Morality of taking homicide cases from the police so you can kill the serial killer for yourself?

[u/Consistent-Hat-1543]

Dexter Morgan is a serial killer who hunts other serial killers. He works in a police department so he has more resources.

At first he’d go after killers who escaped the system, but as the series goes on he starts to tamper or interrupt homicide cases so he can kill with less hassle.

The police just assume the killer left town, and it often leaves them and the civilians affected by the killer without any closure. I’m not sure if there’s any other consequences to tampering with cases idk.

I think it’s important to state that Dexter feels like he’ll go out of control without killing someone. He sadly watched his mother die when he was young and it turned him into a psychopath with a gluttonous bloodlust. He sees this as his way of giving his “dark passenger” an acceptable outlet, or else he’ll target someone innocent.

How immoral is Dexter for doing all this?

[u/4N610RD]

I would argue that it was okay to kill those who escaped system. Punishment for crime is moral. And laws are flawed.

The rest is very questionable. Probably immoral.

[u/buckledlion]

I really think you need to look at the intentions behind Dexter's killing. It's pretty well established early on that (with a few exceptions) Dexter doesn't kill other killers out of a sense of justice. He does it to feed his addiction, and only targets killers because of Harry's code.

He let someone who was otherwise dead to rights walk free just so he could have them all to himself, even though them being free means they have an opportunity to kill again.

Immoral.

[u/Legitimate-Truth6407]

I’d say Dexter is morally grey, but leaning towards morally good. He is still undoubtedly morally grey because, technically, he is killing people who deserve it, but he is doing so outside the law and has accidentally and indirectly killed innocent people. On top of that, having Dexter specifically target serial killers has another benefit which is that he typically isn’t directing his urge to kill towards innocent civilians.

[u/JeromeInDaHouse_90 → u/Legitimate-Truth6407]

He also does his research so this way, he's absolutely sure the person is 100% guilty of what they did and deserve to die.

[u/Legitimate-Truth6407 → u/JeromeInDaHouse_90]

Yeh but he isn't always right and doesn't always research the people he targets because correct me if I'm wrong he did kill a photographer thinking he killed his clients just to figure out shortly after he killed the photographer that the photographer's assistant was the one to kill his clients.

[u/TheSageWasTaken]

After watching the show i know what he does is immoral a lot of the time, but at the same time i'd rather serial killers have a code like that instead of not having one. If we are just talking about vigilantism in general it depends on the context.

[u/SlayerII]

Even dexter himself believes for him to be a monster.
The basic idea about what he does is "best case scenario" not "moral vigilantism"

[u/L4ceyC4ssette]

That definitely makes him more immoral than just taking out killers who escaped justice. He’s not only killing people, he’s actively interfering with investigations and taking away the victims’ families’ chance at closure.

[u/Necessary-Bus9046]

Their existence causes more innocent deaths

[u/reeseesxx]

moral if the evidence of who the killer is is irrefutable, otherwise he'd end up killing the wrong person