Hmm... I didn't get this from
Burt. I didn't take his actions against
Scratch as evidence of a larger pro-death penalty stance for either him or the show. Actually the show is ambivalent about what it would have done with Scratch given that
Pegs did not want to kill Scratch once it was clear she was helpless even if Burt and
Riley did. And as for Burt, on the one hand, the notion that certain people's offenses are punishable by death wouldn't phase him, but on the other hand, he's anti-authority and anti-establishment so I doubt he'd want a governing entity to have the power to decide who deserves capital punishment and who doesn't.
In any case this specific instance of Burt killing and emotionally torturing Scratch is all within the context of his desire for revenge for what she did to him. Objectively speaking nobody (that we know of) has suffered as much at the hands of Scratch than Burt. He was starved for four months, had the symbol of his beloved wife pulverized, and lost his primary trigger finger (when we already learned in
Chapter 13 that Burt feels helpless and scared if he can't use his firearms). And he knew that the torture would never let up and there would never be away out of it until he came clean about the whereabouts of the rest of
the Tower folk, which had to have inflicted emotional pain to Burt on top of the physical. We also know from Burt himself that after the loss of
Shirley and his finger the ONLY thing that kept him living was the dream that he could take revenge against Scratch somehow. Burt's desire to kill Scratch was completely personal to him.
I don't think Burt has any illusion that what he did to Scratch is morally acceptable from a societal perspective. He actively dissuades Riley from her plan to kill Scratch because he wants her moral compass to remain pure. In fact when Riley began to embrace the concept of torturing
Tardust in order to get information from Scratch, Burt specifically asked her if she wanted to go down that road. He also tried to stop her from shooting Tardust when he was goading her. It's clear to me that Burt views himself as damaged (probably from his time in Vietnam) and that he knows he is capable of doing dark things if angered or hurt enough, but that doesn't mean he wants other people to behave similarly.
Put it another way, I'm not convinced that Burt on an abstract level would condone what he did to Scratch out of revenge but I think he accepts that it's something that works for him, given whatever life events he's had to experience, because he is not a morally pure person.
LIke you, Liam, I do not support the death penalty at the societal level. But I can't judge Burt for what he was compelled to do against Scratch.
Hope that makes some sense as I thought I had a clearer idea of what I wanted to say before I started responding.
--Eric
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