The Other Side’s Story

Doing film versions of well-known fairy-tales that explore the point of view of the traditional villain is a great idea. Wicked shows the Wizard of Oz story from the perspective of the two evil witches. Netflix is planning to release a new version of Cinderella that tells the story of the stepsisters.

This is great because it teaches children that in every conflict the other side has its own version of the story. It’s a crucial life lesson. We are all villains in somebody’s story. And sometimes, it’s deserved. Remembering this helps us to be a villain less.

It’s the end of the semester, everybody is tired. It takes an effort not to be a jerk to a colleague who asks the same question for the fifth time, not to go off at a student who barges in while I’m recording a class video and spoils the whole thing, and not to snipe at a lab worker who showed up to work even though we issued 5 reminders that the lab closed for the holidays. Remembering that for all these people I’m a character in their story like they are characters in mine helps to avoid rolling my eyes, huffing, and being annoyed. The realization that they find me as annoying as I find them is a necessary humbling experience. We all need more of those.

The people who are ranting the most about the movies which question whether those everybody considers villains are really villains are conservatives. This is strange because, who do they think the Evil Witch of the West and the Evil Stepsister are in the story taught at every school and college and transmitted from every MSM outlet? In our society, who is it that needs people to wonder whether the official narrative of who’s the evildoer might be wrong? Who is the other side that gets labeled evil by definition? Who is it that doesn’t get to tell their story?

If anybody needs people to have a well-developed capacity to doubt official stories and give a chance to official villains, it’s conservatives.