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Originally Posted by Reed
I suppose to protect his "one and only" loved one he went to extreme measures which were very harsh indeed. But then again I suppose he thought Alex and Karl were both too stupid and young to pay attenion to him, for example. Karl would not intentionally put her in danger but accidental teenage pregancy is common - an obvious statement I know.
Not sure I would call what Ben did to Karl as "torture", atleast from Ben's point of view. We never really found out what Room 23 was for but debates indicated it was a 'brainwash/conditioning room' - that for all we know everyone has spent time in. Karl was probably put in there for reasons OTHER than Alex, possibly.
As nice as Karl was, he was a young man nonetheless and we all know what they are like.
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I'm sure Ben believed what he was doing to be justified, but then you can say that about a lot of fairly horrendous people. What I find hard to swallow is the idea that even Ben believed it was necessary to resort to those methods in order to dissuade two apparently sensible young people who cared for one another from acting in a way that would cause the death of one of them. I just don't see why making sure they were aware of the facts would fail to suffice - I don't buy the idea that they'd be so cavalier as to ignore the danger (or that Karl would rape Alex, which is the other alternative - no way, frankly). And I don't think, hence 'Maybe I overreacted'. Certainly it didn't have the desired effect anyway - Karl and Alex seem (or did seem, till Karl apparently died) more in love than ever, and more adverse to Ben. So it wasn't really justified by result either.