Oh, no. No no no.
That new series Mr. Robot is cool, and the fact that they're portraying a protagonist with social anxiety is a cool idea (because it's underrepresented in popular culture except to mock quiet/awkward/insecure people, and because, well, SA is ****ing boring, it's not romanticized like depression and schizophrenia, etc.).
However, while I am aware that the severity of the anxiety varies from person to person and depends upon the situation/activity, I think it's safe to say that most socially anxious people struggle with conversation. I'm sure there are many exceptions, but by the issue's very nature it only makes sense this would be the case, and if you're going to make a protagonist of a TV show have some kind of disorder/emotional issue, you would want to make him a typical case, no? You can't say he has social anxiety and then have him walking up to strangers and slickly informing them he has dirt on them and can ruin their life if they don't do A or B, without breaking eye contact, voice perfectly even and composed, facial expression confident.
They're portraying him as strange and nonconformist, someone on the fringes of society (it is cyberpunk after all), depressed, a drug user, and a psychotherapy patient. And he mentions (more than once) that he is socially anxious. Okay, so he has mental issues, we get it. But honestly, do some actual research on SA next time, it's kind of insulting. He really just looks more like a depressed drug user than anything else. I see no real social problems here.
I've been watching the series too, and have liked it (killing me they pushed the season finale off a week!) but I think, given the character's full psychology, he's portrayed pretty well.
[possible spoilers below, but I don't think so]
One thing is that it looks like to me that the cause of his SA is actually from his paranoid schizophrenia. I imagine him growing up, walking around and talking to people who were literally not there, and him being conscious of the fact that people think he's crazy, and he himself when realizing thinking the same. You can hear an extreme awkwardness in the way he talks, probably from having a mutism problem and holding back whenever having to speak. (Is this person real? Will I look crazy?) I say that because my voice I think is similar for the same reason. He can even be at ease and his voice will sound as such, it's just stuck like that.
And then some of his other qualities are that he is extremely smart, cyberpunk as you said, and cynical you could say (or at least a person who has seen the harsh realities of life). So when it comes to confronting people about dirt, I think it's a combination of knowing what to do, even if awkwardly, and not giving a ****. Like I'm sure a lot of us imagine ourselves having interactions with people, but usually are held back by the anxiety. But those moments when we say "**** it" and go through with it, a lot of times it goes just fine. I think that aspect is shown in the show.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like it's accurate for a very specific kind of person with SA. They don't overemphasis it which I love. Everyone I've ever met with SA didn't really show it on the outside, I think that's a common quality.
#34381
