evangelion is realistic for its depiction of humankind facing the prospects of apocalypse with a self-preserving mixture of denial, apathy and willful ignorance. i keep thinking about how all of us right now are staring right into the very thing that will lead to our demise (read: climate emergency) and still we go about our daily lives like it’s not going to happen. the thought occurs to me probably once every few days, and more often recently as friends and family struggle with the fear and the grief from the coronavirus outbreak. but if you think about most apocalyptic movies, there comes a moment when everyone realizes that the only way to survive is to drop everything we’re doing and pour all of our time, effort and resources into preventing our doom.
that doesn’t quite happen in the evangelion universe. military leaders slack off on golfing trips during crucial pilot tests. countries refuse to participate. ego and bureaucracy still get in the way. funding is always an issue. on the flipside, people still get married, have children, go on holidays, take up new hobbies. families are quitting NERV to leave Tokyo-3 for somewhere safer, even if they should know there are nowhere safer. life doesn’t stop. they refuse to drop whatever they’re doing to give the world a better chance at survival, same as us.
but it’s also a cruel thing to lead someone to believe they have agency when they don’t. imagine what goes on in kaji’s and ritsuko’s minds as they watch misato kill herself trying to do her job, when both know it’s futile.
anyway, i don’t think it’s stupidity or a matter of weakness in willpower. we can’t sustain a state of emergency all our lives. that kind of thing kills. it’s very difficult to wrap your head around the idea that the daily routine you’ve been living has to be overhauled. that life can never be the same again. we’d all prevent global warming if all it takes is switching off the lights or saying no to plastic straws. the reality is it takes so much more, and the sad truth is, so much of it’s out of our hands. so in our disempowerment, the only way we know to survive is by, yes, going about our daily lives. keeping on isn’t cowardice either. it’s a form of rebellion too to be told you don’t matter and still insist upon existing.
yui ikari takes this a step further, giving birth to shinji at a time when people are asking whether it’s ethical to have children when the world is heading to a very bad place. isn’t that cruelty? i don’t know.
this isn’t, by the way, a ramble to get you to buy a reusable straw (what a straw man argument). i don’t claim to know the right answer. this is only a call to think about which of these archetypes are closest to our own reaction to, again, the very real promise of extinction – if not for us then certainly for our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. which do you think is the right way to be and why? are you already the way you should be? why not?
PS: i came back thinking i’d write something about bach in evangelion for @qmisato, but this is what weighs most heavily on my mind. next time then.
