In Sickness and In Health......
Oct. 11th, 2011 01:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreadedcandiru2As I've said before, about the only reason that the Pattersons do anything nice for one another is because they believe in something called a favor bank; their self-serving and not very moral moral code makes them believe that if they do do something for someone else, they've earned brownie points that are redeemable later on. Not only is this why John and Elly believe that the children's horse are theirs by right, it's why they were confused that Mike did them a good turn without being asked. It's even why they live in fear of Mike and Deanna being forced to give way to Mira's family politics; since it's impossible for them to believe that she does things without any hope of being paid back, they must, MUST think that she expects the Earth of Mike and Dee later on.
Where this favor bank system seems to collapse is when the Pattersons get sick. As we've seen and will see, Elly works like a piston when John and the children are sick; not only does she have to contend with the fact that if she did not, John would sit on his ass and watch the children die gruesomely because he wants her to think that he's helpless, she expects to get a lot of brownie points for doing so. This, of course, is absurd; not only does she not get remotely the same consideration when she's sick and not only is her taking time off to get well seen as dereliction of duty, she doesn't get brownie points because she's supposed to do this. That's the downside of that way of thinking, you see: the most self-serving piece of human excrement gets to play favor banker. Since that's the smug rat with the glasses and the permanent leer chuckling about how he never realized that he'd raised a princess, everyone else, Elly included, are screwed.
Where this favor bank system seems to collapse is when the Pattersons get sick. As we've seen and will see, Elly works like a piston when John and the children are sick; not only does she have to contend with the fact that if she did not, John would sit on his ass and watch the children die gruesomely because he wants her to think that he's helpless, she expects to get a lot of brownie points for doing so. This, of course, is absurd; not only does she not get remotely the same consideration when she's sick and not only is her taking time off to get well seen as dereliction of duty, she doesn't get brownie points because she's supposed to do this. That's the downside of that way of thinking, you see: the most self-serving piece of human excrement gets to play favor banker. Since that's the smug rat with the glasses and the permanent leer chuckling about how he never realized that he'd raised a princess, everyone else, Elly included, are screwed.
