The original idea I think was to take out that Palantine politician simply because he was jilted by a betsy and it didn't work out, so he decided at the last minute to take out the guys pimping iris. The were not the mob, however. They were run of the mill drug addicts who pimped little girls to feed their addictions, which society considers the lowest of the low, at least at that point in time.
One could argue that these characters were deliberately made to be the lowest of the low to make Travis' actions more justifiable and generally create a debate amongst people (ie, "how dare he engage in vigilante justice!" vs "but they were prostituting little girls and were the lowest of the low!"). Also, Iris may be somewhat a symbol of our own relationship with degeneracy. We consider it a contributing factor to our inceldom because women would rather fuck chad and do an onlyfans than settle down and be lady like housewife types, but at the same time, since we can't get laid, all we really have is porn and our imaginations, which due to our lack of actual sexual experiences, don't produce high quality currency for the proverbial spank bank. Remember, he routinely goes to porno theatres because he can't get laid, but is disgusted at the idea of a little girl being a prostitute for a drug addict, which, at least to me, is pretty similar to how we hold promiscuous people of both genders in contempt, yet for the most part, are pretty bad with porn, which seems good at the time, but in the end, hurts us in one way or another.
I first watched this movie when I was a child and violent action movies were just a staple of late night tv. Ironically, both Travis Bickle, as well as Bill Foster of "Falling Down" frightened me because I somehow figured out how being lonely and rejected played a big part of them going from regular guys to the monsters they morph into as the movies progress. They made me want to have a girlfriend and all together avoid being alone out of fear of becoming like them, but now, the older I get, the more I sympathize and frankly connect to these specific characters, feeling like as much as they frightened me as a kid, I now find myself becoming more like them as 40 year old man, at least in terms of having a dead end job which makes you feel like your stuck in some endless time loop, and being increasingly disgusted by how the world you grew up in has completely ceased to exist, feeling alone, wanting to just experience little normal things like human connection and over all decency and normalcy and compassion.
That being said, I say he should not be worshipped, per say, but at least viewed as the warning to the world that was ignored, and as a result, it has come to this, with loneliness amongst men sweeping the globe like a pestilence, complete with depravity, degeneracy, and on occasion, casualties, but that's just my personal view on things.
