there’s a simple question that is kind of interesting, and that question is, roughly, ‘do evil people know that they’re evil?’ or ‘do jerks know that they’re jerks?’
i imagine that most people who have committed evil acts, whatever they might be, don’t necessarily think of themselves as evil. it seems to me that one of the nastiest most pernicious things in the world is when people feel a sense of justification over evil acts that they might have committed. in some ways this might be why christ chose to hang out with prostitutes and tax-collectors, who were supposedly doing evil things, but their lives were filled with a sense of shame and humility.
arrogance is so often the bedfellow of evil. which is why i think that we would all be well advised to approach our actions and the actions of the people around us with great humility.
from my perspective, pernicious arrogance is never justified.
so when we feel justified in being angry, we’re probably wrong.
when we feel justified in hating someone, we’re probably wrong.
when we feel justified committing an act of cruelty, we’re probably wrong. etc.
and then, how does one define evil? and, more appropriately, how does one define evil while writing an update to ones website at 6 in the morning?
i understand evil as committing an act towards someone that is contrary to the will of the person being acted upon. ie-dropping a brick on someone’s foot when they obviously don’t want a brick dropped on their foot.
but what about hedonism? is the pursuit of pleasure, in whatever form, evil? is evil defined in qualitative or quantitative terms? is it more evil to knowingly crush an ant than to absentmindedly go for a sunday drive and unintentionally kill thousands of bugs?
does every person have a different objective standard set for them regarding what is evil and what is not? where does one go to find quasi-objective standards for evil? the bible, the koran, the upanishads, etc?
so if someone goes out and gets drunk and has consenting sex with an adult is that evil?
or if someone stays in and watches tv is that evil?
one could easily make a compelling case for more harm being done by either act.
what acts have we committed that were evil but that we didn’t really know about?
am i posing too many questions?
i guess the big question that underlies all of these questions is, ‘are we living good lives?’ and if so, what are we doing that’s good, and, if not, what are we doing that’s bad?
perhaps the functional thing to do is to approach things as simply as possible and with the humble knowledge that we’ll never really know, with any sort of objective truth, the answers to these questions.
so in the mean time maybe we can avoid those things that seem obviously bad (rape, murder, hatred, anger, theft, etc) and just humbly feel our way around the grey areas. and erring on the side of things that seem ‘good’ (giving to the needy, being kind, forgiving, etc) might not be such a bad idea either.
-moby