Seriously, he wipes out drug dealing murderers, psycho serial killers, and mafia hitmen so often I’m wondering where they come from. He’s wiped out the criminal population so often (and with so many other superheroes doing the same thing nonlethally) that I’m starting to think somebody’s selling clones for 50$ a pop to Uncle Vinnie the Teamster.
smiling bandit - I’m going with the explanation in the excellent Born series, where it’s revealed that…
It’s not about avenging his family, doing what’s right, or “punishing himself”. He’s addicted to violence and slaughter. He wants a war that never ends. From a practical standpoint, that means that he has to hold back a bit, to ensure that there will always be more criminals to continue the war. He could wipe out all the crime in the world if he wanted to. But he doesn’t want to.
Of course, keep in mind that he’s survived too many superhuman foes and absolutely-no-way-out situations to count, and not only is he still alive, there are STILL fools out there who’ll set him free, go along with his plans, etc., so it’s not like you should expect logical outcomes when he’s involved.
Yeah, but every writer changes the Punisher’s character, and it still doesn’t answer the question:
Seriously, even the dumbest crooks would think more than twice about doing something nasty with the Punisher, not to mention Spiderman, Daredevil, et. all. standing guard to beat the snot out of them.
Seriously though, is there no sane answer anymore?
Well, to my knowledge, no one’s ever managed to stop criminals IRL, no matter how strict they are, so it’s really just human nature. Also, think about how often you’ve seen someone watch a friend/acquantance fail at something that many people generally fail at and then try it themselves, saying, “I know better than X.”