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What price your soul...
A good while ago (back in Novemeber) there was the rape-icon kerfuffle. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
spikeylover made a post about it and in one of the threads shipperx made one of the best explanations for why Spike needed the soul that I have ever seen. Since spikeylover was so kind as to find it for me, I will copy it out here for future reference.
All credit and much love toshipperx:
See, I think there are fundamental differences in interpretation because I think the point of the Crypt scene in Seeing Red is to show that Spike really never comprehended the difference in a real way. That's the point of being soulless. It's not that they cannot intellectualize the difference between right and wrong, it's that they cannot FEEL it. The significance of the crypt scene, and what spurred him on to Africa, is because for one moment he glimpsed what he didn't understand (it's the old you don't know what you don't know... until of course, you're faced with your ignorance). Spike THOUGHT he was as good as souled, but he was confronted with the dichotomy of the AR. It violated the promise that he had intended to keep, that he meant to keep, and that meant something to him... and he didn't even feel the point where he crossed the line. When he, in shock, was forced back to look and to realize, he finally "got" that he was missing something, that something was wrong. And it was wrong because he's in such confusion. A vampire SHOULDN'T care. A vampire DOESN'T care, and yet this wasn't something he had intended. He loved her. He really truly loved her and he would never have intended that, but there it was. And he wanted to change that, to fix it.
The point, to me, was that he finally "got" that without the soul he was missing an internal boundary so in a very visceral way (instead of an intellectual one) he didn't "get" the difference between right and wrong. He might well be able to read the labels between "this is right" and "this is wrong" but he couldn't FEEL it and know it on a gut level until he had the epiphany... and that was in the wake of "the incident."
spikeylover made a post about it and in one of the threads shipperx made one of the best explanations for why Spike needed the soul that I have ever seen. Since spikeylover was so kind as to find it for me, I will copy it out here for future reference. All credit and much love to
shipperx:See, I think there are fundamental differences in interpretation because I think the point of the Crypt scene in Seeing Red is to show that Spike really never comprehended the difference in a real way. That's the point of being soulless. It's not that they cannot intellectualize the difference between right and wrong, it's that they cannot FEEL it. The significance of the crypt scene, and what spurred him on to Africa, is because for one moment he glimpsed what he didn't understand (it's the old you don't know what you don't know... until of course, you're faced with your ignorance). Spike THOUGHT he was as good as souled, but he was confronted with the dichotomy of the AR. It violated the promise that he had intended to keep, that he meant to keep, and that meant something to him... and he didn't even feel the point where he crossed the line. When he, in shock, was forced back to look and to realize, he finally "got" that he was missing something, that something was wrong. And it was wrong because he's in such confusion. A vampire SHOULDN'T care. A vampire DOESN'T care, and yet this wasn't something he had intended. He loved her. He really truly loved her and he would never have intended that, but there it was. And he wanted to change that, to fix it.
The point, to me, was that he finally "got" that without the soul he was missing an internal boundary so in a very visceral way (instead of an intellectual one) he didn't "get" the difference between right and wrong. He might well be able to read the labels between "this is right" and "this is wrong" but he couldn't FEEL it and know it on a gut level until he had the epiphany... and that was in the wake of "the incident."
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Still a really painful episode to watch, though!
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I always loved the soul. BtVS was must-see TV since FFL, but it was the very end of Grave that threw me into obsession. I can't remember ever looking forward to anything more! (Except possdibly AtS S5, but that was different!)
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::nods::