#couldnt have said it better

sweaterkittensahoy:

I was checking recaps of Ted Lasso 2.12 to remember the details of Nate and Ted’s fight, and a reviewer said that Ted was a bad father because he was in England and not in Kansas with Henry. 

Like, literally said that Nate was right about Ted being a bad father because Ted was not physically available for his son. 

Which. First of all. Fuck you. The point of Nate’s rant isn’t that every single thing he said was right, it’s that he mashed up things he is genuinely concerned with (Ted’s lack of footie knowledge) with things he knew would absolutely HURT Ted (saying Ted is a bad father). And the other point of it is that Nate is wrong ON BOTH FRONTS. Yes, Ted has a major lack of knowledge, but he handles it by bringing in people (LIKE NATE) who have a TON of knowledge. Yes, Ted is physically away from his son, but he is always shown to be emotionally close to him (unlike Nate’s own father, who is physically near but emotionally distant). 

Nate is attacking Ted on all fronts because Nate doesn’t understand how to handle his anger. It is so frustrating to see a reviewer go, “Yeah, Ted is a shitty dad because he’s far away”. You can be a good parent from a distance. You can have a connection and communication with your kids even if you’re not right there in the room. You don’t have to be physically present to be a good parent, and it’s shitty to say that it’s a must. 

“Well, Nate makes a lot of good points” is exactly the sort of bullshit the show is trying to dismantle. Because that scene isn’t about Nate making good points. It’s about how toxic masculinity and an inability to parse and understand your feelings can lead to poisoning yourself against the people who care about you. It’s about Nate not being able to see the reason Ted isn’t holding his hand through every decision is because Ted trusts his skill and his talent as a coach. It’s about Nate being upset at a lifetime of reaching out to his father and getting rebuffed and then turning that anger on Ted and accusing him of being a bad father because he can’t say it to his own father. 

It’s about the tragedy of Nate not having done the work to find his confidence and self-assurance even as he was surrounded by people who wanted nothing more than to help him do just that. 

“Ted’s a bad father.”

Fuck you. Ted’s a great father. And a great coach. And a great friend. And he managed to do that all while starting to do his own work. Ted Lasso is GOOD, and he wants you to be GOOD, and he is heartbroken because he thinks Nate being mad at him is his fault for not being good enough, and that’s not true at all.