I can’t believe I’m writing this article.
First, because I don’t recommend Netflix’s new teen drama, 13 Reasons Why. From start to finish, the series is saturated with stubborn and relentless sins: relentless blasphemy, physical violence, sexual abuse, drug use, alcohol abuse, persecution, voyerism. , pornography, intimidation, sexual experimentation, rape, verbal violence of the most vile variety and illustrative depiction of suicide. Tell me, don’t you look? It’s still little compared to the series. Please don’t misunderstand my text in this series as a recommendation to anyone?adult or child? Look at this one.
- Secondly.
- Because the theme of the series is painfully personal to me.
- My best friend and childhood neighbor for several years committed suicide when we were 16.
- I mean.
- Did they kill me here because verbs like?Or is it over.
- With their lives.
- They soften the blow in a way that doesn’t do justice to action.
- There may be other places where I would write or speak in softer language.
- But not here.
- Not when I want to warn of a series that portrays suicide in a destructive way.
Teen suicide is not a statistic for me. This isn’t something that happened to an acquaintance a long time ago. Have I never added to the superficial tears of repentance for a?Less classmate?” As some students do in 13 reasons. The emotions I feel after 20 years remain profound. My friend’s decision took me out of childhood innocence and put me face to face with the dragon of death in all its ferocity.
Why write about 13 reasons, then? Because several readers asked me to talk about it, and my son in high school had friends who talked about it at school and in church. As a writer and pastor, I feel compelled to enter this space and issue the strongest possible warning about this. There is a reason why New Zealand has banned children under the age of 18 from watching the series without a parent, and why Canadian schools prohibit students from talking about the series.
For thirteen reasons it is misleading and destructive
To be fair, it is clear that the people who created this series wanted to convince teenage viewers that actions have consequences, that harassment can harm others and lead to despair. The series wants people to take certain sins seriously: the cosification of young women, the invasion of privacy, sexual assault and the temptation to hide it, as well as not paying homage to the victim of rape. In order to increase the severity of these sins, 13 Reasons Why surprises the viewer with his horrific demonstration of depravity in high school, and the many forms of guilt and shame that arise in a society saturated with social media and driven by sexual revolution. When the series sometimes seems to rumble, it becomes clear that writers want young viewers to treat others with respect.
But it is also clear, at least to me and to a growing number of psychologists and mental health experts, that 13 reasons why more suicides will occur, not less. We are already hearing warnings from several adolescent suicide experts and are likely to experience a number of suicide attempts across the country.
I’m not surprised 13 Reasons Why is a desperate series whose climax in history is suicide. Viewers who identify with the main character, Hannah, imagine their own journey as if they were inexorably to the grave, attracted by a fantasy of revenge against those who have let them down. In an attempt to combat bullying, the series advocates suicide. This gives the main character a noble outlet, a kind of martyrdom, a tragic but fascinating ending (represented in graphic detail) that goes against virtually all best practices for handling suicide in a responsible way.
I can’t exaggerate how destructive this message is
I can’t exaggerate how attractive it will be for those who are harassed to imagine a scenario in which they can change things and emotionally destroy their peers.
Most people believe that 13 Reasons Why refers to a group of teenagers who, in their selfish actions and omissions, are responsible for the murder of a fragile young woman, no, it is a series about how a girl, from the grave, kills her classmates. It’s not just about physical suicide, it’s about emotional murder. Hannah’s revenge has a deadly effect on all those left behind, even those who, while morally reprehensible, are hardly responsible for her final action.
G. K. Chesterton has already observed that suicide is an extreme and absolute evil; Refusal to take an interest in existence; Refuse to take an oath of fidelity to life. The man who kills a man kills a man. He who kills himself kills all men; As far as he’s concerned, does he eliminate the world?I have always believed that Chesterton’s comment about suicide was unfair and exaggerated, as most suicides occur at the end of significant mental anguish and unwavering despair, not as a rebellious decision to refuse to see good in the world.
However, after seeing 13 Reasons Why, I understand Chesterton’s point of view, because this particular suicide is actually one?Annihilation? The people who made you suffer. It was wrong to generalize all suicides as such, but for thirteen reasons it is also wrong to give the impression that teen suicide is motivated by a fantasy of revenge. in this way it is misleading and dangerous.
Moreover, while the intention of the series is to raise awareness of how bullying can affect students, many of the self-destructive choices that define the course of this culture of despair are never questioned, it is as if the producers of the series think that you could have all the perceived benefits of the sexual revolution (which approves of any kind of consensual sexual activity) without it leading to the objectivity of women , or as if we could have drugs and alcohol as one of the pillars of adolescence without creating an environment for car accidents, beatings and rapes to occur in the dark of drunkenness.
What about the young women in our society who have made bad choices on social media or with their friends, whose repentance is due, at least in part, to their own sinful choices?What do you do when taunts and hostile people are partially sure of it?The reputation of the girl they’re mocking?Aren’t guilty girls nice? Megan Basham writes:
At any time, the story tries to emphasize that Hannah’s reputation as a school is totally false, but what if it wasn’t?What if, like a wounded, lonely child, she really did some of the things that tarnished her reputation?Would your suicide be less tragic?Love and friendship? For constantly focusing on Hannah’s virginity and victimization, for thirteen reasons?He seems to suggest that he does.
The prospects of 13 reasons why they are grim, even with their sanctimonious tone, viewers find nothing transcendent. None of this world today. Is there no call to what is true, good and beautiful, but alone?My truth? Or? Your truth?In terms of convenience.
God receives a single mention and the Catholic Church is described with a curse, and there is nothing. There is only this world, only the immediate horizon. No one cares about paradise or hell, not even the weak secularized hope of “being in a better place. “The world of the 13 reasons why it is totally wicked, from start to finish, so it is also desperate.
None of the students can find a place to atone for their sins, even though confession of sin and the desire to be free from guilt often appear.
Adolescents in 13 reasons why they are plagued with guilt, not only for the suicide of a girl, but also for the toxicity of a culture that ignores injustice and burys shame under layers of self-preservation. Guilt turns into internal bleeding that builds up under the skin, without escaping until many of the main characters make decisions that lead to a literal blood bath. The wages of sin are death.
For thirteen reasons it creates a problem you’re trying to solve, perhaps because it doesn’t have an eternal solution to offer. For those who have suicidal thoughts or who have friends who know the darkness of this despair, hope remains. But this will not be found. Netflix.
The challenge for Christians is to look carefully at the message we promote and the culture we create.
Will we be faithful in offering the opposite message, that our sins are very real and we are truly guilty, but also that Christ is precious and his blood was shed so that his life would be ours??
Will the Church be an oasis of faith, hope, and love in a world of doubt, despair, and hatred?
In an increasingly critical world with abuse and intimidation on social media, can the church be the place where grace spreads?
Grace this unusual, undeserved, powerful, and transformative favor on God’s part, which wins the battle against guilt and shame. Grace, greater than all our sins, even suicide.
At the end of grace, there is always hope.