also the characters themselves show the same bias that i’m seeing in a lot of critiques, they only judge the others/themselves by the active choices they make.
natalie was judged for killing ben, even though everyone in camp sat around and watched him slowly die. they all made him suffer, who got the blame for it in the end?
jackie went outside to sleep in the cold and no one went to see her? not a single person went out there to sit with her for 5 minutes? and then shauna obviously blames herself, because she actively shouted jackie into the cold. nevermind the fact that everyone else watched it happen.
the trial was poorly written so i can see it getting glazed over but everyone stood there and watched shauna intimidate specific people to get them to raise their hand. if you’re not going to do something at that point you’ve handed your autonomy away. do you think anyone had relief when shauna did that? when she took the burden of actively choosing away from them?
i would argue that the wilderness itself is the scapegoat for their passive actions. the wilderness chose javi, so all of us standing here and watching him drown had nothing to do with it. we can eat his flesh and be absolved of blame.
the wilderness chose tai to kill coach ben so we can all stand here and watch it happen. the wilderness chose mari so all i can do is stand here and wait for shauna to hunt her down.
and now we’re here, too many passive choices into it to do anything but let it happen. “it wasn’t me, i didn’t want to do it!” like it matters, she’s dead.
they’re all dead, and you watched it happen.