Yet Leslie regularly forgets the maxim that charity starts at home, and just as often Ron remembers it. These personality sketches are rough, and so incomplete-Leslie can be nice, Ron can be mean, etc. (See especially the episodes “ 94 Meetings,” in which Ron visits April at her parents’ house and makes clear that Andy cares for her, and “ Media Blitz,” in which he convinces April not to string Andy along.) And he’s attuned to the emotional states of the people around him, filling the role of office parent, as when he advises April and Andy (Chris Pratt) about their relationship.
He’s also an excellent judge of character, recognizing that Leslie’s boyfriend Justin (Justin Theroux) is a “tourist” who cares primarily about gathering outrageous stories. When he learns that state auditors plan to fire her, for instance, he offers up his own job instead. He gives Leslie a wide berth to do what she pleases even though he disagrees with her politics, and he always supports her. Generally, though, he’s a more considerate person than the good-government Leslie Knope.
Yes, he sometimes loses his patience with Jerry (Jim O’Heir), the office imbecile, and he dates Tom’s (Aziz Ansari) ex-wife, even though Tom still has feelings for her. When it comes to his friends and co-workers, however, he’s a mensch-a sweetheart, even. Helping the anonymous hordes of Pawnee is anathema to Ron.
What passes for a conversation between Leslie and Ann (not always, but frequently) is the former worrying about bureaucratic matters, or her dating life, with the latter listening patiently. She’s not the most charming of house guests.) Nor is her ignorance especially surprising. Then she falls asleep on Ann’s couch-for 22 hours. (Later, she goes over to Ann’s house for a chat. Leslie’s behavior ill befits an intimate friend she’s out of touch and comes perilously close to embarrassing both Mark and Ann deeply. But it turns out that Ann is poised to break up with Mark, and Leslie has to call him off at the last minute. Leslie immediately tells him he ought to, and even suggests that he propose on air.
In the B-story of the telethon episode, Leslie’s colleague Mark (Paul Schneider) confesses that he’s thinking of asking Leslie’s best friend Ann (Rashida Jones) to marry him. Leslie does not balance exactitude with solicitousness-she often has little concept of what’s happening in her friends’ lives. They’re ridiculously kind Midwesterners, so they grumble but oblige, and get little thanks in return. In Season 2, she signs up her office-mates for an all-night diabetes telethon without first asking permission. Examples abound of Leslie blithely taking her friends for granted in pursuit of the public good. No one’s going’s anywhere no one’s sleeping.” Leslie’s friends believe that her goals are admirable, so they don’t call her out on the fact that she’s taking advantage of their good will. More dramatically, when no one submits a feasible proposal, Leslie acts the tyrant: “What we need to do is just keep working and just work again more. Because she cannot generate a post-festival idea, she requires her co-workers to accompany her on a camping trip for a brainstorming session, hardly noticing that they would rather spend their off-hours otherwise. The real flaw in Leslie’s character is not her pride, but her offhanded, sometimes cruelly demanding treatment of the people she knows well.
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