13 Reasons Why

13 Reasons Why is a popular Netflix drama, because "mental health" is the hot topic these days, and the show's about the aftermath of a suicide. I have finished the show- it's kind of hard to watch. Not as in, "suicides are emotionally difficult to deal with"- which they are, btw, but the show feels so cringey. Like every little thing is magnified for the sake of drama- it's not that I want to take a shit on teenagers, but I cringe because I felt the exact same way when I was that age.

People have said positive and negative things about the show. In terms of entertainment value, I would rate this a 7/10. Not the most exciting thing I've ever seen, but it didn't bore me at any stage. When we want to talk about themes and characterisation, I feel like it's a bit complicated. I believe the main idea behind the show was to demonstrate how small actions may have major consequences, and sometimes we might not realise that the one careless thing we said to a vulnerable girl was what drove her to kill herself. There's a haunting thought. In my lifetime I have certainly done something similar to those kids in the show- and if I find out that the girl who I was less-than-friendly to in highschool killed herself, I would probably have problems living that down.

There's this pathetic vulnerability to Hannah Baker that made it difficult for me to sympathize with her. I feel like if I was in her position, I would have reacted differently to almost every single situation and encounter. There's this Chinese proverb that translates to something like, "those who are pitiful must have some despicable qualities", and I think that is so true in Hannah Baker's case. It's unsightly for me to blame the victim, but so many of her actions are soooo questionable. Can you call it "stupidity of youth"?

Most of the characters in the show are not very likeable. The only character who I thought was alright got hit by a car and died. You can side with Clay (the main character) and say "he did nothing wrong", but he's seriously a self-righteous little shit and way too edgy. Like that time he takes a picture of Tyler naked and releases to the whole school. WTF was that. It's a teenager's version of "justice", but to an adult it's like "that is so immature and such a terrible thing to do". Then there's all that shit he puts his parents through. You'd think I'd understand why a kid wouldn't speak to his parents; but the difference is, his parents care about him and they're such nice people. They trust him, they stand up for him, and they try so hard to understand his life. Real talk if someone told my parents I trashed their son's car, my parents would turn on me in like 2 seconds without even confirming whether I trashed the car, or why I did it. My deeply troubled relationship with my own parents make me irrationally envious of other people's parent-child relationships. When I see anyone having a normal conversation with their mother or father, even if it's about the most mundane thing, I become so, soooo agitated. Do you realise how good you have it, if your mother doesn't wail away past midnight whilst clutching to you, crying and crying about what an abomination you are? Ohhhh what about her turning all the lights on in your room at 4am, and you wake up and find her sitting by your bed staring at you. I treated her as if I were treating a psychiatric patient- de-escalate, stay calm, and call for help. Except for the last part, the calling for help part. I had no help. Help wasn't coming. I was stuck there and there was no escape.

Those memories haunt me still.

If I were Hannah Baker, all 13 of my tapes would be about my parents. I'd hope to see them in great pain and full of remorse, lamenting that they were always wrong about me and that they should have treated me better while I was alive. Then I'd hope to irrevocably ruin their lives by giving them the reputation that they were such terrible parents they made their son kill himself. Oh, the ultimate catharsis.

I'm being sarcastic, of course. This is part of the reason I criticise 13 Reasons Why. The girl kills herself and you get to see how it all played out- her white knight exacts revenge for her, she makes her bullies feel the pain and there's a great demonstration that wowww, she was loved. Pffft, reality doesn't work that way. Except for the bit where she totally fucked her parents up emotionally. I have a feeling that's not what she was aiming for.

Do I wish pain on my own parents? No, not really. I don't really want to see them suffer. In fact they're in pain now, but for all the wrong reasons. They're mostly ashamed of me, but at the same time trying to deny who I am because they find it all too offensive. Two years ago when I was feeling extremely suicidal, I came to the conclusion that if I killed myself then, my parents wouldn't even address me properly at my funeral, and it would be the most humiliating ordeal. Well I'd be dead, but it's like, even if I died I wouldn't get the acknowledgement I wanted. That was frustrating, but it was a good wake-up call to why killing myself wasn't the solution. I'm not some anime hero like Lelouch, who could kill himself to establish a new world order, I'm just an ordinary guy who wants to be happy in life, but there can be no happiness if there is no "life".

By now I've probably painted my parents as absolute demons and despicable human beings. They were to me, and that is my opinion of them. If we weren't related though, I'd tell you that they were alright. They say things and do things I would classify as "borderline retarded" a lot of the time, but other than that they're just your average Asian-immigrant parents. Conservative Asian values, including a healthy dose of sexism, racism, homophobia, and willful ignorance. It's not really their fault though, that's just part of our history and culture. They don't actually exist to make me miserable, though it's a consequence at times. People are deeply flawed, they are just flawed in ways different to me. I tried turning to Christianity to learn the art of forgiveness, but it escapes me for now.

Practise makes perfect, and perhaps I need to practise forgiveness as well. I won't get there most of the time, but it's important to me that I try, because there are so many things more important to me than my parents in my life. Family means a lot to me, but family cannot be my everything, as that would be incompatible with life, in my case. 13 Reasons Why reminded me of all the teenage angst I used to embody, but I am at the stage where I'd rather establish 13 reasons of why I'd like to live.

1. This medical school thing has been such an ordeal, I need to reap the joys of being a doctor.
2. I still need to meet again with my best friend, after all these years.
3. I wanted to have my own art exhibition one day. If I can't become an accomplished artist, I hope I'll be rich enough to buy out a portion of the gallery for my works.
4. Music was not something I had much talent for, but I got so far in teaching myself the piano. I wanted to be good enough at it to justify buying a grand piano one day.
5. Ah, romance. That sunset and sunrise I wanted to watch. Tinder dates just won't do it, after all.
6. Travel! So many places I wanted to go- Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, England (again), Italy, France--- if I have one holiday a year I have more than half a decade of holidays planned.
7. Kids- it sounds weird for me to say, because I've always complained about how kids are the greatest responsibility that I absolutely can't handle. I'd like to influence someone's life as a father, though. I'd teach my children to be strong, and I'd teach them to be kind. Then they would teach me what it takes to be a good father, and we'd all learn a little more each day.
8. The books I need to read! I'm not even talking about ASOIAF series- I haven't read stuff like, A Clockwork Orange, and I'd like to read all the "classics" to see what the hype is about.
9. After years of writing depressing shit on my blog, I'd like to be an author. I want to write something that is personal to me, and invite the world to experience my vulnerabilities through my book.
10. There's this fantasy I have where I'd be addressing a large crowd and they'd all applaud after my grand speech. I have no idea wtf I'd be saying, because public speaking scares the fuck out of me, but that's why it's a fantasy.
11. God I need to learn how to swim. I swear I learnt when I was young, but I have a feeling I'd drown if you threw me into a pool right now.
12. That 5km run thing I mentioned earlier- let's take that a step further. I want rock-hard abs at some stage before I die.
13.This blog. If I died where are you going to get your weekly dose of melancholy from???? Who else is going to write posts which sound like reviews of recent TV shows, then divulge into deeply personal details about their pathetic life????