2025-05-25 6:35:11 ¶ ● ⬈

ceaselesswatchersspecialboy:

> Here’s the thing, I absolutely agree with the fact that the way Jon was treated in S4 was awful, dehumanising and often cruel. It impacted how he viewed himself in harmful and permanently damaging ways that then bleed into every choice he makes after, because his self-worth is never going to recover from that.

> However, if you end this point with ‘and he was treated like this for no-reason at all’, I am going to have to sit you down and have a long talk about nuance, and how every character in TMA has a reason for what they’re doing, even if it’s not right. Engage with the material at hand. I am begging you.

> And Jon being a victim, particularly in S4, does not absolve him of the consequences and harm his own actions have done. There’s a very twisted irony to me in the fact that the harm Jon does to feel a sense of control — a common C-PTSD response — is often stripped of that agency and nuance. Please, the Web does that to him enough.

> The above also applies to pretty much most TMA characters, especially the S4 Archive Crew. It goes without saying that yes, Basira is a hypocrite, that Melanie clings onto Jon as a scapegoat before she takes steps to improve herself etc. All these characters have been hurt in some way, and they are reverting back to what gives them a sense of safety, even if it means hurting others people or each other. It’s not good, but you can, at the very least, understand why it is they’re acting this way.

> I think it’s easier to understand S4 when you go in with the mindset of ‘these people are all victims, and they are not perfect ones’, rather than the mindset of it’s Jon Vs Everyone, even if it feels that way at times.