#but we shouldn't make assumptions about how much Damien actually cares about Rose

[thelaurenshippen]

uhmm.. i worry i might be the only one thinking like this but? im not entirely a fan of the gang gathering up to ward off damien from having ANY friends? like,i do think warnings of toxicity are necessary but none of them are really a mutual friend with rose and her and damiens possible friendship was nipped in the bud. idk people change people, and if damien gets pissed that theyre engaging in a potentially toxic behavior as well in isolating him-- well saying "you were worse" doesnt (1/?)

justify it??? like..i KNOW damiens abusive and him getting beat up was GREAT… but im not a fan of the group ganging up on any possible friends of damien and stopping it? again, people change people and especially if damien was to get involved with a friend who is good at emotionally mature convos like rose seems to be??? i think thatd be awful of the group to do and though i excuse this as “dr. bright acting on being rose’s therapist” as valid, if its someone NONE of them know and they (2/?)

get involved??? i dont agree with damien on anything but i would definitely be in his corner for the inevitable blow-out of isolating him. and idk i would be a big fan of damien having a relationship with someone where,if his power returns, he is a bit conflicted because it means he will be manipulating his friend. idk im a big fan of bad characters growing into decent ones, and if damien never becomes one,thats fine. but id hate it if he didnt purely because of that kind of interference (¾)

am i crazy for thinking that??? (4/4)

First of all, no you’re not crazy for thinking that - I think you’re probably not alone in feeling this way. But, okay, this turned into a long one, so more under the cut. 

I think it’s important to think about the information that the group has - they only know Damien as someone who has manipulated and abused them (granted, this is a little more complicated for Mark, but we’ll get to that) and they only know Rose as a seemingly innocent patient of Dr. Bright’s who got caught in his orbit. Damien has been known to use mostly unrelated people to get to people he’s targeting - using Adam to get to Wadsworth, threats against Sam to get to Mark and Dr. Bright, etc. So when Dr. Bright shows up to meet Rose and Damien is there she, as Sam said, “freaks”. 

Does that mean it’s the gang’s place to determine who is in Damien’s life? No. Does that mean they feel a responsibility to warn Rose about Damien’s pattern of behavior? Yes. Does that mean the actions they take are completely without fault? Absolutely not. Nothing any of these people do is without fault. 

Rose is a grown woman who can make her own decisions. She’d only met with Damien a few times, but she also doesn’t know any of the group very well, except for her therapist and this is a pretty weird situation in which to see her shrink. She’s going to have to make judgements on her own about who to trust based on the information she has. 

What the group said to Rose is not dissimilar to what Damien said to her - after she approached him, he warned her against what The AM was capable of. But she had a good experience there - Agent Green made sure she was well taken care of and it really helped her. With the new information Damien gave her, she’ll have to make her own judgement. Should Damien not have told her about the shadier stuff The AM does? Will that keep her from going back there when she really needs help?

I agree that people change people, but if Damien doesn’t grow into a decent person, it won’t be because the gang interfered in whatever tentative acquaintance-ship he’d struck up with Rose. It will be because he consistently and continually chooses not to change. Dr. Bright began the series as someone who lied and manipulated but she ultimately made an effort to own up to her mistakes, apologize, and try and be more open. This doesn’t mean she’s perfect, but she is constantly trying to be better. We haven’t seen that kind of behavior from Damien, so there’s not really a strong argument for him making huge changes just because he met Rose or doesn’t have access to his power anymore.  

They are imperfect and messy and are literally constantly making bad, potentially damaging choices, but, in this particular instance, I would have made the exact same decision the group made to warn Rose. They don’t control her - they’re not trying to forbid her from seeing Damien, they want her to be part of a decision despite the fact that she makes it clear she doesn’t have a strong connection to Damien that she wants to defend - but they want to make sure she doesn’t put herself in danger. In telling her, they’re not thinking about ruining Damien’s life or ganging up on him; they’re thinking about protecting Rose.

This is probably the moment for me to acknowledge some inherent, strong bias I have about this kind of stuff. I work in an industry that is now notorious for our spreadsheets of terrible men (many of which I have been seeing for years). I’m very glad to see some of these terrible men being torn down, but my community still very much operates on women (and LGBT folks) warning each other about scary, abusive people. Some of the people I hear about are people I’ve had perfectly nice interactions with. And then I have to make a judgement call based on the info I have. Given how much this topic has been in my conversations over the past five months, I think a lot of that bled through into my writing, for whatever that’s worth.

Some of the people I’ve encountered I bet could change - I hope some of those people do change. But taking that on is an enormous responsibility. Maybe it’s one that Rose would want to take on but maybe Damien was never interested in being her friend in the first place - he’s certainly never shown interest in growing a relationship with anyone, with the exception of Mark. And I personally believe it is never the abused’s responsibility to redeem their abuser. 

Sorry for this extremely long-winded reply, but I always want to take the time to talk about these Damien-related things because it is a very sensitive and difficult subject. I really appreciate you vocalizing this view and I absolutely don’t want to suggest that someone like Damien couldn’t become a good person. He could. But he would have to choose to change his behavior and how he treats people and so far, we haven’t seen any indication that he’ll do so. 

Just a head’s up about Episode 48, our next episode: Damien has a pretty difficult conversation that addresses a lot of these ideas of responsibility and abusive cycles. So if he’s someone that you feel a lot of empathy for, just know that before listening!