Cthulhudrew said:
But once he found out, yeah- I heartily agree that it would have been a much better idea to just go over to the Lostaways with open arms, and he probably could have gotten Jack to operate then and there.
Repeating Myself From Above: The actions of The Others, make sense – or as much sense as they can – if you realize they are operating like some kind of cult. On the face of it they are not being logical. However, logic is not an issue for them. Ideological obedience is important to them. Benry’s the one with the tumor, the one who is dying. Yet it was so important to him that Jack do the surgery because Benry had broken Jack, they he had people killed, kidnapped and put his own life in jeopardy.
Everyone’s lives matter to the Others only in so far as they play a part in Benry’s vanity melodrama, with him in the unquestionable role of God the Judge and Executioner.
Cthulhudrew said:
…and is the one who ordered Michael to take out Ana Lucia.
Actually, that was never part of Benry’s plan. He expressly tells Michael on the docks that he was unhappy about the deal made. It was Miss Klue – absent this season, oddly enough – who made the deal with Mike to get Jack, Kate, Sawyer and Hurley. And that deal never included the elimination of Ana. This is revealed in
Three Minutes and
Live Together, Die Alone.
Cthulhudrew said:
Shannon was a lot more than a "kept woman." She was a manipulator, who intentionally deceived and used men's feelings for her to get what she wanted. Pretty reprehensible in my book.
Maybe. But she was not that person when she died.
Hand of Evil said:
…then the others on the beach (did he have to kill them)…
Most vexing of all this talk of who is and who is not evil, is the equation of passivity with moral and ethical integrity and evil with resistance and attempts at self determination.
Eko had every right to defend himself – and that included the use of lethal force – against unknown attackers silently kidnapping him. To say that it was wrong for him to defend himself because he did not
know they meant him harm is risible.
That is the ethical system imposed upon sheep, pigs and cattle – not humans. To impose such a system on humans is to deliberately denigrate their worth as humans and a tacit creation of slavery.
However, Eko’s reversal from repentant man to unrepentant man was poorly handled by the writers.