I don’t mean that the butcher didn’t deserve his fate, or Mary. I mean that giving in to the impulse to be so brutal, to deliver karma so personally, is apt to lead to a coarsening of the spirit for both Rick & Carol–the same sort of coarsening that the Terminus people themselves suffered.
I see the merit in both of these arguments. On the one hand, you don’t want to be reduced to the level of the people you are killing (for very good reasons); on the other hand, some people need to be put down like a mad dog. I guess the “coarsening of spirit” (well-said, Skald) comes from how you do what needs to be done - do you shoot them in the head and put an end to the evil that they’re doing, or do you leave them to be eaten alive by zombies and turned into zombies themselves?
Going to rescue other people who are trapped in the other boxcars - more of a grey area. Do you risk the lives of your group to save other people, or do you leave those people to a long, lingering, painful death? In our modern world, we have the luxury of helping those who can’t help themselves - should you risk the lives of your own group for strangers? Is that kind of self-interest bad in those situations? Is a coarsening of spirit necessary to survive?
She doesn’t work for the CDC or listen to the latest real-world ebola news. We’re in a world where zombies exist and defy physics. I think in this fictional world, she did the right thing, or at least an understandable thing.
Same thing with letting bad guys turn. What, bad guys aren’t supposed to get their just desserts sometimes? I don’t expect the characters in this show to hold the highest of high unwavering moral high grounds. Sometimes the bad guys deserve to suffer while they die.
Anyhoo, way back when Rick let that backpacker die and then later they took his stuff - that was cold.
that was a very shitty thing to do.
During the Zombie Apocalypse I shall bobby trap my backpack.
Understandable, sure, but far from right: it was dangerous, unilateral, and accomplished nothing.
Agreed; Rick and Co have done some pretty awful things over the course of the show (such as killing the hermit on the way to Woodbury, which I remarked about at length at the time), and they can be be split into two rough categories. Category 1 is ruthless pragmatism, such as ignoring the desperate hitchhiker, killing the hermit, killing Tomas semi-preemptively, or Carol killing the two sick people at the prison. This is behavior that’s immoral, but rational. Category 2 is malice, such as leaving people to be devoured alive, or to die and turn (given that the characters regard zombification as something terrible to endure; I remain unconvinced that this would actually be the case). Purely malicious behavior is clearly on the rise, though altruistic behavior persists (such as trying to free fellow captives of the Termians).
Emphasis on the this. One persistent flaw with the show is how it rigs the choices the characters face: altruism virtually never pays off. This is in stark contrast to the real world, where fairness and altrusim are mutually beneficial, and biologically inherent, parts of human society. On TWD, kindness is only ever for it’s own sake, there’s nothing made of the fact that altruism is rational and desirable on a purely material, pragmatic level as well.
Notably, Rick’s banishment of Carol was also outside the decision-making structure of the group, conducive to instability, and thus also wrong.
Any theories on what the deal was with the guy they rescued from the shipping container? Fellow captive, survivor of the band that overran the place, other?
Yours was the name I could not recall (and was too lazy to look up). I’m pretty sure I mocked you viciously at the time, so I’ll say here that you were right and I was wrong.
That said, I disagree that altruism never pays off. Consider Michonne.
This brings to mind an expression: I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy.
Incidentally, I can understand why our protagonists consider the idea of turning into walker to be the worst thing imaginable. Even aside from the degrading nature of such a transformation, it’s to show that they are not completely corrupt yet.
The worst thing Rick can imagine is not dying; it’s not even being eaten alive. It’s turning into a zombie and killing Carl or Judith–and maybe Michonne at this point. There are things that matter to Rick more than his own life, and likewise all the other protagonists. Which is a good thing. None of the Terminus people cared about anything but himself by the end. I write “himself” on purpose, by the way, because I mean it to be singular. They’d gotten so evil that they were willing to eat their own.
Rick, et al, are not to that point. If Judith or Carl died, they would not eat them.
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Category 2 is malice, such as leaving people to be devoured alive, or to die and turn (given that the characters regard zombification as something terrible to endure; I remain unconvinced that this would actually be the case).
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I see it less as causing them suffering than desecrating the body to show disrespect.
[QUOTE=Human Action]
Any theories on what the deal was with the guy they rescued from the shipping container? Fellow captive, survivor of the band that overran the place, other?
[/QUOTE]
I thought he was the rapist from the flashback to Terminus. Might be wrong as there was very little light in that scene.
In Real Life, my experience is that No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.
No theory, it is confirmed. That was the rapist we see in the last scene of the episode, the flashback to rapin’ time. He was the Head Rapist In Charge who smacks the guy comforting the woman. “No, it is definitely not okay.”
There is a distinguishing tattoo you can see that confirms this, though it’s a bit tough to see clearly even in HD. On rewatch I was able to make it out when I knew what I was looking for. (They also said that’s who it was on Talking Dead.)
Anything that the Terminites did to him I have no problem with.
In fact he’d have been in far worse shape if most people had him as a captive. He was filthy and deranged but he could still walk; you’d think emasculating him and crippling him would be the first thing they’d do before they really went medieval.
I didn’t buy that they’d have kept him alive and in possession of his limbs, though.
I disagree. Rick’s choice was definitely unilateral, and was arguably - but not indubitably - correct. However, it was clearly and indisputably more conducive to the stability of the group. If he had brought the issue to the group for decision, there would have been division over the punishment. Daryl would not have allowed her to be exiled alone. Also, Tyrese clearly wanted vengeance.
More than that. Telling the group would lead to an immediate fight in which either Daryl or Tyrese would either die or be badly injured.
Also, a group can only have one leader, and that leader is Rick. They were discussing Carol becoming the new leader on The Talking Dead - I think that would be a terrible idea. Glenn, Daryl, Michonne, and now Carol are Rick’s lieutenants, and they’re very good at that, but Rick is their leader. I’m very glad to see him acting like a leader again - it is very difficult for people to see their leader not acting like a leader.
We can’t know what would have happened, but we do know Carol, Daryl and Tyreese haven’t killed each other.
Yeah, he let them veto going back and killing the survivors at Terminus. Gareth will be back.
Are they going anywhere? Have they a goal, or are they just staying alive?
To be fair we didn’t see him with his pants off. 
Yes, they could slice it off an eighth of an inch at a time, while the girls watched and giggled.
