thought of the day on the pitt:
robby handled things with mohan badly. dana was nicer in delivery to mel but it wasn't great longterm advice. robby is not handling things well with himself or langdon. langdon is not doing a great job being responsible about his steps.
but also, because it's a fictional drama, viewers expect specific emotional arcs and discussions on screen. it's a conditioned and normal expectation for fiction!
robby and dana aren't wrong. the delivery is varying levels of flawed. but these people are at work, in a high stress environment where lives depend on them. mohan needs to find a way to set aside her issues with her mom, or accept that she's spiraling and go home. mel needs to table her upset about her relationship with becca and not use the red phone or obsess. langdon needs to ask people to talk to him after work or before a shift or another day, instead of during treatments or patient on-boarding.
we as the viewers have a natural emotional desire to see the discussions and reactions! but also! robby and dana are still not wrong that it's a workplace and these adults should be able to get a grip ok themselves and finish the next few hours. if they can't do that, then they shouldn't be at work! robby was HORRIFIC to mohan but it's still true that if she's having an active breakdown she should go home! the reason it feels especially awful from robby is that we all understand that HE should go home or seek help and he isn't doing that. but to seek help, he'd have to excuse himself from work, because his workplace is not one where he can do his job AND be treated.
mohan needs help and time to talk. so does mel. langdon needs to make apologies and amends. and the realistic messiness of the pitt as a show is that these people are hitting their breaking points at work and they should not be letting it spill over. it is! but it's also not stuff that should be handled at work during work.
their work environment is making it worse, for sure. the workday is one with unusual stress. and it's still not sustainable to let personal problems shut you down at work and refuse to leave or take a break. yes, they're understaffed, and that's a management from administration problem the pitt has made clear from hour one of day one.
when someone is spiraling that noticeably or publicly at work, in front of patients and other staff, it is not actually cruel or wrong to pull them aside and say some variation of "you need to set it aside, pull yourself together, and do the work, or go home."
and i think because robby was so awful about HOW he did it, and because he's not taking his own advice, and because we can see HOW mel is hurt and overwhelmed, a lot of fandom is getting the two (delivery vs message) confused and thinking the message itself is mean. neither dana nor robby owe any of the staff a ten minute sit down and discussion about what's bothering them in the current environment. long term yeah, a senior staff member taking that time to check on someone and give advice for pursing help would be ideal. but they barely have time to see the patients they have, much less manage staff, so the staff that's there this specific day with a computer systems crisis needs to be staff that can self-manage without intervention. because it's not a found family. it's not a bunch of friends. it's a job.