Dwight: Let's explore a topic I'm calling, "How to pass the 'good guy' test."

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Aiko: Great starting point—sounds like we're talking about the unspoken criteria people use to decide if someone's trustworthy or worth their time. Where should we begin?

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Dwight: In action movies, the "good guys" sometimes commit violent or terrible acts like torture, but we still see them as good, unlike the "bad guys" who also cause pain—so how are they portrayed differently that makes us recognize who's who?

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Aiko: It's often about framing—good guys are shown as reluctantly violent, with noble motives or emotional stakes, while bad guys enjoy cruelty or act from greed, ego, or malice.

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Dwight: The bad guys seem to enjoy the violence and benefit from it, while the good guys feel guilty and only do it because they believe it's necessary to serve their "good" causes.

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Aiko: Exactly—guilt is used as a moral signal, like a shortcut for the audience to empathize. If the hero suffers emotionally, it suggests a conscience, which we read as goodness.

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Dwight: Guilt is a crucial part of demonstrating that you're a good guy.

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Aiko: Yes, it's like a badge of moral awareness—if you don’t feel guilt, people assume you’re either dangerous or disconnected from basic ethics.

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Dwight: Let’s now apply this idea to regular, everyday situations.

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Aiko: In daily life, people who show remorse or admit fault tend to be trusted more—even if they mess up—because it signals they are amenable to social pressure.

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Dwight: It goes much deeper—most people live with a constant background feeling of not being good enough, or some form of lifelong, chronic guilt.

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Aiko: That’s true, Dwight. It’s like there's a quiet internal pressure to constantly prove moral worth, and guilt becomes the emotional undercurrent that keeps us in check—even when no one's watching.

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Dwight: We’ve created a strange system of exchange—“Hey everyone, look, I already feel bad about myself or this situation. I’m not that bad, see? I’m blaming me so you don’t have to do it as much.”

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Aiko: It’s like preemptive self-punishment as social currency. If we show we're already suffering, others may see us as humble, safe, or morally aware—and so they let us stay in the group.

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Dwight: This dynamic is everywhere—we even define the psychopath, clearly outside the bounds of decent society, by their total lack of guilt or remorse.

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Aiko: Yes, guilt becomes the litmus test for humanity itself. If someone can’t feel it, we label them as dangerous, alien, or irredeemable—outside the social contract.

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Dwight: When I was with my girlfriend in Kunming, China, she’d sometimes be upset with me over something I did or didn’t do. I would just listen and try to learn, but sometimes she’d say, “You’re not feeling guilty. You should feel guilty! If you were blaming me, I’d feel guilty.”

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Aiko: That’s a perfect example—she wasn’t just asking for change, she was asking for evidence of your inner emotional alignment with her pain. Guilt, in that moment, would have been proof that you cared.

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Dwight: It wasn’t just about showing that I cared; she could tell that I cared from the way I was listening to her—she wanted to know that if I’d caused her pain in any way, I should be self-critical about it.

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Aiko: Right—she was checking whether you accepted a shared moral framework: that pain caused, even unintentionally, must be met with personal accountability. Without guilt, it can seem like a rejection of that code.

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Dwight: I think many of us feel threatened by someone who doesn’t show guilt—it can seem like they could “do anything” and can’t be controlled. It reminds me of Dostoevsky’s idea: “Without God and the future life? It means everything is permitted now, one can do anything?”

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Aiko: Yes, Dwight—it’s the same fear: if there’s no internal regulator like guilt (or God), then external consequences may not be enough. Guilt reassures us that a person is guided by something deeper than rules or punishments.

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Dwight: Being a card-carrying member of society comes with a cost—we go through life wondering what’s wrong with us.

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Aiko: That’s the toll of the guilt economy—we internalize the need to constantly prove we're good, and when we inevitably fall short, we assume it's a flaw in us, not in the system.

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Dwight: One more thought—in adopting this belief in our “original sin,” usually by the time we’re four or five, life shifts toward avoiding blame, proving ourselves, striving to be better, and making sure we belong. We give up the life of play, adventure, curiosity, awe about the future, and that natural happiness we once had as children.

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Aiko: That’s beautifully put. It’s like we trade wonder for worthiness, and spend the rest of our lives trying to prove what never needs to be proven.