i saw this on your site first neat~

Gosh, I forgot how long you've been at this. Those are some old comics!

I wonder what Mort's problem is, though. Like, nobody is built perfect, and we're all a mess of nature and nurture and chaos. Probably everyone in a school for gifted students like that would have some sort of neurodivergence, and him in particular. I haven't read all your comic, so I dunno if it was ever explained... What drove him to do what he did in the first place? What made him think it was a good idea, and was he aware of what would be the result? What does he want, even? At this point, it's clear he wants to make up for it and fix what he messed up, but I mean overall. What are his goals in life? It seems like all of this would have put them in jeopardy... Of course, all the kids from that school seem to have ended up doing weird stuff to themselves and others.

I've seen time and again, so many folks like Ash who are so focused on things like justice, revenge, and most of all, punishment. They're more interested in seeing people punished for the harm they do, than they are in helping those who were hurt. Mort is trying to fix things, and has skills and know-how to do it, so pushing him out would make it harder or impossible to repair the damage. That said, I don't think it's good to just use him to fix his mess and then do terrible things afterwards as punishment, either.

I tend to be really 'results' focused like that. If someone does something wrong, but regrets it and is willing to make ammends, they should be allowed to try. It's more important to help people than it is to punish those who hurt others. Even with those who aren't regretful, I feel like it's better to keep them contained and unable to hurt more people, than it is to actually hurt them in some sort of balancing act, or warning to others.

Anywho that's a lot I just wrote there! Thanks for reading it. I've been really wordy, lately...

Morty has a complicated history that's only been a little fleshed out so far. It's been mentioned that his parents weren't good influences on him and that he's had a mostly sheltered life. His motivations early in UTC came from the fact that he's grown up in his father's shadow and was trying to escape it using his limited perspective, knowledge, and the resources his dad left him with.

I hope things get better for everybody. Rarely, folks can't help but do bad things, but most people only do bad because bad was done to them. Gotta counter that with good. So much good.

Most of what Ash says is true, most of. Morty has earned punishment. Morty just apologizing if all that is done is not enough for ruining two lives.

But Ash's choice of words that make me worried: "Someone needs to HURT him." Not "someone needs to PUNISH him" HURT him. That suggests someone who is letting their perception be twisted.

And what would happen, if Ash realized Morty is such a wretch, that there is only thing that WOULD hurt him... 13.

as comment bellow mentioned-most of what Ash is saying is true. However it ignores one key lement that has been going for a while in this story-and that is Morty actually doing more than saying sorry...yes his personality is barely improved,yes he is still antogonostic with very poor social skills, but....there have a been legitimate, possibly quite earnest, if somewhat begrudging effort from Mort to not only try and fix his past actions but also help the rest of the crew with any other crisises or problems that showed up. Thus i belive Ash argument might have been more understandable if Mort would have been completely uncooperative after his apology but so far that has not really been the case.
Morty is still far far away from finishing his penance but we cant just ignore him earnestly walking towards it....if slowly