Unsutiable punishment

The driving point behind White Bear is giving someone a suitable punishment for the crime they have committed. In this case, the severity of the punishment far outweighs the crime. Does she bear some responsibility for the crime? Yes. Should she be punished? Yes. Is this the right punishment? No. It does not seem like an appropriate method to force a person to relive a very traumatic experience every day for who knows how long, especially when she is going through that trauma not knowing who she is or why she is going through it. And that is only covering the mental abuse of being hunted that she must deal with, let alone the physical abuse of continuously running with a very small amount of food and water each day, or the emotional abuse of the big reveal of who she is and the way the people treat her. It could be a more understandable punishment if there was a foreseeable end to it; a point where the people running the simulation say, “okay she has had enough.” Without an end in sight, the severity of this punishment just does not fit the crime. This is especially true when it is revealed that technically she was a bystander to the murder and her fiancé is the one who performed the act.

This punishment also becomes unreasonably cruel and basically torture when it is disclosed that her memories have been erased each night so that she wakes up confused and doesn’t know who she is. Now the argument can be made that she is still the same person after they have erased her memories; however, to do that would also require evidence from her that she is still the ruthless person she is described as by the curator, which does not happen. All that is seen is a person being victimized for something they do not know they did then learning the reason they are going through it is because they did something bad they literally are not allowed to remember. This is a very flawed and twisted method of justice that also raises many concerns about the people whose job it is to put her through this every day and the people so excited to aid in someone’s personal torture that they would bring their children along too. Ultimately, the severity of the punishment order by the court is way out of proportion despite who she physically is.