Compassion and Skam
Last year, I discovered a Norwegian TV show online called Skam. Although nobody I knew had ever seen it, apparently it had reached a height of fame unexpected from a Scandinavian teen drama, and it was easy enough to find episodes on the internet.
I will always be grateful to the fandom that helped me find this show, not because it changed my life, but because it told me that there were more people out there like me and that we can all be understood by the right people.
Let me explain.
For as long as I can remember, I have related to characters in some books and movies and sometimes TV shows, perhaps more than real people, and have an uncanny ability to accept formula. This is because a formulaic storyline often revolves around someone who, at the end of the day, is a good enough person, and they always "do the right thing" in the end, as opposed to a lot of people I met in real life who talked up a big game about what "the right thing" is and how they embodied it but seemed to change their mind way too often about their definition and have low tolerance for people who did not agree with them. Real people's idea of the "right thing" felt inflexible to me, dissimilar to a character arc of starting out one place and ending up reformed and more understanding by the third act, and due to this inflexibility, to me it all felt shallow.
When I started watching Skam, I thought I was just watching another formulaic show about good-looking teenagers in a wealthy neighbourhood with their first world problems, which would be good enough for me but nothing to write home about.
Obviously, I was wrong, because here I am, writing about it.
It was the first season that got me hooked, about a sixteen-year-old girl called Eva who is insecure about her new boyfriend Jonas. We soon realize that she was dumped by her friends, too, and is now alone. It all feels very typical, but what caught me off guard was the showrunners ability to see Eva's problems from her perspective, therefore lending the show an emotional nuance which only the compassionate can lend. Instead of a Gossip Girl-esque drama, we get to see a young woman grappling through struggles all young women have, and showrunners validating that struggle as something to acknowledge while reminding the audience, through the character of Eva, that it'll get better if you grow up, not just in age but when you learn some lessons.
The second season, I think, was one of the most cliche of all, about a beautiful girl, Noora, falling in love with the cool boy in school. I will admit this season was more of a guilty pleasure than anything else, because who doesn't like to watch beautiful people falling in love? But it was more than that, because it dealt with the misunderstandings of a new relationship, when two people are absolutely convinced they like each other but don't really know each other that well, finally culminating into a story about sexual abuse. Again, I was struck by the writers' decision to focus less on graphic scenes of violence or over-dramatic storylines, but the internal feelings of the protagonist, and it was worth it to see people not just for their attractiveness but for their depth.
The third season, probably the most popular in the fandom, was about a boy, Isak, coming to terms with his queerness, only to find out that the boy he loves has problems bigger than he could have comprehended. Isak doesn't start out the most likeable character. He is manipulative, restless, and has no direction. His family life appears to be a mess, with an absent father and an emotionally unstable and very religious (and therefore, unaccepting of homosexuality after he comes out to her) mother (but perhaps that was just to avoid having to pay parent-aged actors). But we see how we can be transformed not for our own sake, as we saw in Eva's storyline, but because we are needed by someone we love. There are so many storylines about breaking free of other people's needs and expectations, and it was refreshing to see a story where someone's strength could be to become a source of strength for another person, because after all, who are we without the people we love? I remember having tears in my eyes when Isak loses hope with everything, and at that moment, his mother sends him a simple text saying that she has loved him since he was born and will love him forever, just as he is, relieving him of all his fears and causing him to go to church for the first time in years. I am not ashamed of crying over this scene given how many parents disown their kids for this very reason. Even though I am not gay, this level of acceptance is something all children want from their parents, and it's representation in the show left me feeling emotional.
But it was in the fourth season that I finally said, "This is going to be my favourite show for a long, long time." Because that's when we get to Sana, a character who had been recurring throughout the series, but only given a season in the end. I thank the showrunners for giving me this season. Sana, a Muslim girl, struggles to fit into her Western surroundings. Although she appears to have it all figured out, we realize in this season that she's been fighting internal and external battles for years now, feeling insecure about her choices in a world that doesn't completely understand them. She is acutely aware that her family, her life and her faith is different from everyone else's, and maybe she should go the route of sticking to other girls like her, who go to mosque and wear a hijab, but really wants friends of all kinds, including the very Norwegian Eva and Noora.
But no, it's not a story about a Muslim girl. In fact, it's a story about anybody who has ever battled between ideologies, and chosen to stay on the conservative side of things as a means to guide and discipline oneself, not as a means of judging others. We see a lot of movies about people stuck in small towns yearning for the freedom and perceived progressiveness of bigger places. But what about the opposite? What about the stories of good people who have chosen to follow tradition without judging the choices of others and even wanting to look at the world through other people's eyes without compromising too much with their own worldview? That was confusing even to put down as a question, so I am grateful for the writers of Skam doing it for me.
The best part was that season 4 was about a Muslim girl but eventually ended up being about two things Western teenagers are expected to be dealing with- bullying, and first love. And no, Sana does not get bullied. Instead, fueled by her insecurities she becomes the bully, leading to a downward spiral of guilt and shame. And then, there's a boy, and no, he's not a Norwegian boy, but from a Muslim family just like her, but their story of accepting each other and getting on the same page was more inspiring than a lot of opposites attract Romeo and Juliet stories out there, because differences don't always have to be glaring and easy to put on paper. Sometimes, they're just differences that exist because too people are, well, not the same, and the keys they use to open the door to understanding is the same key that even bigger differences need. Their romance is portrayed as chaste, full of long walks and longer conversations, with a few games of basketball here and there, and instead of the clearly very progressive writers looking down at it as a sign of two people from stuck-up families not knowing any better, they celebrate it as a difference in ideology worthy of being understood, a choice made by people with a certain set of beliefs with no less of a value than the accepted norm Western norm that we are all supposed to be striving towards. And so we see the growth of a character that seemed the most grown-up throughout the series, and realize we all have room for more.
Honestly, I felt as if Season 4 was about me sometimes.
But this brings me to something that sounds cheesy, but I feel I should say anyways because it's important. The showrunners were not teenagers. They were not Muslim and had not been raised in the context that a lot of teenagers in families from more conservative families come from. Yet, they understood Sana in a way that a lot of writers from India and other parts of the Eastern world can't. And I think they were able to do so because they chose to listen.
After coming to the United States, I have witnessed bigotry from the most unexpected places. I have witnessed girls from the Indian subcontinent looking down upon black and latinos, claiming they would never live around these communities as that would compromise with their ability to feel like they live in a first-world country. I have seen Indians who have very little depth of knowledge of deep political issues making fun of minorities, with the superiority of thinking that they're Indians, so they're on a higher plane (going back to the idea that Indians have done better in the US than some other communities). I have witnessed Indians looking down upon their own culture and country, acting like they could never go back because it was unbearable there, as if they came as survivors of civil war and rampant terrorism. And these are my own people! The same ones who cry a river when the president makes a reference to "shithole" countries even though their opinions don't really seem very different from his, just because they might not get H1B visas. In the end, they all excuse their behaviour saying that people, at the end of the day, want to stick to their own people and nobody really cares about other communities. But the truth is, if that was the truth, a show like Skam would never have happened, because writer Julie Andem has proven to everyone that it is possible to see the world through the eyes of somebody who you have very little in common with. Unfortunately, shows like Skam are the minority compared to the myriad of shows that have a bunch of bad Muslims and one good Muslim on the side of the good American people, which is why I think more people should watch it.
I am glad that I got to watch this low-budget show with no stars from an obscure corner of Scandinavia, and if you agree with anything I said in this post, maybe you should watch it, too, and join a very positive fandom that keeps growing everyday. Maybe you could even follow @imanmeskini on Instagram, the actress who played Sana and now does a series where she explains modern-day Islam to people who have questions. Perhaps, once you get over feeling like a cheesy goofball, you can relate to the series' message of love.
I will always be grateful to the fandom that helped me find this show, not because it changed my life, but because it told me that there were more people out there like me and that we can all be understood by the right people.
Let me explain.
For as long as I can remember, I have related to characters in some books and movies and sometimes TV shows, perhaps more than real people, and have an uncanny ability to accept formula. This is because a formulaic storyline often revolves around someone who, at the end of the day, is a good enough person, and they always "do the right thing" in the end, as opposed to a lot of people I met in real life who talked up a big game about what "the right thing" is and how they embodied it but seemed to change their mind way too often about their definition and have low tolerance for people who did not agree with them. Real people's idea of the "right thing" felt inflexible to me, dissimilar to a character arc of starting out one place and ending up reformed and more understanding by the third act, and due to this inflexibility, to me it all felt shallow.
When I started watching Skam, I thought I was just watching another formulaic show about good-looking teenagers in a wealthy neighbourhood with their first world problems, which would be good enough for me but nothing to write home about.
Obviously, I was wrong, because here I am, writing about it.
It was the first season that got me hooked, about a sixteen-year-old girl called Eva who is insecure about her new boyfriend Jonas. We soon realize that she was dumped by her friends, too, and is now alone. It all feels very typical, but what caught me off guard was the showrunners ability to see Eva's problems from her perspective, therefore lending the show an emotional nuance which only the compassionate can lend. Instead of a Gossip Girl-esque drama, we get to see a young woman grappling through struggles all young women have, and showrunners validating that struggle as something to acknowledge while reminding the audience, through the character of Eva, that it'll get better if you grow up, not just in age but when you learn some lessons.
The second season, I think, was one of the most cliche of all, about a beautiful girl, Noora, falling in love with the cool boy in school. I will admit this season was more of a guilty pleasure than anything else, because who doesn't like to watch beautiful people falling in love? But it was more than that, because it dealt with the misunderstandings of a new relationship, when two people are absolutely convinced they like each other but don't really know each other that well, finally culminating into a story about sexual abuse. Again, I was struck by the writers' decision to focus less on graphic scenes of violence or over-dramatic storylines, but the internal feelings of the protagonist, and it was worth it to see people not just for their attractiveness but for their depth.
The third season, probably the most popular in the fandom, was about a boy, Isak, coming to terms with his queerness, only to find out that the boy he loves has problems bigger than he could have comprehended. Isak doesn't start out the most likeable character. He is manipulative, restless, and has no direction. His family life appears to be a mess, with an absent father and an emotionally unstable and very religious (and therefore, unaccepting of homosexuality after he comes out to her) mother (but perhaps that was just to avoid having to pay parent-aged actors). But we see how we can be transformed not for our own sake, as we saw in Eva's storyline, but because we are needed by someone we love. There are so many storylines about breaking free of other people's needs and expectations, and it was refreshing to see a story where someone's strength could be to become a source of strength for another person, because after all, who are we without the people we love? I remember having tears in my eyes when Isak loses hope with everything, and at that moment, his mother sends him a simple text saying that she has loved him since he was born and will love him forever, just as he is, relieving him of all his fears and causing him to go to church for the first time in years. I am not ashamed of crying over this scene given how many parents disown their kids for this very reason. Even though I am not gay, this level of acceptance is something all children want from their parents, and it's representation in the show left me feeling emotional.
But it was in the fourth season that I finally said, "This is going to be my favourite show for a long, long time." Because that's when we get to Sana, a character who had been recurring throughout the series, but only given a season in the end. I thank the showrunners for giving me this season. Sana, a Muslim girl, struggles to fit into her Western surroundings. Although she appears to have it all figured out, we realize in this season that she's been fighting internal and external battles for years now, feeling insecure about her choices in a world that doesn't completely understand them. She is acutely aware that her family, her life and her faith is different from everyone else's, and maybe she should go the route of sticking to other girls like her, who go to mosque and wear a hijab, but really wants friends of all kinds, including the very Norwegian Eva and Noora.
But no, it's not a story about a Muslim girl. In fact, it's a story about anybody who has ever battled between ideologies, and chosen to stay on the conservative side of things as a means to guide and discipline oneself, not as a means of judging others. We see a lot of movies about people stuck in small towns yearning for the freedom and perceived progressiveness of bigger places. But what about the opposite? What about the stories of good people who have chosen to follow tradition without judging the choices of others and even wanting to look at the world through other people's eyes without compromising too much with their own worldview? That was confusing even to put down as a question, so I am grateful for the writers of Skam doing it for me.
The best part was that season 4 was about a Muslim girl but eventually ended up being about two things Western teenagers are expected to be dealing with- bullying, and first love. And no, Sana does not get bullied. Instead, fueled by her insecurities she becomes the bully, leading to a downward spiral of guilt and shame. And then, there's a boy, and no, he's not a Norwegian boy, but from a Muslim family just like her, but their story of accepting each other and getting on the same page was more inspiring than a lot of opposites attract Romeo and Juliet stories out there, because differences don't always have to be glaring and easy to put on paper. Sometimes, they're just differences that exist because too people are, well, not the same, and the keys they use to open the door to understanding is the same key that even bigger differences need. Their romance is portrayed as chaste, full of long walks and longer conversations, with a few games of basketball here and there, and instead of the clearly very progressive writers looking down at it as a sign of two people from stuck-up families not knowing any better, they celebrate it as a difference in ideology worthy of being understood, a choice made by people with a certain set of beliefs with no less of a value than the accepted norm Western norm that we are all supposed to be striving towards. And so we see the growth of a character that seemed the most grown-up throughout the series, and realize we all have room for more.
Honestly, I felt as if Season 4 was about me sometimes.
But this brings me to something that sounds cheesy, but I feel I should say anyways because it's important. The showrunners were not teenagers. They were not Muslim and had not been raised in the context that a lot of teenagers in families from more conservative families come from. Yet, they understood Sana in a way that a lot of writers from India and other parts of the Eastern world can't. And I think they were able to do so because they chose to listen.
After coming to the United States, I have witnessed bigotry from the most unexpected places. I have witnessed girls from the Indian subcontinent looking down upon black and latinos, claiming they would never live around these communities as that would compromise with their ability to feel like they live in a first-world country. I have seen Indians who have very little depth of knowledge of deep political issues making fun of minorities, with the superiority of thinking that they're Indians, so they're on a higher plane (going back to the idea that Indians have done better in the US than some other communities). I have witnessed Indians looking down upon their own culture and country, acting like they could never go back because it was unbearable there, as if they came as survivors of civil war and rampant terrorism. And these are my own people! The same ones who cry a river when the president makes a reference to "shithole" countries even though their opinions don't really seem very different from his, just because they might not get H1B visas. In the end, they all excuse their behaviour saying that people, at the end of the day, want to stick to their own people and nobody really cares about other communities. But the truth is, if that was the truth, a show like Skam would never have happened, because writer Julie Andem has proven to everyone that it is possible to see the world through the eyes of somebody who you have very little in common with. Unfortunately, shows like Skam are the minority compared to the myriad of shows that have a bunch of bad Muslims and one good Muslim on the side of the good American people, which is why I think more people should watch it.
I am glad that I got to watch this low-budget show with no stars from an obscure corner of Scandinavia, and if you agree with anything I said in this post, maybe you should watch it, too, and join a very positive fandom that keeps growing everyday. Maybe you could even follow @imanmeskini on Instagram, the actress who played Sana and now does a series where she explains modern-day Islam to people who have questions. Perhaps, once you get over feeling like a cheesy goofball, you can relate to the series' message of love.
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