Is Ginko a sociopath?

leukocyteofdoom said:
op - dude, i disagree with you so much. truly.

the point to ginko's detachment (which is by no means a bad quality!!) is a necessary balance. it doesn't mean he doesn't care. literally the whole point of the series is that he cares in equal measure for both humans and mushi, as shown in his efforts to restore the equilibrium when either side goes astray.

he cares, as shown in his very lifestyle of moving from place to place and going out of his way to help the various strangers he comes across. it's a fact that the consequences of him staying in one place would be disastrous - therefore, getting too emotionally attached to places and people for him is neither a smart nor a viable option, and he's dealing with it in the best possible way.

while we are on the subject, not feeling unnecessary guilt is, in fact, not a bad thing. not getting overly emotional is also not a bad thing. incredible. lord forbid that there exists a main character who's mature enough to realise that saving everyone is not always an option. harbouring too much guilt/various other negative feelings does not a stable mental state make, and helps no one - not ginko himself, nor the people in trouble who turn to him for help. i've always kind of likened him to a scientist, and maybe a bit of a surgeon as well, if you will - not in the sense that mushi are disease, but in the way ginko approaches situations in an unbiased, objective manner. idk about you, but that's definitely the sort of person i would turn to for advice if weird s*bleep* started happening.

he's essentially in-between human and mushi, it's little wonder he appears to you as morally ambiguous, or 'grey'. but i think it's too naive to separate bad from good as one would black and white; as these labels are all too subjective - what's "callous indifference" to you is "level-headed and rational" to me. there are as many truths as there are people to think them up and believe them.

i don't think ginko's a sociopath. you're misinterpreting the diagnostic criteria. to give a comparison in terms of another fictional character as to better highlight the difference, light (death note) is a sociopath. so is L. ginko? nah. what i'm seeing with ginko is positive employment of emotion/appraisal-adjusment as coping mechanisms.

also, dude. that cigarette comes with the profession. the smoke is actually very helpful when it comes to keeping mushi away. you're projecting your real world bias on a fictional world - dissing the smoking in mushishi is pointless at best, so y'know, you might want to consider refraining from doing that lol

DalPuri said:

^Well said.

To me, Ginko is a level-headed and rational character, but he can also be quite passionate. You can see this when Ginko desperately tries to find better solutions than the ones other characters have found (before it's too late). Such as in the Sleeping Mountain episode, where Ginko tried to stop Mujika from being eaten by the Kuchinawa, but failed and realized he didn't actually have a better solution. This is also seen in the Heavy Seed where Ginko breaks a serious taboo to keep Saishu and the village alive. Even in Where Sea Meets Man, Ginko acts cruelly to save a man's life.

For awhile, I'v considered Ginko to be somewhat altruistic (and very nosy, srsly). He goes out of his way to help people with their mushi problems, and at the same time he stops people from abusing mushi. He doesn't always succeed, but I believe his intentions are good. It gets confusing because Ginko acts on a circumstantial basis, and even then he may not always act for the cause that the viewer thinks is 'good.'

The man is not all-knowing or omnipotent. He makes mistakes, and he has to live with them. Someone who was truly indifferent would not get involved at all. But Ginko gets involved... I wonder if he realizes that he is partly to blame for that man's death in the Pillow Pathway. Had Ginko told him the true nature of the mushi, disaster could have been avoided... But hindsight is 20/20. Living with guilt is crushing. Knowing that tragedy will occur to those who he doesn't help, and then not helping them would be truly callous and indifferent.