Slayermania Spell, Dana and Consequences

I was re-watching Damage the other day, Angel Season 5, EP 11 and it reinforced my opinion that the spell Buffy had Willow cast in Chosen was not only unnecessary but utterly reckless and badly thought out. Now I understand many people disagree but let me make my three main points before telling me how wrong I am.

1. It wasn't necessary to defeat the First.

Now I know having the potentials as actual Slayers made them much stronger and faster and let them hang in longer vs the UberVamp army, but the fact is that they fared no better than Riley and a well trained platoon of soldiers with the right weapons would have. Much like Buffy's solution to kill The Judge, grenade launchers, white phosphorous rounds and flamethrowers would have been just as good if not better at taking out the UVs as Buffy's Slayer gang. All they needed was to buy enough time for the amulet to work and they would have got the same result and the First would have been defeated.

2. Suddenly imbuing hundreds if not thousands of girls with the Slayer legacy without their consent was a gross violation of their rights.

How many times did we hear Buffy lament about no one asking her if she wanted to be the Chosen One and being forced to carry that burden with no say in the matter? It was enormously hypocritical and morally wrong of her to do that.

3. Collateral Damage

While just about any thinking person could come to the conclusion that suddenly giving all of the potentials across the world, a number that was possibly in the thousands, superpowers with no explanation as to why or how or what was happening to them would have terrible consequences. Dana in Damage, a deeply traumatised girl who had been seen her parents murdered and then was kept prisoner and tortured for months, was a perfect example of what could go wrong. Even without her extreme example, not all of the girls that would have received the powers would have used them for good. Many would have put those new skills to less than lawful pursuits and with a shattered Watcher's Council and no quick way to find and identify these girls, it would take months if not years to track them all down and teach them, if they wanted to be taught at all. It's tantamount to handing out loaded pistols to kids in a school yard.

I've always said that Chosen was a poor finale for a show I love as much as I love Buffy and this was my main gripe. They spent so many hours talking about power and the nature of power and the responsibility that goes along with it and ends the show with the gang handing out superpowers like candy on Halloween. It just felt so contrary to everything they had said and done prior and a facile ending to a show that always prided itself on storytelling.

(Also have a gripe that when the town sunk there was no sign of the ocean which we had been told many times Sunnydale was on, but that one is much smaller)