped should not immediately go to the police. Many of them are lying, he claimed, ‘because they have got this idea of so-called equality, equal rights’.
Asked about those outwardly misogynistic comments, the ISC said: ‘Maulana Abu Sayeed is a deeply respected scholar. He was quoting traditional Islamic discussion regarding rape within marriage.’ "
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