Beyond Good and Evil by Sara Kane

One of the major themes of Lost has been a general inability to define 'good' vs 'evil.' There has only been 'us vs them,' right up until the point that 'them' becomes 'us,' and a new 'them' is discovered. And then the whole thing happens all over again.

Why do we assume the MIB is evil? He's wearing black. An excellent fashion choice, yes, but not necessarily connotative of pure evil. He wants to kill Jacob. Well, Jacob is something more than human, so 'kill' might not have the same repercussions a normal murder would have. He pretended to be Locke. Well, many of our Losties have been pretending to be someone else for a very long time (Lafleur, anyone?). He tells Richard they're going to 'take care' of the Ajira survivors. Heck, he might just want to kick them off the Island. We don't know that he wants to actually kill them. He doesn't want people on the Island because they fight, destroy, and corrupt. Guess what? He's kinda right about that.

Is Jacob good? The Others adore him, but then again, the Others are kind of psycho. He seems pretty laid-back, but hey, it's always the quiet ones that end up on the evening news in handcuffs. He made Richard immortal, and while we might all appreciate that, we don't know that Richard is very happy about it. His actions may have led to Nadia's death and Sawyer's (and Kate's) life of crime. He sits in the dark and knits. Um.

My point is, I think the speculation that there's going to be some massive war between Jacob and the MIB is misplaced. I don't think either of them is evil---just really, really powerful. When the Black Rock came, they were on chatting terms. They clearly differ about what's best for the Island, and each has a valid point.

Jacob is free will, the MIB is fate. As we've seen, both are true and necessary on the Island. Neither is going to 'defeat' the other, because neither side is 'correct.'