That's sort of a problem, isn't it? My question is why you're okay with this.
There are several reasons, but the main one is that you are coming from a point where being a shade (and by extension slavery) is the absolute worst possible fate, and is therefor indefensible (apologies in advanced if I've oversimplified your position or missed something important). I'm also not a fan of her tactics, but, I feel like there's a lot more grey that isn't being acknowledged. First off, is it really worse than death? To you, yes, I accept that. But to everyone? I would bet that a decent number of the people who Riona has are the type that would pick a coma to death, just on the balance of probability, because it's a hard question. I don't know what I would pick, if Riona sat down across from me and told me she was either going to kill me or put me into a coma.
There's also this:
Riona probably sees claiming souls forever as a mercy. Because hell is the ultimate fate worse than death.
which has no support, but then, neither do any of the assertions that she thinks it's a fate worse than death and she's evil and that she needs to be gemmed right now. So, *shrug* But it's easy to
see how she would view this as better than death, especially at first. Evil girl, send her to hell? or put her in purgatory via your power, where her soul can potentially work off her wrongdoings? It's not difficult to see where this belief might form, especially since Riona does not have a bunch of armchair generals inside her brain. Given how much
we're freaking out about this, words on a
page, what do you think Riona's formulative years as a magical girl were like?
Beyond that, arguing which is eviler doesn't really serve a purpose. Yes, she's done bad things. But I resist the assertion that these things are appreciably worse than any other girl who's done bad things (Homura, Orikol, and Kirika all included). Especially because
we don't know what she's done. Beyond hunting after girls who, by all accounts, are
actually evil, to the point where they make Kyoko's familiar "farming" look like jaywalking. Again, this is based solely on her own words, but so is every argument against her.
Essentially, Riona's probably spent a few years looking into the abyss, this is what looked back.
I have at least a little interest in making sure we aren't working with someone that will undermine us by hurting - not hunting, but going out of her way to ensure a fate worse than death for - witch makers.
A deterrent only works if it presents an outcome that makes the course of action you want to discourage come out worse than the course of action you want to encourage. Riona is attempting to discourage use of grief spreading powers and attempting to encourage... what, exactly? Witching out? Suicide by gem smash? Her plan only makes sense if being turned into a shade is horrible. And she does it to people because it's horrible. There isn't any other interpretation.
EXACTLY. And I'm willing to forgive the past if she stops and if she felt like she had no other alternative to making her message to Griefbenders. But it has to stop.
This has already been addressed to some extent, but beyond discouraging the abuse of grief transfer powers (and again, we don't know how discerning she is so let's not jump the gun), but we are all in agreement that she should stop stealing souls if possible, and that we're offering to do our part in making that possible.
And really, there is another interpretation of her actions, as is shown
by this thread. Just because a less evil interpretation of what she's done is antithetical to what you've come to believe does not make it impossible. This thread has clearly demonstrated that both sides have logical arguments, and those arguments cannot meet because, as I mentioned in response to Aura's post above, they are coming from irreconcilable assumptions (which, for the last time, we have no support for in either direction except for even more assumptions).
So really, she came here in peace. She's willing to talk. At the very least that means we
can get her backstory. That way, instead of constantly going in circles, we can know more about what's up with her power before making any more arguments based on information we do not have.
