Ethics and poetry: just a trash bag

I have been re-watching The Good Place and recapitulating reading I did a year or two ago.

Warning: suicidality, violence, PTSD

Doing bad things and having bad outcomes: selling a cure you know does not work to someone who doesn’t need it; phishing attacks on pensions and payments through cold calling, website spoofing, and scam emails; bilking the already poor out of what little they have. Sometimes, this leads to really bad outcomes. So my friend is cold-called by a phisherman. He lets the guy go on for a minute and then rips his face off – metaphorically, of course – inviting him to attend an assisted suicide centre for sick fucks who rob the poor. He rings off. I say that was a bit harsh. He judged, given his own back story and his positive decision not to rob those weaker and more fool, in light of his present sufficiently dire circumstances, it was both morally repugnant and cowardly of those perpetrating financial scams on vulnerable people. There was no virtue or forgiveness in it. I took a position that could be called “liberal”. Cutting the caller slack. This is a big 1000 mile question. Where on a continuum do you measure yourself and others? Relative to me, I thought the guy might be pitiable. Relative to someone else he might be despicable.