Talk:Fresh Meat/@comment-25755332-20150112140749

Immortality, darling: 

So here we go, this is just my personal opinion and everyone is able to have their own opinion here and that's great. Because then we can have these interesting discussions. I see your point and I agree that we sometimes forgive some characters way easier than other. I thoght I just share my point of view  =)  Both Ali, Toby and Ezra did some awful things and we can all agree on that, but their motives and behaviour are very different. This isn't necessarily the truth, but simply my point of view. In my opinion it's more about motive, than the seriousness of a particular action. Because the possible motive tells us more about the person rather than the action itself.

First of all Ali was young, that isn't an excuse but should be taken in to consideration when we discuss this considering that Ezra was an adult and Toby a young adult. An other important thing to point out is that we still don't know why Ali did and behaved the way she did and we know both Toby's and Ezra's motives quite clearly. My personal opinion is that her difficult relationship with her family triggered her behaviour, and especially her relationship with her mum. Her mum wasn't a good role model and Jessica was quite a cold person. It's a quite common thing that the bully is the one that actually is the weak one and not the other way around. A lot of bullies put up a fascade to appear stronger. In reality it's sort of a defense-mechanisme for them, because they are afraid to become the target. So instead of becoming the target they choose to put up a fascade to prevent anyone from targeting them. I believe that Ali actually was quite fragile and insecure and put up a fascade to appear stronger. Most because she was never really loved and was insecure. I mean we have all met those, those who are trying so hard to appear to be strong and we know that they deep down inside are really insecure.

Her complicated family is also the reason I believe why she became really attached to Emily, because Emily was the only person that really cared and loved her. It's been said many times that Ali doesn't exactly know how to love someone and I think it's because her family never gave her that attention. So Emily became in a way both family and friend. And that's a possible reason why Ali has a hard time dealing and figuring out if she really loves Emily as just a friend or more than a friend. Because in a way Emily is both a dear friend and could possible be her first love, and Ali doesn't necessarliy know how to separate platonic and romantic feelings. Your family is supposed to be the source for your platonic love, but since Emily in a way took her family's place it's hard for Ali to differentiate those to things. For Emily it's easier because she has a family that loves her and Ali, when Ali a lot of the times only had Emily. This was off topic but let's continue with the real topic....

We know Toby and Ezra's motives very clearly. Toby thought that he was protecting Spencer even though his way was nothing but perfect. He was also a bit naive to think that he at all could protect her, but I believe his intentions were good. He didn't meant to hurt no one in the first place, but he was also aware of the risks. But he was willing to do it as long as he was going to keep Spencer safe. But he still is responsible for the things he did, but he tried to help. We can then question and wonder if he was protecting Spencer when he indirectly put her in Radley, but that's an other discussion. I can still see where he was coming from, his intentions were to protect Spencer even if it didn't turn out as a brilliant idea as he thought.

Ezra on the other hand was first of all an adult, that means that he clearly knows what he was doing. He went after Aria knowing she was a student and the worst part was that he knew her, becasue he had stalked her and he was going to use her so he could write a novel. A novel that would make him famous. That's the most disturbing part, his motive is so weak. He did it to write a book?! His motive was that he could write a great novel, I mean if that doesn't describe a weird motive I don't know what doesn't.

That's the whole point with my post. Ali did her things in a way to protect herself and she hurt people. Toby did his actions in order to protect Spencer and he hurt peolple. Ezra did it because he was selfish and only thought about his novel and he did hurt people. So Ali and Toby have some kind of valid motives, when Ezra don't have an valid motive at all. Ezra's intentions weren't evil, but his judgement was really bad.

Now I just talked about motives. Now if we talk about the seriousness of their actions, I can agree that Ezra's actions were the least damaging if we talk about physical harm, but that doesn't mean that he is the one we necessarily should be forgiving first, because he clearly has the poorest motive. Ali and Toby did things that hurt a lot of people, but at least they can explain why they did it and it sounds at least as a normal excuse.

So the things we are comparing are a) Ali was young, insecure and a bully, had some sort of motive b) Ezra was an adult, but he wasn't evil and he hadn't a reasonable motive c) Toby wasn't evil, just trying to protect and have some sort of motive

We are justifying their behaviour with; Ali was young, Ezra didn't have bad intentions and Toby was just trying to help. And we are judging their behaviour with; Ali knew she hurt people, Ezra was an adult and should have known better and Toby was a bit stupid to think that it could be so easy to be the hero.

So my conclusion is that Ali and Toby at least had some kind of motive and we can find reasonable explanation of some kind to explain their behaviour. But we can't find a valid motive that in any way could explain the things Ezra did and the way he behaved. It's up to each person to decide if they want to forgive or not, but here was my point of view and reasons why. I can also say that I have forgiven everyone including Ali, Toby and Ezra at this point, but I'm not going to lie. Ezra wasn't necessarily the hardest one to forgive, but I had most trouble with his motive =)