Talk:Asami Sato/@comment-2163322-20120516002555/@comment-50.53.109.37-20120516071513

If Tarrlok is aiding the equalists, his likely motivation is to play both of his enemies against one another in hopes of being the last one standing when the smoke clears. Simply put, he provides aid, financial support, and information to the equalists who in turn use that against benders, many of which could be Tarrlok's enemies. He continues to play both sides, allowing both to wear each other down. He builds up anti non-bender sentiment in the bending community using Amon to enflame that, all while making his fellow benders in power (Tenzin, Lin, the other council members) look bad in order to garner more support for himself from the bending populace.

His behavior in episode 6 supports this when he suddenly changed his vote when Lin came in, claiming to be able to safeguard the tournament. He made it a big point to stress that Lin would take personal responsibility for this. He then aided the equalists in infiltrating the tournament knowing Amon would be able to properlly make a fool of Lin and her metal bending cops, further eroding public confidence in Lin while simultaneosly building animosity towards the equalists and non-benders in general.

In a sense, if this theory is correct, Tarrlok and Amon could very well be involved in a rather high stakes game against each other. Like a game of pi sho, both maneuver their pieces and try to one up each other. Amon uses Tarrloks aid to greatly faciliate his plans while planning to betray Tarrlok, and Tarrlok simultaneously aids Amon in order to facilitate his own plans, also planning on betraying Amon.

This would be interesting if true since it would open up the notion of two main antagonists, each representing the far extreme of their respective positions; Amon representing the worst of non-benders, and Tarrlok representing the worst of benders. Korra, as the avatar, would have to defeat both, symbolically establishing balance by defeating both extremes.