The author begins the article with a reference to The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in order to draw a clear analogy between the fictional transformation of Dr. Jekyll into his evil alter ego Mr. Hyde and real-life situations where ordinary people can act in evil ways given the right circumstances.
This literary reference sets the stage for the main argument that it is not inherently one's nature (being purely good or evil), but rather the external social situations and pressures that can cause people to behave in ways they might never have imagined. The article further supports this by discussing the psychology research of Philip Zimbardo, the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse case, Stanley Milgram's obedience experiments, and the Stanford Prison Experiment, all demonstrating how situational effects influence behavior.
The reference is not to claim that good and evil exist only in stories (which rules out option A). Nor does it propose that some people are naturally more good than evil (which rules out option B). Instead, it uses the fictional transformation as a metaphor to explain how real-life people can be drawn into doing evil through environmental and social factors.
Furthermore, it is not merely providing an example of what happens when people face the choice between good or evil (which would match option D), but rather making a broader comparison between Jekyll’s transformation and how situational forces impact real behavior. This aligns best with option C.
Therefore, the correct answer is C: to make a comparison between Jekyll's transformation and real life.