#charleecat-bat

Janelle-Li: I would say that she also has a very strong sense of justice, but that's also kind of a natural side effect when you're directly facing discrimination for most of your life. A lot of people, way more than just the Brotherhood, treated her differently simply because she was a woman, so she had plenty of drive to promote change in her world. Janelle did a ton of good for Echidnaopolis and the Brotherhood, but she took a more subtle approach to do so, mostly in the form of leading by example. There's nothing wrong with that, to be sure, but it also results in changes coming at a much slower pace overall, and sometimes it doesn't always drive home why bad behaviors are bad, so there are going to be people that never learn the lesson. I'd like to think that, had she lived longer, maybe she also would've made some bigger, bolder moves as well.

Thunderhawk: There's probably not much I can say here about Thundy that y'all don't already know, because I'm pretty sure he's almost universally everyone's favorite (living) BH member. He has pretty much the same morals as Janelle, and also shares insights into what discrimination and abuse can look like. The main reason he's ranking below her instead of equal with her is that he DOES have a bad habit of drawing lines in the sand once he's come to the conclusion that someone is bad; we saw this both in how he treated Nemo and how he reacted to Locke's treatment of Elias. All of his kind words and empathy go out the window at that point, and it can take quite a lot for him to change his mind again.

Spectre: In an interesting way, I see Spectre in much the same way I see Janelle, but the key difference between them is that he doesn't have nearly as much courage. Janelle was very vocal about her thoughts and feelings and used that as a persuasive tool when fighting adversity, whereas Spectre learned very early on that it was not safe to speak his mind. As a result, he has a strong sense of morality and why things are right or wrong, but he does very little about it. If it's something he can solve with an action, he will absolutely do so, but if it requires a discussion? Spectre is borderline useless in that situation. Unfortunately, strong morals are almost meaningless if you're unable to put them into action.

Sojourner: We all know Sojo's not a pleasant person to be around, and that he can verge into abusive territories when uninterested in holding back. He IS aware that he shouldn't do things like that, but there are two problems there: 1) He may or may not actually feel bad afterwards, depending on how justified he feels to act out, and 2) even when he doesn't feel justified, he still comes up with excuses for why things are fine and he doesn't need to change. It wasn't that bad, they'll be over it soon, it's just the way I am, life isn't fair... etc etc etc, I'm sure we've all heard these excuses before. I mean yeah, it is good that he DOES occasionally call himself out for being shitty, but if he doesn't then adjust his behavior or outlook to reduce and eliminate that quality, then it's functionally the same as not calling himself out at all.

Locke: Pretty sure you guys don't need me to go into detail here, because we all know all too well how many times Locke has crossed the line without looking back. He unfortunately has the perfect mental recipe of 1) recognizing that the things he does hurts others, but 2) convincing himself that doing so is necessary. I won't even tangle this up with the fact that he feels like his actions will be a net positive in the end, because he is DIRECTLY presented with evidence, OVER AND OVER, from lots of different people, that his information is inaccurate, that there exist far less harmful ways to achieve his goals, and that he lacks the consent of those he's affecting. Even with his belief that he's had a vision, even with the fact that he undoubtedly has mental illnesses affecting how he thinks and behaves, he actively chooses the methods that necessarily and irreparably cause others harm, purely to satisfy himself and his needs. I can't even cut him a break from the fact that his illnesses are tainting how he perceives and processes information, because he DID have that period where he was in the hospital and received some of the help he desperately needed and showed a marked improvement even in that short time -- and then chose to return to methods he knew were harmful purely for his own benefit. And unfortunately, there was no more reaching him after that.

MORITORI: MORAL OR...?

I kinda wanted to address Moritori separately from everyone else, and not necessarily because he's not "really" part of the Brotherhood. An argument could be made that he -functionally- is a part of them and therefore counts, but to me that issue is kind of a red herring. The thing to remember about Moritori is that he's playing a very different game, and on a VERY different scale. He doesn't do the horrible things he does simply for shits and giggles, he does them because he's DEEP under cover in enemy territory and trying to systematically weaken his enemies enough so that his side can be victorious. That's not really uncommon or unexpected for someone in his position; he's basically the equivalent of a CIA operative. If he intends to gain any ground for HIS side of the war between the Brotherhood and the Legion, then yeah, he's going to have to get his hands dirty.

So as far as his morality is concerned, I feel like it's kind of not fair to judge him because we're necessarily looking at him as the bad guy, because our POV is implicitly aligned with the Brotherhood's. From a BH perspective, yeah, it's very easy to say that Moritori is a despicable person that does unconscionable things -- but from the Legion's perspective, this guy has made OUTRAGEOUS sacrifices purely for their benefit. He, like Athair, literally had to give up everything in his life in the hopes of helping a people desperately in need -- and he doesn't even get the benefit of BEING with those people like Athair does. Everything he does is motivated by the idea that the Brotherhood needs to be stopped, that the Legion is relying on him, that his family needs him to do these things. If it was someone on our side doing these same things in a Nazi regime during WWII, would we judge our spy for the individual things they had to do, or would we hail them as a war hero for taking down the enemy and saving our people? And if we were to do that, does that mean that the individual acts they had to commit against the other side are now fine? They're still horrible things, but we forgive them for those things in that context. But they still did them, and people suffered for it -- just not our people, so we don't tend to extend that compassion.