#i miss old degrassi

[boag]

This video is so sweet to me in such a bizarre way jejdjdoskfskkfsk

[goldscoyne]

I think I missed a lot of Degrassi because I don't remember Zig and Maya looking that young I must've gotten back into it when they looked older. Is Degrassi still ongoing? I heard someone say they got back together and honestly I wish the show stopped having their couples break up then get with someone else every 5 mins I know it's a drama but come on lol

are you talking about the gifset of them dancing that i reblogged? if i remember correctly, i think that’s from one of their last episodes… if not their actual last episode. i always thought it was cute zig and maya had their first episode and last episode together. throwback… i won tickets to a screening of zaya’s first episode at city walk and got to meet some of the cast. i think zaya always held a special place in my heart because of that. it was implied they probably got back together on the show and then someone told me the writers confirmed that they did

that was my thing with degrassi too. the couples always breaking up and all the random hookups got old. i don’t believe the show is still going. it got canceled awhile ago. i’m not sure if there’s ever been talks about bringing it back, though

[trippinsorrows]

So I cant remember if I sent this last night cause I was exhausted and have poor memory but I have to rant a little😭:

I feel like Kendrick Lamar’s performance was more about delivering a powerful message than putting on a flashy show, and I really appreciated that. It wasn’t a Beyoncé or Rihanna-level performance in terms of spectacle, but the message was the point—and I think that flew over a lot of people’s heads. Someone had to do what Kendrick did because white people still don’t get it. It’s sad that, as Black people, we have to go to such lengths to make our voices heard. They don’t listen when we speak directly, but they’ll consume it in our music. Black struggle is real, whether they like it or not. I loved how Kendrick cast Samuel L. Jackson as Uncle Sam, and how every time Kendrick tried to play the song he wanted, Uncle Sam would stop him, saying it was too “ghetto” or harsh. That moment felt so real—like a reflection of how society polices Black expression. Seeing Serena Williams on stage was iconic. It reminded me of when she got backlash for crip-walking during a match, and here she was, standing strong. It also felt like a jab at Drake, who’s disrespected her in his songs. Honestly, Drake could never do what Kendrick is doing. Drake only leans into being Black when it’s convenient, while Kendrick is always unapologetically proud of who he is. For me, the performance wasn’t about being the best show of all time—it was about the message. Black artists constantly have to go above and beyond to be heard, and Kendrick used his platform to say something that needed to be said. That’s what made it unforgettable. Sorry this is so long but as a black persona I felt seen by his performance🙃

you did, friend! i just am still trying to get through all my asks, cause i'm behind 😭😭😭

i definitely agree. i'll be the first to admit that i don't listen to a lot of rap outside of like mainstream female rap, just cause idk, my musical palette is a bit weird. so, i can maybe understand if people who don't listen to rap struggled to connect, but also.....let's be fr, that performance was for the niggas lmao

like literally FOR us BY us, and that's such an important, huge thing, especially in this day and age with everything that's going on. i was looking at one of the few youtubers i follow give a recap of it, and i actually had to stop watching the video because she was pissing me off talking about how it was "boring" or something like that. she completely missed the message. which was wild, cause she's black, but not all people who look like us are for us, so i digress lmao

so many people missed the point/message. it wasn't one of those performances where you can just watch. you have/had to really watch. he gave so many powerful messages and presented with such imagery that it really felt like a middle finger to all the shit that's going on, and i loved it deeply. to me, it was a stellar performance.

i'll also say that i was not and do not really get too invested in rap beefs or celebrity beefs in general, cause i'm old, and i just don't care atp in my life after years of over-caring, if you will. but baby, as someone who knew drake from degrassi when his ass was still aubrey graham, if you know, you know. performative asf. "drizzy drake" has always been a performer and actor. and, i say that as someone who also used to really like him as a teen, but when you get older, you see things from a different perspective.

[iamthefemaleweezy]

i miss when drake used to reference degrassi in his old music

[spinelli-gemelli]

A Degrassi Essay Series About Rick Murray

(Part 7)

In the last essay, I mentioned that it was difficult to have an unpopular opinion about the Rick debate. In this essay, I'm closing in on one specific question: how could one feel sorry for Rick, a woman beater? This question still boggles most Degrassi fans today. After all, it's a valid opinion to not feel sorry for the guy. Once you put all of his wrongs in writing, it proves even more difficult to empathize with him. Consider all of the following of which Rick is guilty:

Domestic violence: he attacked his girlfriend three separate times.

Aggravated assault: this resulted in landing Terri in a coma. If she had died, he would have been possibly charged with third degree murder.

Vandalism: he spray painted a giant "X" on Spinner's and Jay's car windows.

Possession of a deadly weapon: He brought a gun to school. This is exacerbated by the fact that Rick is also a sixteen-year-old adolescent/minor.

Attempted murder: he shot Jimmy Brooks in the back. If he had succeeded in killing him, he would have been charged with second degree murder. He later found Emma and aimed the gun at her face. If he hadn't been stopped by Sean, he would have killed her instantly.

It goes without saying: on paper, Rick is a classic, S-tier douchebag. Heck, one could probably expand on this list. And yet...some people feel for him? Why is that? Obviously there is contextual information missing from the list that would explain why Rick was driven to make many of the decisions he did. It's not like he woke up one day and decided that he wanted to kill everyone at Degrassi. In Rick's mind, he had tried everything: he tried to make amends with Terri's friends; when that didn't work, he tried to mind his own business; when that didn't work, he began to retaliate. When he finally got the chance to show the school how valuable he was, he was pranked on camera, and everyone that previously cheered him on began to laugh at him. In Rick's mind, the school betrayed him. Nothing else he did was going to work. The only way Rick was going to right the wrongs done to him, the only way he was going to earn respect, the only way he was going to fend off his bullies--in his mind--was if he used violence. Rick bringing a gun to school wasn't premeditated: it was his last resort. You see after his interaction with Paige that he goes from intending to shoot her to immediately concealing his weapon after he realizes that Paige wasn't there to give him a hard time. He reconsidered his choice after that single conversation. He put his backpack in his locker afterwards, a clear indicator that Rick didn't want to harm anyone if it wasn't necessary. Of course, after "overhearing" Spinner and Jay, he receded back into his violent ways for good. In the beginning, Rick was looking for a second chance. In the end, he wanted to avenge his suffering. Ephraim Ellis, the actor who played Rick, talks about the psychological whiplash that Rick undergoes in the span of a second: after he is doused in paint and feathers, Rick goes from the best day of his life to the worst instantaneously. After all of the hell he had been through, that was just a devastating blow for him.

Degrassi fans aren't shallow: crimes 3, 4, and 5 would be better understood if Rick also wasn't responsible for committing crimes 1 and 2. Rick's abusive past, and a recent past at that, is the point of contempt with some Degrassi fans when it comes to exploring the school shooting plot line. For one thing, high school shooters in real life typically didn't have records of domestic violence against women, though some definitely had some misogynistic overtones. For another, it makes it difficult to sympathize with the bullied victim when the victim himself has been cruel to his own girlfriend. Why couldn't the writers have chosen another character, one who was innocent beforehand, to explore the school shooting story line with? If Rick was innocent of any crimes before the extreme bullying, there would have been a chance to make him relatable to the audience and for more people to garner sympathy for him. This is the perspective that these fans are coming from, and I can understand and appreciate their reasoning.

I can also see why the producers decided to go with Rick's character, this former abuser, to tackle the gun violence topic. From a casting perspective, the Degrassi crew saw the actor playing Rick, Ephraim, as a talented young man, so they knew after his performance in season 3 that they wanted him to be back for Rick's tragic end in season 4, which is half of the reason why Terri's abusive boyfriend and the bullied school shooter are the same person. The writers have been wanting to do a school shooting episode since season 1, but they knew that they needed to "earn" that experience before they did so; they had to wait until the actors, who were all very young in season one, were old enough and experienced enough to pull off such a heavy and demanding role. Ephraim, playing a recurring guest role, exceeded the creators' expectations, so they decided to give him the most difficult part: he had to play the school shooter. Considering that fans still are appalled by Rick's character today, I'd say that Ellis successfully played the role.

I also understand this decision from a moral standpoint. I mentioned this in part 6 of this essay series: the writers were wanting to demonstrate the vicious cycle of violence and the ripple effect it can leave on a community for years after the fact. They wanted to show teens that solving violence with violence only creates more violence in the end. We see this when Rick almost kills Terri; when the students bully Rick relentlessly; and lastly when Rick brings a gun to school and essentially gets himself killed because of it. Nothing was solved in the end. Only pain, guilt, trauma, and devastation remained. The creators were implying a lesson to their teen audience: don't bully, even if the bullied deserves it. I think this is more powerful to teach kids than if the school shooter was just a cut-and-dry, loner nerd. I also think it was a more realistic way to introduce Rick's bullying problem, which was initiated by characters we care about who traditionally aren't bullies save for Spinner and Jay. You can understand why they did it. If the victim was innocent, it would be harder to understand the motivations of the bullies, and the story would be very black-and-white obvious. As I mentioned before, a lot of the main cast aren't written as bullies, so it would be strange to see these mostly good kids decide to torture one kid for no real reason. In this case, the kids had a legitimate reason to hate Rick, so the writers used that conflict to explore school shootings. Degrassi is about the nuance, and boy did Rick's arc have a bunch of that. You may not have liked him, and it's okay if you didn't sympathize with him; he wasn't designed for you to feel sorry for him. However: right is still right, and wrong is still wrong. It doesn't matter if Rick wronged Terri in the beginning, that he wasn't the "perfect" victim. He was still wronged by the school and his parents afterwards, and in the end, Rick committed the ultimate wrong. This whole tragedy is summed up in one sentence by Snake at the end of episode 4x08: "None of us took Rick's bullying seriously enough."

That still doesn't answer the main question. Sure the majority of fans have no empathy for Rick, but there are still a few who do. Why is that? How can that be possible? Considering that there is not much in the show's writing to suggest that Rick should be pitied, except when he was humiliated on stage, all of the credit goes to his actor, Ephraim Ellis. In order to make a character believable, whether they are playing a good or bad person, the actor himself has to find a way to relate to the character he is playing. Ephraim put in the hard work and had to internalize Rick's inner world so he could deliver an amazing performance. That is very difficult to do, especially when Rick becomes violent and sinister in the end. There is an interview Ellis did for Popgurls magazine twenty years ago that I recommend you take a look at. It may seem bizarre to reference such an out of date interview, but that era of Ephraim Ellis has fresh memories of playing Rick as he shot the episodes for Degrassi just months prior. You will get a better idea of what was going through his mind as he played Rick during the date of the publication, which was December 5th, 2004. In this interview, he discusses finding common ground between himself and Rick in order to connect to the character, and he says that they were both theater nerds and hopeless romantics, which is how I think Ellis was able to make Rick believable. He bridged the gap between his conscience and Rick's with what they shared, and then went from there. Consider the following which was said by Ellis:

"...when the character grew more in Season Four, when [the audience] learned there was a lot more to him than just this evil abusive person and that underneath he was just a kid with a problem who sincerely wanted to change – that’s when things got a lot more interesting for me as an actor. I had my run-ins with bullying throughout middle school and such, but it’s unthinkable what Rick had to go through, despite his past."

This was how the actor saw the character he was playing: "just a kid with a problem who sincerely wanted to change". This puts things into perspective. I get that this was in 2004, and Ellis is now twenty years older, but, as mentioned before, this is him talking just after he finished playing Rick. I remember reading this interview when I was younger and being impressed by how Ellis was able to sympathize with a villainous character, but then I reminded myself that he's an actor. It's his job to connect to the character he's playing; that's how you sell the part. That is what every actor is required to do: they have to make you believe that their character is real, and in order to do that, they have to be able to connect to certain parts of the role. Obviously he doesn't have to relate to everything that the character stands for, especially in Rick's case, but imagine if Ephraim looked down on his character and didn't take his psychosis seriously. It would show in his acting or lack thereof. Yet Ellis encapsulated the role of Rick. He was a natural at the part.

It makes sense from an acting standpoint to connect with Rick, but what about the average viewer? It is never confirmed in the show that Rick was "sincerely trying to change" apart from Rick's declaration. Did the viewers believe him? Is that why they were more apt to feel sorry for him when bullying didn't let up? That appears to be the correlation.

Since the first essay I published about Rick Murray, I have been using hashtags that I deem relevant to the series. One of them is #Degrassi confessions. In case you were wondering what that meant, here is my confession: I can't get through "Time Stands Still" part 2 because my head canon can't help but believe that Rick never fired his gun. Up until the moment he decided to shoot Jimmy, I was a believer in Rick's repentance. I didn't want my bias to shroud the integrity of this essay series because I wanted to give validation to all sides of the debate, but there was something about the way Ephraim played his character in season four, with a complete change in his demeanor, that I couldn't help but root for. There's something to be said about him not hitting any of his classmates back in "Mercy Street" (4x04) even though many of them had no problems with pushing, shoving, or punching him. Some argue that it was because he was more intimidated by guys than he was girls, but girls were also hitting him, yet he turned the other cheek constantly. If this kid has anger issues, poking the bear would bring them out, but Rick kept his head down and didn't retaliate during the ribbon campaign, keeping his temper in check.

No, I don't think he is blameless: I've laid out my case in all of the preceding essays. Everyone is to blame for participating in the cycle of violence, including and especially Rick Murray. He was deeply flawed. He was terrible at reading the room; he underestimated the difficulty it would take to earn forgiveness; he couldn't take a hint that Emma wasn't into him; and he was wrong in assuming that it was okay to force a kiss on her. It also goes without saying that it was disturbing for Rick to decide that Emma was worth killing because she didn't reciprocate his feelings for her (though I've made the argument before that at this point in his arc, no one feels bad for Rick). Still, before the shooting, I genuinely believed that Rick was making an effort to improve, however poorly he went about demonstrating this. He still had a lot to learn, but he never once, since returning to Degrassi, said or believed that the students were overreacting to what he did to Terri last year. He never denied what he did. He knew he was in the wrong, which was why he was putting in the work to be right. Maybe a different school or juvenile hall would have been a better fit for this transformation, but I do believe that Rick was trying to change. The fandom's perception of Rick's intentions has shifted throughout the years, but even so, I still find myself wishing that things turned out better for him. The whole story is just tragic all around because, despite what happened, there were many opportunities for this to have gone the other way. As I said before, this was the story the writers wanted to tell the audience. Rick wasn't meant to have a happy ending, but there were plenty of chances for him to get one. He sealed his fate the moment he thought it was justified to shoot his classmates. It's a tragedy that Rick had to lose his life, but he was a threat, and he needed to be stopped by any means necessary.

[signetrings]

12, 19, 24 for the Monday meme!

munday meme / accepting!

12. Have you any old muses that you’d love to bring back?

i have a few ocs that i think about occasionally! i have my first ever oc ( renata ) on @/polyjuiceds adapted into the hp universe. she was originally a muse for percy jackson and i've played her for years as a fandomless oc after that. ( fun fact: ren's the reason my wife and i started talking in the first place☺️ ). and i do kinda miss writing jt yorke / frankie hollingsworth from degrassi.

19. Do you listen to music whilst writing? If so, what kind of music?

i answered this already, but the short answer is no as i get distracted sooo easily.

24. What about your muse are you most proud of?

i'm both insecure and proud of how soft the way i write draco can be. i'm obviously a very huge fan of draco pushing everyone away / being indifferent to everyone on the surface, but that boy grew up spoiled rotten with attention and love from his parents that it's a no-brainer that he secretly craves affection and attention and i love how i can explore that in all the dynamics i get to write with everyone!

[boricuacherry-blog]

Absolutely no disrespect meant, I’m surprised this blog is still active. It’s such a time capsule of things that unfortunately aged poorly. I miss the hype around early 2010s Rihanna (she didn’t age poorly tho), and back in the day I loved seeing her and Drake interact, rock each others merch, collab, etc. I was also such a hoe for YMCMB, OVO, and OVOXO. I really loved Drake sm rewatching Degrassi I’m so disappointed in how things turned out (the Kendrick beef and everything that’s been exposed)

Lol this blog is only like a year old. I just like and blog old stuff/older news. I guess that's a compliment tho cause it feels nostalgic if you think I'm an old blog. I remember really enjoying watching her music videos back in 2010/11 very visually creative and just idk she was just a very visual artist. But that was the height of avante garde pop being ushered in, around the time Lady Gaga popped up in the industry. And I liked Degrassi too. Also that was around when Tumblr started so it's interesting to go dig back in old blogs and find stuff from that time.

[someotherdog]

for / @seolinah participants / mary esther & your choice of muse, as long as they're the type to work at a psychic shop! story / based off of here; our muses work at a psychic shop, where mary esther views it as just another con in her long list of cons, and she gives phony fortunes all the time (she's got a flair for the dramatic). your muse can be the one that actually believes in their gift or they can be another grifter, we don't have to stick to the plot wholesale! setting / the psychic shop where they work! let's call it... miss rudy abilene's house of fortunes.

mary esther propped her feet on the table where the employees of miss rudy abilene's did their tarot readings. of course, it was another slow day in the shop; only weirdos and desperate people came to see a psychic, and they usually didn't want mary esther to give dole out fortunes when they eventually realized she was just copying storylines on general hospital or old episodes of degrassi. the only reason she hadn't been fired was miss rudy abilene's refusal to cover shifts until mary esther's vacant position would be filled. that, and miss rudy abilene said she saw real potential in mary's lifeline when she read her palm during the initial job interview. "yeah, okay, maybe i shouldn't have told her that her daughter was going to meet a man in a yellow raincoat that would show her a world she had never dreamed of before. was i supposed to know she'd chase down any man she saw in a raincoat, not even ones that were yellow, and ask them if they'd be willing to take her daughter on a date?" mary scoffed, rolling her eyes. "my psychic told me it would happen clearly wasn't a good defense in the police's eyes. that's on her for being so dumb to believe me."

[degrassi-fandom-confessions]

I'm only just now getting around to binge-watching Next Generation, and I'm on season 9, and so far, I simply do not care about the newer group of students at Degrassi like Clare or Holly J or any of them. I miss the old crew like Jimmy, Ash, Craig, Paige, Sean, etc. I get that it's focused on the high school and the old characters had to graduate and everything, but I'm having a hard time adjusting to this new cast of characters. I'm not sure if I even want to keep watching at this point.

[zayadriancas]

Seeing these old screencaps from Degrassi is very trippy. How can pics of Zoe be 9 years old already? Jeez. Time flew!

I know right! It doesn’t feel like it was that long ago but even their graduation was 7 years ago now as well as the end of Degrassi :( it feels like it just happened. I miss them so much! Hence the post spam lol 😂

[grunge-mermaid]

grunge rewatches murdoch mysteries pt 2

1x04 elementary my dear murdoch

alright ice storm is winding down and we've got power back let's go

Historical Figure Shoehorned Into Plot #2: Arthur Conan Doyle

oh and he's a detective Murdoch fanboy

Julia's evening gown is

Miss Pencil comes back, right? I seem to recall her being one of Julia's future psychiatric patients?

that little girl in the green pinafore really likes skipping around the station house

does the Toronto Paranormal Society still exist? it sounds like a fun time

rooting out charlatans and trying to find "real" clairvoyants

you know what

I'll roll with it

read a contemporary biology textbook and then tell me the paranormal society's beliefs are so bonkers for the time

that is an awfully racy flashback for Mr Straight-edge-stick-in-the-mud-not-so-much-as-a-hint-of-impropriety-allowed-allergic-to-physical-affection-devout-catholic Murdoch

full frontal contact and open-mouthed kissing in public? unmarried??? I'm gonna need my smelling salts. good thing the Toronto Constabulary didn't employ morality officers for another 20 years

1x05 Til Death Do Us Part

that is a gorgeous church (St Paul's Presbyterian, Hamilton ON btw)

"he was a sodomite???" "William, I believe the term in use now is homosexual"

Julia being completely unfazed by

mandrakes, pansies, shirt lifters

slurs used to be so creative

please please tell me the priest was Wendell's lover please

it's probably the Best Man but come on

"no I've got a family" ffs man that means nothing

oh it's not him so it may be the priest

HA! It WAS the priest!

or reverend. toronto is a protestant city after all. Shuter Street Church is a curiously non-denominational name

handbag. mary. bender. molly. add to the list of slurs

wait. I thought "left-footer" was slang for a catholic not a homosexual?

that suit is atrocious

"you look like Oscar Wilde...if Oscar Wilde were good-looking"

was that a genuine blush

aw fuck it was the best man poor bastard

if I didn't know better, I'd have thought Julia's impassioned speech about how natural "omnisexual behaviour" is was trying to establish her as a lesbian

the good thing about long-running tv shows is that characters have time to change their opinions

if this didn't result in a crisis of faith, I'd be very disappointed

1x06 Let Loose The Dogs

I forgot we meet Murdoch's father so early in the series

Stephen McHattie!

aka Uncle Jimmy in emily of New Moon

aka Vreenak

aka this guy:

well that's one way to kick off a family reunion

watching old episodes of Murdoch Mysteries is a meta version of Where Do I Know Them From? because instead of recognizing the actors from Degrassi or some niche Canadiana, I actually recognize them from a more recent episode of Murdoch Mysteries

Bugalugs counter: 2

I am concerned about the sheer number of locations in this show that have "No Spitting" signs on the walls

as per my previous post on the matter, undershirts good.

also ladies' exercise clothing. good look.

ok you never hit your boy or your wife, but what about your daughter? or have we not reverse Chuck Cunninghamed Murdoch's sister, Susannah the nun?

[spaceshipsandpurpledrank]

I think it is time for me to bring this discussion back up because it's very relevant.

Every major artist on Young Money Cash Money has been a predator or a victim or both.

Tyga: was allegedly having sex with a 14 year old Kylie (at kendalls sweet 16, which he performed at) while he was 22.

Drake: We've all seen his "at best" questionable behavior, but i also believe he is a victim grooming, specifically while on degrassi, a lot of his older interviews hint at this plus his obsession with older women in his earlier music.

Nicki: We've seen Miss Captain save a pedo in real time, but i have to believe this also comes from being groomed as well. Her staunch defense of the broken men in her life has to be because if she condemns them, she has to take a hard look at EVERY MAN who was ever in her life.

Wayne: There is a literal interview where birdman talks about locking wayne in a room with a prostitute when he was either 11 or 13 until he came out, "a man." Nuff said. And while he hasn't (in any instance I've heard of) perpetuated these behaviors himself, i have to believe his drug addiction is a side effect of the unresolved trauma.

[thebridgehqs]

Welcome to 1926 – Miles Hollingsworth!! I hope you feel right at home here in Sydney. Before you get too comfortable and see what all our city has to offer, be sure to review our CHECKLIST. We’re so glad to have you with us, Doe !!

We are in the middle of an event - Miles has been given air at beginner level.

** Blair Waldorf (Gossip Girl) is now reserved for 48 hours!!

Look who just woke up- is that FELIX MALLARD? No, I must have been mistaken, that’s MILES HOLLINGSWORTH III from DEGRASSI.  I heard they are TWENTY years old and stuck here just like everyone else. Even in the 20’s, he still gives off a CHARMING SMILE THAT CAN CHARM HIS WAY INTO ANYTHING, BABY BLUE EYES THAT HAVE A DEVLISH CHARM TO THEM, A BASKETBALL ALWAYS NESTLED UNDERNEATH HIS ARM, MESSY HAIR FROM SLEEPING LATE, RUNNING SHOES  BECAUSE HE ALWAYS MISSES THE BUSS, AND A SMART MOUTH THAT OFTEN GETS HIM IN TROUBLE. But here, they are working as a BUSS BOY at UNDISCLOSED. They’re known to be quite LOYAL & KIND but have a tendency to be CHOATIC & AGGRESSIVE on their bad days. (britt here, could i reserve Blair Waldorf (Gossip Girl)?.)

[mcdreary]

I miss old degrassi I just watched a season 8 episode that finishes with a character saying as the LAST LINE [to a cis girl]: “You ever have ball cancer? I did. So if I can get through all that, you can get through this.” A+ writing

[spinelli-gemelli]

A Degrassi Essay About Rick Murray

(Part 2)

"We have to do something."

It's difficult to continue this story without discussing the one-and-only Emma Nelson's role in Rick's return. Most fans find her intervention in this plot line quite irritating, wondering what would motivate her to suddenly interact with the upperclassmen. If we refer back to episode 4x03, we would recall that her current classmates have unofficially stopped talking to her because of how she felt about her ex-boyfriend, Chris, showing interest in Liberty Van Zandt. Her lines in that episode have become infamous. "What are people gonna think of me if Chris goes out with Liberty next?" Manny Santos, Emma's BFF, who was first on board the "Emma and Chris reunite" train, was taken aback by Emma's...well, let's call it condescension. Anyway, word gets back to Liberty, and, to quote her words, Emma is "dead to [her]." Since Manny and JT are dating, and since Toby is friends with J.T. (though not for very long here: more on that later), that leaves Emma completely friendless in time for this season's festivities. I doubt that the boys of the friend group care about the ladies' petty squabbles about the Chris ordeal, but since J.T.'s girlfriend is friends with Liberty, and they all hang out, it would just be awkward for them to include Emma in any of their social engagements at this time.

Now that we've established her social status, let's get back to Emma's involvement in the return of Rick Murray. Miss Nelson quickly learns from Paige and Spinner about who he is and what he's done and ceases the perfect opportunity to flex her cause girl muscles. I'll give her credit where it's due: she's bold, driven, committed, and smart. She may have let the glow up get to her head, and so what if she thinks that she's better than Liberty. At least she didn't put a classmate in a coma! She actually is better than this guy. She takes it upon herself to do whatever it takes to get this abuser out of her school. Of course, it's wrong to hurt others, but if she were successful with this mission, she would win the approval of Paige and her clique. What could be cooler than that? Definitely not Liberty's hot tub!

Collaborating with Paige and Marco, Emma manages to organize a ribbon campaign at school that is against domestic violence on the surface, though truly, it is an anti-Rick campaign. Somehow harassing a student in school, regardless of what he did before, is not considered breaking the rules. "We wanna pressure Rick. Make his life hell," Emma would go on to explain to Sean Cameron after he asks about her true motives behind launching this crusade. Either Emma doesn't know what the word "pressure" means, or she didn't foresee how the students of Degrassi would interpret the word. The campaign combined with Paige's popularity status means that everyone knows Rick, hates him, and wants nothing to do with him. Now, because of Emma, Rick's identity is out, and the student body feels a sense of duty to make this guy suffer the consequences of his actions. It's not like the principal was going to do anything about it anyway (more on that later).

The fact that this happened is both good and bad. On one hand, Rick was reminded of the simple fact that his actions have consequences. Everywhere he went, he was greeted with hostility. Going back to my argument in part 1, here at Degrassi, he wouldn't be granted the luxury to slip back into his old, abusive behaviours. While I believe that Rick was sincerely repentant this time around, it wasn't enough for him to just want to "bury the hatchet" with Paige et al. He made a student suffer because of his unchecked rage and almost killed her. Wanting to change is a good starting point, but he had to prove to everyone that he was different from last year, and students had no reason to believe that he was. Degrassi's opposition to his presence was a reminder that what he did couldn't be swept under the rug and forgotten about. He didn't just hurt Terri; he wounded her community as well.

On the other hand, getting the entire student body involved was a bit extreme, as not everyone knew Terri or even cared about her. Students like Jay Hogart were simply tormenting Rick for their own amusement. Jay loved to wreak havoc, and Rick was an easy target. No one was going to go out of their way to defend the guy, so why not have some fun? Treating Rick poorly on school grounds is one thing, but to heckle him at the Dot? Sure, it's a popular hang out spot for Degrassians, but they don't own the establishment, and Rick should be free to dine wherever he wishes. It's not like he's causing any trouble by ordering a cup of coffee. After Rick got jumped by Jay behind the Dot, Emma realized that her crusade had gone too far, and stopped the students from attacking him before he became severely injured.

Emma's involvement in Rick's plot, though it initially seemed to come out of left field, was necessary in order for Rick to see the error of his ways and to know what it felt like to be physically assaulted. After considering the events that happened to Emma in "King of Pain", the episode that preceded "Mercy Street", it makes perfect sense that she would take up a new cause at Degrassi in an attempt to be accepted and appreciated by a new group of friends. When fans look back at Rick's story, they usually view these episodes in a vacuum, forgetting about the buildup that came before the episode of Rick's return, and as a result, they are confused and annoyed about Emma's seemingly sudden involvement.

While Emma might not have meant for her campaign to take such a violent turn, I think after episode 4x04, Rick understood that he had to work extra hard in order to earn the rapport and acceptance of his classmates. He is sadly mistaken, however, that they are interested in his change of heart to begin with. Ironically, at the end of this episode, both Rick and Emma are social outcasts: Rick for putting Terri in a coma, and Emma for publicly defending him. Both were seeking approval from their peers, and neither of them received it in the end. In a sense, they are both on the same side against the student body.

[minamotoz]

*me reading boycoff the caf* damn that was racist as shit........ *keeps reading*