Original question:
>I was talking with someone once who said he couldn't believe that the SWAT
>Kats couldn't kill someone accidentally, especially if their misguided
>missiles hit buildings and such. While this may be true, they've never
>been *aware* of civilian casualties resulting from their missiles until the
>episode "Razor's Edge." Any comments on this?
Many have commented so far that it is "hard to believe" that the SWAT Kats
could not kill someone accidentally. I am not refuting this belief; where
explosives are involved, damage inevitably occurs. However--
The facts in the episodes indicate that the SWAT Kats have *not* injured any
innocent civilians. Suppose instead that they have. Then Feral has legal
cause of action against the SWAT Kats, and as such, he should arrest them on
the spot. (Example when he did have cause of action: episode involving the
dual universe.)
However, you will notice that Feral *doesn't* arrest the SWAT Kats when he
encounters them in general. Furthermore, Feral *does* realize that they are
an asset to the city (cf. Andy's story--if you accept that it is based on
the series, then whatever reference he used is valid support for this
statement).
In addition, the SWAT Kats themselves have at least two reasons, to wit,
*not* to harm innocent civilians. One is their characterization as "good"
guys. (Consider, if Razor had never found out that the two civilians hurt
in "Razor's Edge" were working for Dark Kat, wouldn't Razor have turned
himself in?) Simply for moral concerns, it would be "wrong" to harm
innocents. Another is their duty--possibly self-imposed--to keep themselves
available *as* protectors of the city. Given the paragraph above, if the
SWAT Kats were brought up on (possibly defensible) charges for killing
anyone, they wouldn't be able to defend the city, would they?
Well, you may argue, they could get out on bail. Perhaps, but Feral would do
his official duty by insisting that the SWAT Kats be held without
bail--manslaughter is a sufficiently serious offense to merit the
possibility of holding without bail.
In summary: You're welcome to assume what you will about civilian deaths. I
wouldn't doubt that the bad guys certainly do kill innocent civilians. But
the SWAT Kats have a realistic reason to avoid hurting innocents at all
costs. Because they act as private citizens, they can be tried as such. They
cannot *afford* to make that kind of mistake. Razor *knows* this, as we have
seen. And if they had *ever* made such a mistake, they would be in jail,
quite possibly because they'd turn themselves in--if not, they'd be arrested
soon enough.
-- Jonathan Higa, higa_at_math.hawaii.edu,
http://math.hawaii.edu/~higa/
Received on Tue Apr 25 1995 - 18:37:39 PDT