The Gang Asks Buffy To Leave

[caileybeth]

I didn't see a thread on this, sooo:

How did you all feel about that? I was angry. I pretty much shared Spike's rage. I understood why they felt it had to be done, but it was just infuriating for me.

 

[angeldarla]

i was really mad with all of them.. especially with the scooby gang cause they didnt do nothing to make her stay or to suport her.. even her sister was telling her to leave.. it pissed me off. the only thing that i liked was when faith took control.. i like her as a leader.. =)

 

[Wicked]

Im sure there is a thread about this somewhere.

 

[sizzle-sozzle]

yea this pretty much p***** me off,its like who do they think they're talking to,i mean Buffy has saved their butts again and again and suddenly they dnt trust her.okay yea maybe Buffy's decision to go up against Caleb again wasnt the best idea but where do they get off telling her to leave her own house.and i couldnt believe Dawn supported them and even enforced what they wanted.i was really annoyed by this. i definately agreed with and shared Spikes anger.

 

[Ladybug]

They had no right to even ask her to leave. Even if it was the right thing, Buffy is their leader and she gets to make the decisions, whether for good or bad. When she ended up leaving on her own, that was worse than if they'd forced her out with chainsaws or bribed her with anchovies. Sure, I know where they were coming from, all of them, (except Rona) but... I mean, ouch.

Characters I hated in this scene: Dawn and Rona. Dawn, obviously, because she didn't stand up for Buffy even the least bit, or so it seemed, and she probably hurt Buffy's feelings so much here. Rona, well, she's one of the potentials, so I don't need a reason hate her. "You know what? I am sick of your deal with this Spike guy. This isn't about him. This is about you. You're being reckless." - fine, there. There's a reason. And "Ding dong, the witch is dead."

Anya: And it's automatically you. You really do think you're better than we are. But we don't know. We don't know if you're actually better. I mean, you came into the world with certain advantages, sure. I mean, that's the legacy. But you didn't earn it. You didn't work for it. You've never had anybody come up to you and say you deserve these things more than anyone else. They were just handed to you. So that doesn't make you better than us. It makes you luckier than us.

I hope someone will say something about this quote. I still can't decide if she's right or not. I agree, but I disagree. Erm... anybody agree with me? ::huh1::

 

[Wicked]

I dont disagree. Anya is spot on. It could have been any one of the girls. Anya could have been a slayer back when she was Aud. We dont know why girls are potentials. None of them appear to have anything special about them. Its most likely random. Which just makes them lucky (or unlucky depending how you look at it) that they were picked. It in no way makes them better than anyone.

In fact, the fact that Buffy didnt choose it but had it forced upon her makes her less better (you know what I mean 😛) than the others. Willow and Xander choose to fight the good fight, stand by Buffy. Willow wasnt always a witch. Xander wasnt always a carpenter 😛. They chose to put their lives at risk to help other people. Buffy didnt get that choice. So unless you can prove that Buffy would have made that choice if she wasnt a slayer, then Anya is right. She isnt better than anyone. Willow and Xander are.

 

[Spirit_Of_Fred]

while i agree that the rest of what anya said is true for the aforementioned reasons, i have something to say about this part that is sort of a disagreement:

I mean, that's the legacy. But you didn't earn it. You didn't work for it.

even though she didnt work for it, she did work at it. she fought powerful evils for six years+. she died twice, and came back and kept fighting. she didnt have a choice in the matter, but she still did it. the things that she did weren't easy, but she accomplished them, and did it well. she saved lots of innocent people, as well as her friends, many times, and avoided many apocalypses by killing "unstoppable" evils. so, sure, it could've been someone else, but it wasnt. what anya is claiming is that buffy thinks she's better, but she's not, and doesnt deserve to lead. but even from where she's standing, after all this time of buffy being the one, she's more qualified to lead everyone into the battle than any could-be-better-if-they-had-been-lucky-and-chosen-instead others. ...i hope that expressions of my opinion made some form of sense, or at least served as a valuable counterpoint.

 

[Schillaci]

Anya: And it's automatically you. You really do think you're better than we are. But we don't know. We don't know if you're actually better. I mean, you came into the world with certain advantages, sure. I mean, that's the legacy. But you didn't earn it. You didn't work for it. You've never had anybody come up to you and say you deserve these things more than anyone else. They were just handed to you. So that doesn't make you better than us. It makes you luckier than us.

I hope someone will say something about this quote. I still can't decide if she's right or not. I agree, but I disagree. Erm... anybody agree with me? ::huh1::

Anya is wrong. I could explain, but I believe that entire scene speaks for itself.

By the way, who kicked a hole in the sky so the heavens would cry over me?

 

[HeaTk]

well i remember what i felt the first time i saw it, i was just confused.
then i loved that spike found her. that made it all better for me.

 

[The Arcane]

...even though she didnt work for it, she did work at it. she fought powerful evils for six years+. she died twice, and came back and kept fighting. she didnt have a choice in the matter, but she still did it. the things that she did weren't easy, but she accomplished them, and did it well. she saved lots of innocent people, as well as her friends, many times, and avoided many apocalypses by killing "unstoppable" evils. so, sure, it could've been someone else, but it wasnt. what anya is claiming is that buffy thinks she's better, but she's not, and doesnt deserve to lead. but even from where she's standing, after all this time of buffy being the one, she's more qualified to lead everyone into the battle than any could-be-better-if-they-had-been-lucky-and-chosen-instead others. ...i hope that expressions of my opinion made some form of sense, or at least served as a valuable counterpoint.

Exactly my way of thinking. Why and how Buffy became a slayer was far from being the point. She was the slayer and had done an incredible job with the responsibility for going on nine years by that point. How did anyone, least of all Anya, feel that they had the right to question Buffy?

Sure, she had made mistakes that had led to the deaths of some of the potentials but up until that point absolutely nobody else had come up with any better ideas for fighting the First. They had all just looked to Buffy to make the call and then when that call went wrong they turned her into a scapegoat for their own blame and fear. Of course they were all scared but turning on Buffy at that point was not the answer.

However, all that is beside the point for me because the real problem I have with what happened that night wasn't so much the "why" but the "how".

It was one thing for the potentials to question Buffy. They barely knew her and what they had seen of her wasn't her best. Even the likes of Anya and Robin could almost be forgiven for questioning. Robin had only known her a short time too and Anya... well, she was Anya. The thing that really pissed me off about all this was the way Giles, Willow, Xander, Dawn and Faith dealt with what was going on.

When they saw things getting out of hand they (and especially Giles here) should have had the respect for Buffy to take the debate somewhere more private instead of shouting her down in front of all of the potentials. Talk about doing their best to publically destroy a girl that had saved all of their lives, not to mention the world itself, many times over.

Maybe, just maybe, the core Scoobies had the right to take Buffy aside and question her choices that night, but they sure as hell didn't have the right to humiliate her and then ask her to leave her own home, which is exactly what they did.

Not the shiniest moment for the Scoobies, in my opinion.

 

[Lyri]

i think it was completely wrong for the guys to kcik Buffy out...i mean, it was HER house! and not only did Faith take her place as 'leader' of the Potentials, she also took Buffy's bed! forcing her to sleep in the basement, which, okay, with Spike, but still, why couldn't they sleep in her bed? lol

ok, but getting back to the point. i can understand Xander's reaction, i mean, he had just been majorly injured and he was feeling frightened and unsure of his place. Willow and Giles, just mad eme angry. Giles, of all people, should hav known what Buffy was capable off, saving the world, giving up her life TWICE, and saving every single one of their lives at least once.
but it's Dawn that really gets to me. Buffy is her sister, and she still takes everyone else's side, and stands against Buffy. for the longest time i wondered what had caused Dawn to force Buffy to leave, and it hit me while watching S7 again. during 'Conversations with Dead People' Dawn was told by 'Joyce' that, come the time, Buffy won't choose Dawn, she'll be against her. so, to me, this is Dawn's way of getting in their first, her way of not choosing Buffy, before Buffy can not choose her. Even though it was proved that the thing Dawn was probably not her mother. but Dawn is a teenager, 16, it would make sense that she'd want to believe something that looked like her mother, because of how she lost her mom at such a young age.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

Hmm, interesting.
This is a complicated issue because only one person kicked her out House, but I don't Dawn was wrong.

First of all, i'll discuss the potentials.
They had every right to question Buffy's decision.
Most of these girls were mid-teens and had already seen Buffy's decision making lead to death. Thats not an issue, they were scared. I know that every single person in the world would(or at the very least should) question leaders that place them in that situation without knowing why.
Faith had come, and ok she was a convicted killer, BUT she was proof that Buffy was not the ONLY Slayer. If a Slayer was to lead the group, then its quite right that the potentials question if the right one is leading.

Xander, Willow, Giles and Anya, there is the issue.
They know exactly what Buffy has done for the last 7 years. They have fought side by side at times and saved by her more often then I care to remember. Sometimes her plans have been reckless BUT she always comes through. They let their fears add doubt to their own thoughts. Thats my biggest issue, they forgot who they were talking about and at one point even validated the 'Faith as leader' stint which is doubly wrong because they know her too.
Its not a matter of Faith being good now, its a matter of Faith showing she still isn't strong enough to lead an army.

Dawn, however, I believe did the right thing.

BUFFY
I can't watch you just throw away everything that"” (looks at Xander and at Dawn, who's not meeting her glance; Buffy holds her head up high) I know I'm right about this. I just need a little"” I can't stay here and watch her lead you into some disaster.

DAWN
(stands, walks up to Buffy, softly) Then you can't stay here. Buffy, I love you, but you were right. We have to be together on this. You can't be a part of it. (Buffy blinks her eyes in disbelief) So I need you to leave. I'm sorry, but this is my house, too.

Thats the part where Dawn says Buffy has to leave.
She isn't telling her she should leave because she agrees with what the potentials and the Scoobs are saying, she is agreeing with Buffy. Buffy knows that if they are to succeed then they need to work together and she also knows she can't watch them if she isn't part of it(and Buffy really couldn't be second to Faith) so Dawn does the thing she has to do. She tells her that she needs her to leave the house.
No, in my opinion in this entire scene Dawn is the ONLY one who does the right thing for the right reasons.

 

[The Arcane]

Thats the part where Dawn says Buffy has to leave.
She isn't telling her she should leave because she agrees with what the potentials and the Scoobs are saying, she is agreeing with Buffy. Buffy knows that if they are to succeed then they need to work together and she also knows she can't watch them if she isn't part of it(and Buffy really couldn't be second to Faith) so Dawn does the thing she has to do. She tells her that she needs her to leave the house.
No, in my opinion in this entire scene Dawn is the ONLY one who does the right thing for the right reasons.

Hmmm, I have to admit that I'm not sure that I took what Dawn said in the same way that you did, BotD. More than that, I'm certain that Buffy didn't see it that way.

You may be right that this was the motivation Dawn had in her head and that she really thought that she was doing Buffy a favour in what she was doing but her words and tone, in my opinion, only served to add to the humiliation that Buffy must have felt. Here was her little sister telling her, the slayer, to leave in front of all the people that she had been attempting to lead. Even her one true family member was not standing by her.

Again, if Dawn had privately taken Buffy aside and told her that she believed Buffy needed to take a step back for a little while, just whilst things cooled off, then fair enough. That would have been justified. However she chose to just join the "let's pile on Buffy" parade and say what she said in front of the entire group, at a point where she could clearly see that her sister was already hurt and upset.

Again, it's not the "why" that annoys me, it's the "how" it was done.

 

[caileybeth]

LadyBug, I'm with you on the agree/disagree.

I was also glad Faith got her chance to be leader.

But those DAMN POTENTIALS!!!!! grr.

 

[Jules]

Sure, she had made mistakes that had led to the deaths of some of the potentials but up until that point absolutely nobody else had come up with any better ideas for fighting the First. They had all just looked to Buffy to make the call and then when that call went wrong they turned her into a scapegoat for their own blame and fear. Of course they were all scared but turning on Buffy at that point was not the answer.

I agree with what you said. Buffy had been in dangerous situations before, but she had always managed to keep the people in her group safe (barring Jenny). She had never trained an army before, she had never had to lead other potentials into battle...she had never taken on the role of teacher/watcher. And she losts some potentials. But as she pointed out, that's war, she can't protect everyone. She's not that powerful. I bet a leader in the army does not know the name of every soldier in his force. To be on friendly terms with someone and then have to send them off to their potential deaths would make their job extra hard. And the Scooby's judged her on that...wrongly I feel.

It was one thing for the potentials to question Buffy. They barely knew her and what they had seen of her wasn't her best. Even the likes of Anya and Robin could almost be forgiven for questioning. Robin had only known her a short time too and Anya... well, she was Anya. The thing that really pissed me off about all this was the way Giles, Willow, Xander, Dawn and Faith dealt with what was going on.

Again, I agree...kind of. I don't think the potential's had the right to question Buffy. They new her reputation, she had done this (fighting evil) for a long tie. She had more experience than they did. And I don't think Faith dealt with it badly. She didn't come to Sunnydale to lead. She came to help. Everyone else forced the position on her, and she accepted the responsibility.

My point is that I think the gang was wrong to kick Buffy out of the house 🙂

 

[Mesektet Ra]

I'm just going to go ahead and say this, in the bitchless way possible: we've beaten the living crap out of this topic. There has to be like 6857467 threads lying around in the Cemetary about this.

For the record, me:

Buffy deserved it. I'm not going into specifics because I'm tired, but I think Buffy deserved it. And Spike getting angry was a tad childish in my opinion.

Resume.

 

[The Watcher]

How can they ask her to leave her own home? Hmmm...

 

[DarkAngel92]

I think they were totaly wrong in telling her to leave right in the middle of the biggest threat they ever faced. I also don't blame Spike for getting that mad but if you think about it if she didn't leave and Spike didn't find her then they wouldn't have spent that time with each other that made Buffy's true feelings for Spike come out.

 

[Willara]

I agree, I think that it was absolutely terrible that Dawn, Faith, Anya, the Potentials etc. through Buffy out of the house. Although it was good that Faith got to have a chance at being the leader, because after Faith experienced it Faith understood what Buffy was going through much more.

 

[Randy Giles]

I have mixed feelings about the whole scene. In a way, the Potentials are right. Buffy does get a little fanatical and all insistent that they be 100% serious, all the time, because death was coming. I think Faith was right in taking them out to have a little fun, I'd want to if I thought I might be dying in a few days. I think Buffy got carried away and so I understand why everyone was fed up.

However, they were also being selfish and childish. Xander lost an eye so suddenly Buffy is reckless and leading them into danger. They should realize that all of them (the Potentials), should they be called as a Slayer, would be expected to sacrifice themselves for the fate of the world. They've been told this repeatedly and seemed to accept it, but suddenly anything that might cause them harm is a no-no.

I did like Anya's speech, and she was half right, but still, she wasn't thinking very clearly. Like a previous poster said, Buffy did embrace what she was and tried to be the best Slayer she could be, so in a way she earns leadership.

Buffy was also right when she was saying that she's always led the Scoobies into danger and she was always right. Yet everyone seems to write that off. Sure, Caleb is scary, he poked out an eye, but why does Buffy have to be wrong this time? She made a perfectly good point.

Her friends turning on her reminded me a lot of "Anne". In that episode I was totally on Buffy's side, but in this episode it's hard to side with anyone.

BTW, I wanted to slap that chick with the broken arm. What a bitch.