Reddit reply in r/Funnymemes: okay jenny — August 12, 2025 | Ali Shukri Amin

Refusing to take responsibility and intentionally not developing your own self awareness when you know something is clearly wrong is a moral failing. It doesn't have to be a circumstance of perfect malice to be wrong or even evil. Most people who do evil things have tons of mitigating circumstances that precipitate what they are doing. They justify it to themselves. Very few people conceive of themselves as truly evil even if they are.

Hiding a child from his father is evil. Even if she was molested and drowning in self hatred. It's possible to recognize that she was a victim, done wrong, and these kinds of decisions were much harder for her while still acknowledging the difficulty of the decision doesn't make the evilness of the evil choice not evil. Does it reduce culpability? For sure.

But could there have been a Jenny who was more compassionate to Forrest, more compassionate to her own child, despite what happened to her? For sure. Nothing stopped Jenny from calling Forrest when she had their son and saying, "Forrest I've made mistake after mistake but you deserve to be a part of your own son's life and your son deserves that."

How do we know this? There are many people like Jenny who have had just as bad or worse experiences, made tons of mistakes, but also chosen to make the right ones.

Jenny's background and justifications definitely make her less morally black than someone who just outright hides kids from their parents but it doesn't make it white. She's on the dark side of gray.