Is EVIL something you ARE or something you DO?

[Heddi]

(with apologies to Morrissey)

Discuss

[lamp_shade]

1. Are.

[cali]

2. That's a great question. I'd argue it's more something you do

but it gets complicated really quickly

[H2O Man]

3. Yes

(in the sense that green is both yellow and blue).

[Downtown Hound]

4. I think it's something you become

because of what you do. To really do monstrous acts, I think you have to kill a part of yourself, namely the part of you that loves. When that part of you is gone or seriously wounded, then you become evil. In other words, evil is really nothing more than the lack of love.

[Heddi]

5. but can you be a "good" person and still have evil thoughts?

Can you be a "good" person in your acts despite having hateful, bigoted, etc, thoughts? Can a holocaust denier, who believes that the holocaust was a complete fabrication, still be a "good" person based on their deeds? Or are thoughts enough to be evil, even if you never act in an evil way?

[Downtown Hound]

7. For myself, I don't really like the term evil

I prefer the terms light and darkness. I think everybody has dark thoughts. We're still animals underneath the guises that we put on in civilization. For example there are lots of people that like to give and receive pain during sex. They like to tie their partners up and whip them and beat them or what not. Now, if they were to do that to a total stranger and unwilling participant, then most of us would call that evil. If they they do it consensually behind closed doors, most of us wouldn't really care. Some people might find it weird or deviant, but not evil. So, is someone that gets a sexual thrill our of torturing somebody in a consensual setting evil? They may be wonderful, kind, responsible people in every aspect of their lives, but they have these "dark" thoughts when it comes to sexuality. A more basic, primitive instinct that they happen to enjoy and indulge in, but their sense of morality prevents them from taking it into the realm of being "evil."

When it comes to killers for example, you have psychotics and then sociopaths. Psychotics don't give a shit what anybody else thinks. They are too far gone, and they genuinely have something missing that the rest of us have. I don't think they're so much evil as they are just really, really messed up people that can't control what they do. Somewhere along the line in their development, something just didn't form right.

Sociopaths, are capable of doing great evil, but they do actually care what people think about them. These are the only kind of people I think you could really call evil. Because they really and honestly do know the difference between right and wrong, are capable of empathizing with others, and yet their personal ambition overrides that sense of morality. In other words, they are capable of love and compassion, but ignore those impulses in themselves in favor of something darker. Somebody who was fundamentally love-based would be far more likely to understand the damage their actions were causing. Bush is a sociopath.

So, I don't think that having evil thoughts makes you evil. Everybody's got them. We're wired to have them. It's what you do with them that makes you evil or good.

[Greyhound]

6. Both and neither. Few things in life are as binary as we would like them to be.

I'd say there are relatively few truly evil people, evil people being those that consciously do evil, but many or most of us commit evil acts regularly as it is inherent, or structural, in our system.

[pipoman]

11. hey greyhound

I know it isn't generally polite, and I don't want to derail this thread, but I have seen that pic of Dennis and Elizabeth around and have wondered where it was taken, it always makes me think of 'People's Court'? I suspect it is just the way it is cropped.

[Greyhound]

12. Sorry no help here. I found it on Dennis' site a few months ago when my old

one was declared to big.

(The third time I was asked to remove a pic of him during the late primaries for one reason or another *cough *cough)

[pipoman]

8. I believe it can be

a lack of moral compass, an inability to feel for others, an overwhelming selfishness, embedded prejudice, lack of conscience, extreme narcissism or various mental illnesses. I think most truly evil people (who are not clinically mentally ill) have been made that way through their treatment by others. Victims of child abuse or neglect, post traumatic stress, repeated victims or witness to crime, living in extreme poverty, mistreatment of family members by others, incarceration or institutionalization, etc.

To your question, I think most people have done something others may classify as evil at one time or another and a few people are evil through repeated acts.

[hfojvt]

9. to do is to be

Does one evil act make a person evil? What is an evil act? Is it a monstrous thing, like a rape or a murder, or a tiny thing like speeding or littering or telling a little lie? If one evil act makes a person evil, then why doesn't one good act make a person good?

Jacob Riis told the story of a young thug who was being arrested and escorted by a couple of police to jail. On their way, they saw a young child playing on the train tracks while a train sped towards her. They turned away because they could not stand to see her crushed by the train, but the 'criminal' broke free and rescued her. Some might have called him evil, he had a string of crimes to his name, but in a pinch, he proved himself to be a hero, didn't he?

One of the hopes, kinda, is that most people think they are good. Thus, when they are called out for doing what others consider evil, they will rethink their actions and attitudes. This social control, however, is ineffective if they have their own support group assuring them that their cause is just and their actions noble and justified.

[DailyGrind51]

10. Can't it be both?

"Good" people can commit "evil" acts when they have no other options, however, "evil" people do "evil" as a matter of policy.

[baby_mouse]

13. Well I think it's something you are. NT

[blogslut]

14. I think evil is an action

As well, I think that most people are capable of evil acts, if given the proper incentive.

I tend to be Zen when it comes to questions like these. I don't look at things as evil versus good but rather, constructive versus destructive.

[varkam]

15. Speaking as a criminal, I say do.

Or at least I hope that's how it is. There used to be something of a notion in this country of redemption - once you have served your time and made amends, you're considered to have "paid the price" for the evil things that you have done. If you have that, then it gives people who have committed crimes a way to fully rejoin society - but I'm not sure that is really the case these days (if it ever was). For instance, in some states you can't vote, you can't get grants for college, you're forever locked out of certain lines of work and good luck on trying to get into public housing.

Furthermore, I have met some people who have done worse things than I have done and, generally speaking, they were decent people. They had remorse for the things that they had done and they try to help people when they can. I wouldn't for a second think of them as "evil people", but I likewise wouldn't for a second think of the things that they had done as anything but evil.

That's just my .02.

[Maeve]

16. Most of us, most of the time, are simply human

With the capacity for good or evil and with the ability to convince ourselves that we are really good no matter what we do. There are some without an internal compass--there are sociopaths--and there are some who choose to reject what is considered "good" for selfish reasons. Both those groups are likely to be labeled as evil people and we need to limit their freedom to do harm when we identify them.

Labeling someone "evil" is seldom useful; it won't change them (they don't see it that way at all) and limits your chance to communicate with them. People stop listening when you cast them out.

[BlooInBloo]

17. The vagaries of ordinary language.