But it doesn't seem fair that we just discount someone from moral responsibility.
True - but what is it that he has control over, that he's morally responsible for? He "knows" the carver is free and going to hit someone again, and this is going to happen regardless of what he does. His action, morally repugnant as it may be, is also the one thing guaranteed to (1) free an innocent from jail and (2) get the cops to pursue the actual criminal who is victimizing actual people. How much of this is Christian's selfish desire to be free, his desire to show up Kit, and how much is a genuine concern about justice... I'm not sure. But I do think he's only mostly a monster, and not entirely one - and justice is a genuine part of it. Which is why it's even a point I'd debate instead of writing him off as a simple monster.
We can come to different value judgements, which is fine, because we all formulate values in our own way. Utilitarian, Kantian morality, Jewish ethics, and so on and so on... debating this stuff is a good way of probing and testing ourselves and refining our views, and in theory making us better at making value judgements in our own lives.
One of the many points of Christian is that he's such a dark mirror - particularly, his lack of scruple points in contrast to Sean's attempts and failures to be a paragon. There are any number of things that Christian has done to people that should be condemned and a strange number of cases where he would appear (to me anyway) to a better man than Sean. Sometimes, one wonders if the difference between the two is that Sean looks at what Christian does and sometimes thinks the difference is just that Christian has the balls to do what he doesn't. And this is sometimes both for good and for ill.
I suspect if I wanted to over think it, I could start pulling up many bad Buffy-Faith parallels...
Turd Sandwich vs. Giant Douche
True - but what is it that he has control over, that he's morally responsible for? He "knows" the carver is free and going to hit someone again, and this is going to happen regardless of what he does. His action, morally repugnant as it may be, is also the one thing guaranteed to (1) free an innocent from jail and (2) get the cops to pursue the actual criminal who is victimizing actual people. How much of this is Christian's selfish desire to be free, his desire to show up Kit, and how much is a genuine concern about justice... I'm not sure. But I do think he's only mostly a monster, and not entirely one - and justice is a genuine part of it. Which is why it's even a point I'd debate instead of writing him off as a simple monster.
We can come to different value judgements, which is fine, because we all formulate values in our own way. Utilitarian, Kantian morality, Jewish ethics, and so on and so on... debating this stuff is a good way of probing and testing ourselves and refining our views, and in theory making us better at making value judgements in our own lives.
One of the many points of Christian is that he's such a dark mirror - particularly, his lack of scruple points in contrast to Sean's attempts and failures to be a paragon. There are any number of things that Christian has done to people that should be condemned and a strange number of cases where he would appear (to me anyway) to a better man than Sean. Sometimes, one wonders if the difference between the two is that Sean looks at what Christian does and sometimes thinks the difference is just that Christian has the balls to do what he doesn't. And this is sometimes both for good and for ill.
I suspect if I wanted to over think it, I could start pulling up many bad Buffy-Faith parallels...