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LITERALLY!!!
No one, not even Spike, thought what happened in Seeing Red was okay and all throughout season 7 we were reminded of that. Yet fucking Riley, douchebag extraordinaire, was still seen as 'in the right'??? I'm supposed to watch him whining about Buffy being emotionally unavailable WHILE HER MOM IS DYING and feel sympathy? I'm supposed to watch him project his insecurities onto her, blame her for his toxic masculinity ruining their relationship, and then listen to Xander gaslight her into thinking this was all somehow her fault, and feel something other than unbridled rage??? Fucking how???
I am increasingly grateful that Spike was so divisive in the writers' room. Both Angel and Riley were supposed to be heroes, but you have them doing things like:
Experiencing a moment of true happiness when nutting in a teenager, but not when cuddling with his own child
Cheating on Buffy and saying it's her fault
Like, knowing what we know about Whedon and the sort of toxic environment he nurtured, it's really no wonder that the dudes on staff thought these guys were sympathetic and couldn't understand why Spike was so popular when he was, you know, not doing stuff like that. Also his actual shitty behavior was called out as actually shitty by other characters and the narrative, whereas Angel and Riley (and Xander and others, lbr) were constantly devil's advocated by the same narrative, if not let off the hook entirely.