Does The Doctor need a dark side?

Yes, I think every heroic character needs a dark side or at the very least, the implication of one. It gives them an intriguing new aspect to explore and arguably makes them more relatable as a result. The Sixth Doctor and the Valeyard is one of my favourite dichotomies in Doctor Who, everything that incarnation represses and rejects bundled up into this Jungian shadow from the id. This is just from my own experiences, but I think it works best when you show that your character is aware of this darkness and is profoundly disturbed by or resigned to its existence when placed in a situation where it emerges.

The Doctor gunning down Legion to prove against his own hypocrisy towards violence (to take a life rather than rely upon others do it for him), Steel sacrificing Tully to appease the unbeatable Darkness in Sapphire & Steel, Robert McCall having to live with the lives he's taken in the pursuit of both the Company's interests and justice in The Equalizer, Ben Sisko's single-minded pursuit of Eddington and bombing of Maquis targets in revenge in Deep Space Nine, John Crichton killing the only scientist left with knowledge of the wormhole experiments in Farscape (a good and kind man), Ed Straker doing everything he can to keep Earth safe in UFO, even at the cost of his own marriage... These are all disturbingly real elements that transform characters into people because people are flawed. Sometimes they aren't strong enough, sometimes they disappoint you or take an action that is pragmatic rather than moral because the long-term consequences are worth what happens in the short term. Humans being humans, we care about them more because they're not invincible. They're not unwaveringly kind. It's a deliberate choice they make to do good.

As to what darkness actually is... Genesis of the Daleks has the Fourth Doctor ask himself -- "Do I have the right?" and he ultimately decides that no, he doesn't. However, what most skip over is that he still goes back at the end of the story to destroy the incubator room. I'd say well-done darkness in a character is often achieved with remorse or at least an acknowledgement that what was done is against their moral character. Mal Reynolds from Firefly is a very good and recent example of a character who does what needs to be done, even though it offends him and alienates those around him because he has to live with those acts of darkness. How a character copes varies, it can be the unswerving assertion that what they did was right (to the point of mania), it can be a quiet sinking regret, it can even be to react in shock or horror. As Colin Baker once said of Sixie's approach -- "Not necessarily good or pretty, but right." Darkness done without trying to score points is putting your characters in situations where the better choice, the right choice is still a terrible one to make and one that they must live with.

Granted it can produce interesting stories, but there's no necessity to depict a darker side of him. There seems to be this urge to have people questioning the Doctor's motives at every turn, which is pretty much what the NAs did, but fundamentally the more you bring it up the less interesting it becomes. Certainly in recent years there's been far too much focus on it, with Series 8's whole arc leaning on it, Series 6 repeatedly bringing it up and last year with Hell Bent 

I think I would articulate it differently and emphasize different aspects than the OP did, but in general this is my favorite kind of story to explore: How the traits that allow a hero to succeed will eventually swallow him up. The hero's core attributes don't change in this kind of story. They might evolve and progress, becoming more of what they are, but in general, it's the circumstances that change and actions that were once beneficial are now destructive in a new context.

I might be misinterpreting your argument, but I think I disagree. Crimes in the US generally require the act, the deed and their concordance, but I think it's very possible for an evil deed to rise from a well-intended action. The argument that springs to mind is those people who are categorically opposed to sheltering refugees (in many cases, refugee children) because they're laboring under the belief that the refugees somehow pose a threat to their family. They're almost certainly wrong, and the refugees face a much greater and more immediate threat than they ever could pose to a random person in the middle of a huge country.

The good intention (wanting to protect their family) leads to an evil deed (sending innocent people back to where they're going to be killed.) I think they're doing it without any specific ill intent in their heart, but by allowing a legitimate priority of moral obligation to become an illegitimate boundary of moral obligation, they have chosen what seems to me to be an evil act for an understandable and well-intentioned reason.

Yes. We all have one, so why wouldn't The Doctor?

Who's Darkside? He sounds like an obscure Batman villain.

I'm going with the standard definitions, ie, Merriam-Webster:

Evil

1.

a: morally reprehensible : sinful, wicked an evil impulse

b: arising from actual or imputed bad character or conduct a person of evil reputation

Every definition I've heard turns on a notion of deliberate immorality, not accidental immorality. An evil deed is done with that intent. Otherwise, it isn't an "evil deed" but a deed that happened to have unintended negative consequences.



Now, we are veering towards the political, but I'm not sure the refugee question counts as a good intention leading to an "evil deed". Surely, anyone who wants to throw them all out must know that they're generally sending families back into war zones. I don't think that it makes sense to focus on it as something done with purely good intentions. It can't be, unless they really don't know (and, I would say, it would be unreasonable to expect them to know) why people are seeking refugee status. Otherwise the intent is not simply "protect my family." It is "protect my family by throwing them back in the fire", which itself suffers the double fault of ignoring factual reality (ie, citizens of the countries rejecting refugees generally commit crimes at a higher rate than refugees do).

Absent guiltless ignorance, it seems instead a selfish and immoral intention - placement of oneself and one's own over all others, even in spite of factual reality - leading to results that can reasonably be expected; send the family back to Syria and the family gets blown up.

They just didn't care all that much. Someone else's problem. I don't call that a "good intention." 




So, whether we speak of immorality or intent, I think my point stands as to what counts as evil. Evil cannot simply be an act that has negative consequences, or else anything with negative consequences is evil. There's something more and it comes down to what is in the mind of the person who acts.

Well, it's a little more complicated than that. The context depends in the law as well (I'm actually a criminal defense attorney who does appeals and other post-conviction stuff, in MA).

If I walk up to you, punch you on the nose, and you fall/die, then yes you're right. The fact that I didn't know you'd die or specifically intend it is irrelevant in those circumstances.

But if you swung at me first and I cannot reasonably retreat, then it changes. Now, a punch generally isn't considered deadly force, so I'd probably be on safe ground if my reasonable action in self-defense inadvertently lead to your death.

On the other hand, if you swung at me and I responded by shooting you dead, I'm looking at least at manslaughter (excessive force used in self-defense that lead to death).

But then, as you recognize, the law isn't quite the right example because the stage of criminal proceedings that determines the offense is focused solely on whether or not the government proved the charged offense was committed (well, should be). The character of the defendant does not (again, should not) come in, except in circumstances irrelevant here, until sentencing, when the judge considers mitigating and aggravating factors.


"If you know people might be hurt by your actions and you proceed with them anyway, is that evil? Or, like most things does it depend more on the context than anything else?"
 
My focus is more on the fact that our concept of "evil" necessarily involves a moral judgment about the person. I think that moral judgment necessarily takes into account whether or not the negative consequences of the person's act were intended for their own sake, or were callously disregarded (aka, the refugee example), or where unforeseeable.

But then, there are degrees of immorality and evil. Is a person truly evil for not wanting to let in refugees? I don't think so. I certainly consider it an immoral stance to take unless the person cannot reasonably be expected to know that if we send a family back to Aleppo, they're very likely going to die as a result, and that that family is generally less likely to commit a crime than the host country's own citizens are. "Evil"? No.

I'd suggest that "Evil" would be flying to Syria and killing civilians before they can become refugee status. In other words, whether something is "evil" or just "bad" is a question of degree, not of kind, and it cannot be objectively measured. (That is, "evil" and "good" are not physical laws of the universe, nor components of the physical universe described by its physical laws). I'm not sure any exhaustive list of parameters can be laid out for measuring whether something/someone is good or evil. It would seem to depend on everything.



Finally, it's no surprise that this isn't the most exact of conversations. There is a rather large body of philosophy devoted to the question of what is good and evil, relatedly, whether there is good and evil, to whether these questions even make sense to ask, etc.

That's definitely one of my faults as a poster, here and on political forums. I'll intend to keep it short and sweet, but then I'll think of various additions/stylistic changes to make. By the time I'm done editing, there is generally one or more posts that respond to earlier versions of mine up.

Whoops...