Honestly, what bothers me, almost to death about this fandom's view of Ben's relationships is that the girls are given far, FAR more grace than what Ben is given despite the fact that he is essentially a teen child soldier that's also engaging in his first ever relationships. No grace, no understanding, just calling him a sociopath until they're all blue in the face. And people wonder why I don't hold the fandom in high regard...
Sadly, the echo chamber doesn't seem to be interested in listening to reason any time soon...
No person in the world is perfect, and that's also true for the characters within any piece of media in existance. Although my re-watch has given me a different perspective on Julie than I had before, I stand by the statement that Ben treated her far better than she ever treated him. She'd claim to trust Ben but then almost immediately do something that proved otherwise (or saying something to make herself seem all high-and-mighty first then claiming to trust Ben afterwards in the case of "The Ultimate Enemy: Part 2").
I haven't gotten to Kai yet, but I have re-watched "Rules of Engagement", which features both Julie and Ester. I can confidently say that, in that episode, Ben's treatment of both girls is better than the way both of them treat him combined.
Julie ghosted Ben despite the fact that he wasn't directing his frustration towards her and can very clearly be heard yelling at KENKO (the main villain of Sumo Slammers) right before Julie hangs up, and Ester snatches him up almost immediately after Julie leaves and tries to kiss up to him with her "I love Mr. Smoothy's too!" comment.
Meanwhile, Ben was trying to set things right with Julie while also helping Ester deal with a threat to her home, and said threat was being caused by yet another female character giving Ben unwanted attention. If his behavior compared to the girls in that episode isn't telling, I don't know what is.
On a related note: I still can't believe Julie dumped THE Ben Tennyson for some spineless loser with a camera. Compared to all of the good and heroic things Ben has done throughout the series, here's a list of literally everything Herve is shown saying/doing in his one episode:
Constantly compliments Julie and rarely ever criticizes her (not even constructively)
Chastises and antagonizes Ben without really knowing him
Tries to claim Ben & Julie’s situation isn’t “complicated” and not even bothering to think about the context
Gets intimidated by Fistina (a petty thief) of all people
Doesn’t actually throw hands with Looma at the Hot Spot and expects her to listen to his words
Calls Ship “the dog” instead of calling him by name despite how much Ship means to Julie, indicating that he doesn’t care about Ship as much as Ben does
Hides behind debris and takes photos of Julie getting THROWN INTO A CAR and BEATEN TO A PULP instead of helping her fight off Looma, even SMILING about it at one point
Runs over to Julie and kneels next to her without helping her up
Stands up (still without helping Julie up) and holds his fists up to try throwing hands with Looma, only to be immediately knocked away by her hammer
Dunks on Mr. Smoothy’s
...okay that last one isn't really all that serious compared to everything else, BUT STILL-
All of the things I just listed are things Ben NEVER would have done if Herve was Julie's ex instead. I'm 100% certain that once Julie fully realizes just how much better of a boyfriend Ben was to her than Herve is, she's going to fall into a spiral of regret and go crying to Ben about it. Unfortunately for her, she blew every chance Ben gave her (which is ironic given the fact that she was the one who claimed Ben blew his chance with her).
