We see it over and over again. A social figure, celebrity, influencer, or any random person on twitter says that one thing. You know, that thing that makes everyone lose their minds and metaphorically stone them to death through public shame, death threats, firings, and general hysterical ostracism. It’s the disease of black-and-white thinking that plagues society, and we can see it everywhere we look. Most notably in politics and on YouTube.

Nowadays, despite having the world at our fingertips, we somehow continue (and arguably worsen) the bad human habit of painting people with broad strokes. Someone does a bad thing once, so now they are all bad forevermore. It’s covered in eloquent detail in Jon Ronson’s So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, from Justine Sacco’s unforgivable AIDS joke to Jonah Lehrer’s career-devastating quote fabrication scandal. This is not a judgement on whether the central figures of a controversy deserve the backlash they receive, but the phenomenon undoubtedly plagues us as a society.

The list of irredeemable figures grows longer every day. Anyone associated with The Confederacy was defending slavery and racism and therefore couldn’t possibly have been a nuanced human being. Depending on which side of the party line you toe, the other side contains heartless, conniving monsters who want nothing more than to destroy your country beyond recognition. Either Black Lives Matter or All Lives do. To teach about or defend Christopher Columbus is to hate Indigenous People. You’re either with us or against us, a flawless recipe for the current paralyzing polarization of our time.

Of course, it doesn’t stop with historical figures or politics. Countless YouTube influencers fall from grace with thoughtless tweets and instagram posts, sometimes from years ago. Such as influencer and former pop star Jeffree Star, plagued for years by racist things he said in a YouTube video from 2009. Which brings us, finally, to Shane Dawson, who is no stranger to scandal himself.

Controversial YouTuber Jake Paul is the latest subject of a Shane Dawson docu-series. Dawson’s series’ have garnered a certain reputation: he investigates a controversial figure in the YouTube sphere such as Jeffree Star, shows them in a humanizing and sympathetic light, and thus successfully reverses the narrative around whoever he’s covering. They go from pariahs who deserve what they get to simply misunderstood, good-at-heart people who have made mistakes in their past. He seems to be accomplishing this yet again with his latest subject Jake Paul.

Many feared Shane would attempt to redeem Jake Paul despite his many, many transgressions — from setting dangerous fires, to tasing his friends, and falsely alleging an assault to name a few; and for many, this fear is being realized. In our current black-and-white, no-redemption mindset, this is simply unacceptable. People who have done bad things are not allowed to be in the public eye, are not allowed to be humanized, and are definitely not allowed to be redeemed. Deep down, they are a BAD person, as demonstrated by their actions or tweets or what have you, and therefore they are — in the parlance of our times — “canceled.”

Enter Shane Dawson, a person unaffected by the current “cancelation” culture. A person who genuinely empathizes with people and is able to not only see and understand their point of view, but present it on screen in a way that helps the audience see the subject through his eyes. Viewers are shocked that they go from despising a person to suddenly understanding and even liking them. Because the magic of Shane Dawson is that he turns public figures back into human beings. Flawed, imperfect human beings who make mistake after mistake for their entire lives, while also managing to have successes along the way. Just like you do.

Celebrities, influencers, and faceless twitter users are just like you. Yes, they should be held accountable for their actions. Yes, they should face punishment when appropriate. But they can also succeed. They can also feel remorse and shame. They can grow and change and learn and move away from the mistakes they made in the past. They are going to make mistakes again, just like you and me. But mistakes aren’t a death sentence. They are a chance to become better, and shouldn’t that REALLY be what we want? For people to get better, and not just crawl away in a hole and die?

If you haven’t been watching Shane Dawson’s content lately, I highly recommend you sit down and give it a try. You might find that it changes your perspective on the world for the better.