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Date Posted: 12:39:25 10/27/05 Thu
Author: Sophist
Subject: Addiction and responsibility
In reply to: Sunshine 's message, "Re: Two points make a line, but do they make a paradigm?" on 10:25:41 10/27/05 Thu

I do believe there existed a history of Willow abusing magic to avoid dealing with life problems. There are the two instances I cited plus Something Blue

Let me ask you this: Xander had two such instances, BB&B and OMWF. Would one or two more cases have made Xander a plausible candidate for the events of Wrecked?

An addiction metaphor enabled an easier and cleaner absolution of Willow’s actions.

I could be more accepting of the addiction "metaphor" -- MORE accepting, not completely; there still are major problems with it -- if I thought this were true.

As I see it, the "addiction" defense suffers from 2 flaws. First, being addicted isn't a legal defense in any case. If you are an alcoholic, that fact won't excuse you if you get into a car while drunk and kill someone. It's not a legal defense and I think most people wouldn't accept it as a moral defense.

Second, it's pretty clear that Willow's most reprehensible conduct did NOT happen as a result of "addiction". This was not a case where she went "off the wagon" only to do something terrible she never intended. She went after Warren for revenge. Her actions were coldly calculated; she intended to kill him. Malice aforethought and all that. Addiction had little or nothing to do with it, grief and rage everything.

To me, the real test of the addiction metaphor is S7. The writers dropped it like a lead balloon in S7. As manwitch pointed out above, if the addiction metaphor continued, Willow's magic use in S7 would have to be seen as sending a message that doing an occasional line of cocaine is just fine. I can't imagine that was intended.

Nor do I think that S7 "absolved" Willow of responsibility. I'm not sure it intended to; I am sure it didn't prior to Chosen. I'm even more sure that it didn't use the addiction defense for that purpose.

To clarify, I do think Willow ended up "absolved" by the end of Chosen. That absolution, however, came from the slayer spell. It was, as it were, an result of free grace. The only comparable event in the series was the snowfall in Amends. I'm not a big fan of that either, but I am willing to see Buffy as a Christ figure so in that sense they both work. But those two events really stand out against the theme of personal responsibility which pervades the show and which is one of the reasons I like it so much.

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