
"Breaking Bad" and its Philosophical Context - Part 1 - zealoushacker
http://alexnotov.com/post/11939566310/breaking-bad-and-its-philosophical-context-part-1
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ddw
I like Chuck Klosterman's take on this show:
<http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/6763000/bad-decisions>

tl;dr: "Breaking Bad is not a situation in which the characters' morality is
static or contradictory or colored by the time frame; instead, it suggests
that morality is continually a personal choice. When the show began, that
didn't seem to be the case: It seemed like this was going to be the story of a
man (Walter White, portrayed by Bryan Cranston) forced to become a criminal
because he was dying of cancer. That's the elevator pitch. But that's
completely unrelated to what the show has become. The central question on
Breaking Bad is this: What makes a man "bad" - his actions, his motives, or
his conscious decision to be a bad person? Judging from the trajectory of its
first three seasons, Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan believes the answer
is option No. 3. So what we see in Breaking Bad is a person who started as one
type of human and decides to become something different. And because this is
television - because we were introduced to this man in a way that made him
impossible to dislike, and because we experience TV through whichever
character we understand the most - the audience is placed in the curious
position of continuing to root for an individual who's no longer good."

I've only seen the first few episodes, but am hoping to find some time to go
through it now. I get plenty of morality from shows like "Mad Men" and "The
Wire" in which we feel conflicted because the characters we love are doing bad
things (in fact you could say that this is the main theme of serious, dramatic
TV shows now), but I think the appeal of "Breaking Bad" is watching a
desperate man make the conscious decision to become "evil."

~~~
Mpdreamz
A question unanswered is wheter Walter actually has changed at all. Had he had
to make life or death decisions before the diagnosis would he truely have
acted differently?

Quite often Walter's actions are motivated purely by narcisistic reasons a
tendency he showed even at the start of the show.

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Mpdreamz
I really wonder why you felt the need to cut this up in parts. I think i would
have enjoyed reading your post untill part 8 in one go. I'm noticing a trend
that long pieces have to be served in bitesize chunks lately either through
pagination or several independant blog post. Presuming that all these part
will try to get the same point across one big post versus many small ones
would do that point more justice. Anyhow i hope part 2 will get on my radar
when its posted.

~~~
aiham
It's often for more page views and advertisement impressions.

Edit: Maybe not in this case, but the news websites that do surely do it for
the extra impressions.

~~~
zealoushacker
Definitely not in this case. I decided to break it up into individual parts,
so that I would have more time to think about the content between parts... and
perhaps even change my view by the end of it. I am currently in the middle of
season 3... and Walter has been displaying too much altruism for my taste of
late.

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diamondhead
Besides of the health issues, Walter was working for a car wash company at the
beginning of the first season and his pregnant wife was trying to get
financial help from his ex-girlfriend who became millionaire thanks to an old
scientific research of Walter White...

First question people ask is, is it ok for Walter White to cook meth for
earning what he already deserves? It's the easy part of the question of
Breaking Bad.

Walter White started cooking by blackmailing Jessie, one of his old students.
(remember another student of him who disrespected and made fun about Walter
when he was cleaning a car) From the first episode to the end of 4th season,
Walter White has fucked Jessie's life up. He made many manipulations in
Jessie's life to have Jessie work for him.

Hard part of the question starts here, is it ok for a teacher suffering from
cancer to destroy one of his student's life for earning money?

To me, the answer is absolutely no. But I see that many people who enjoy how
Walter White became a tough guy, think Jessie already lives what he deserves
as a young punk.

~~~
zealoushacker
Diamondhead, I agree re:Jessie - partially. Though I am a fan of black and
white, I think Walt is simply not so cut and dry. It is my opinion that Walt's
character is sympathetic to Jessie from the very beginning. Even towards the
middle of season 3, when Walt finds himself needing to protect himself from
Jessie, he still has more than just protection in mind. He really does care
for Jessie. What else would explain him not deciding to outright have him
murdered? Saul, after all, does mention the possibility of having to explore
"other options." At that suggestion, Walt scoffs at Saul and instead proceeds
to offer Jessie the partnership. Granted, I question some of the altruistic
tendencies in Walt - though mostly he is out for himself and his family.

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jeffdechambeau
Morality tends to be governed by two views: you can either judge an action by
its outcomes (consequentialism), or by its motivating principles (deontology).

From the consequentialist perspective, Walt's pretty clearly a bad guy: meth
is a brutal drug with very little social upside. Sure he's able to bring about
good for his family, but I'm sure there's a whole network of people who's
lives are worse off because of his work. Overall he's probably created more
bad than good in the world. Because meth tends to tear you down in the long
run, I don't think it's fair to say he's responsible for the goodness of the
high that his customers feel, as in the end it's a destructive addiction and
not a recreation.

A fair response to this is that if Walt didn't cook the meth, someone else
would, so there's the same amount of "bad" whether he does it or not, so why
not take the money and run? I think the simple answer is that something
doesn't magically become not-bad if someone else is willing to do it. Walt can
still cook meth, but it's hard to say it's ethical from this first point of
view.

From the deontological point of view, it's a bit murky. If you boil this down
the view to its core, it's a moral test that's summarized as: "I can only do
this if I'm ok with other people doing it too."

So, has Walt acted in ways that he (or we) would be alright with people doing
broadly? Here's a couple spins on what he's doing:

1\. "A man should be able to do whatever he needs to to provide for his
family." While I might feel like I should be able to do whatever I need to to
feed my wife and kids (provided they existed), I clearly wouldn't want someone
else exploiting my family to feed theirs. So this fails the test and is
immoral.

2\. "I can profit off of goods that are addictive and destructive." This one
is tricky, unless you're a libertarian and think that everyone is free to make
their own good or bad decisions and that they own the consequences. I'm sure
people will advocate this (and I assume the linked article will too, given the
line "rational decision to provide a product to people whom have voluntarily
decided to consume it") but I think it lacks nuance and legitimacy.
Nonetheless, what Walt is doing would at least be internally consistent so
long as he's okay with other people selling equally bad goods, and making them
available to, for instance, his son. The argument here is the generic one
about why stuff should be illegal or not.

So where does this leave us? I don't think there's a strong case to be made
that Walt is a moral guy. No matter which of the two lenses we use, his
actions look pretty bad. But I think that's what makes the character and the
show so compelling: Our morals are an abstraction that we've placed upon the
world to make it easier to navigate, and he's moved into a darker world where
these rules don't matter, and what's more is that he's thriving.

I think that's the hook, that somehow this meek and mild guy who played by the
rules his entire life was able to shed them entirely and find himself
completely at home--and the audience is along for the ride, assuring
themselves that they could thrive in a world without rules just as Walt has.

