I aggree with all you said, save for the fact that the chip forces him to live with human being. I think the chip simply offers him the possibility and that it's a choice Spike made, and one he made twice. First, when he went to Giles in Pangs. Even if he thought he couldn't hurt anyone (human or demon) at that point, nothing was stopping him from breaking into the hospital at night and steal blood bags, especially considering that Sunnydale's hospital didn't have the best security in the world. If he was worried about the Initiative, he could have left the town. He did it too when he discovered he could hurt demons. He choose to keep helping Buffy and the Scoobies, albeit for a price, and yes, he will betray them later (but I believe it was only a matter of priorities), while he could have easily dominated some demons into becoming his minions and excerting revenge.
I think that what drove Spike, in all his incarnations, was the desire to find, not someone who would love him as he wanted, but someone who would accept to be loved as Spike wanted to love them and that this particular desire is what allowed him to change. The evil things he did, I think he didn't do them because they were evil (something I can see Darla, Angelus and Drusilla doing) but because he thought they would give him some sort of leverage to finally be accepted. And this is what I don't really consider Spike as evil. He did evil things, right, but the evilness of it was, in my opinion, secondary.
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I aggree with all you said, save for the fact that the chip forces him to live with human being. I think the chip simply offers him the possibility and that it's a choice Spike made, and one he made twice.
First, when he went to Giles in Pangs. Even if he thought he couldn't hurt anyone (human or demon) at that point, nothing was stopping him from breaking into the hospital at night and steal blood bags, especially considering that Sunnydale's hospital didn't have the best security in the world. If he was worried about the Initiative, he could have left the town.
He did it too when he discovered he could hurt demons. He choose to keep helping Buffy and the Scoobies, albeit for a price, and yes, he will betray them later (but I believe it was only a matter of priorities), while he could have easily dominated some demons into becoming his minions and excerting revenge.
I think that what drove Spike, in all his incarnations, was the desire to find, not someone who would love him as he wanted, but someone who would accept to be loved as Spike wanted to love them and that this particular desire is what allowed him to change. The evil things he did, I think he didn't do them because they were evil (something I can see Darla, Angelus and Drusilla doing) but because he thought they would give him some sort of leverage to finally be accepted. And this is what I don't really consider Spike as evil. He did evil things, right, but the evilness of it was, in my opinion, secondary.