“Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil, no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil spreads. This can be traced back to the very beginning of the world. The gods were bored; therefore they created human beings.” - Soren Kierkegaard.
In the comments on the last entry, Cathy says “Absolutely. There is no such thing as an evil person. There are, however, people who do evil things.” I remember saying exactly the same thing to someone, a friend of mine who is an incredibly wise and insightful woman. “I used to say exactly the same thing,” she said. “But now… I’ve lived a little longer. I’ve met people who chill the air around them.”
I dunno. Perhaps I’m just young and naive. I’ve never known of a human being who I could confidently call evil. Definitely a few who have done evil things – take George Dubya for a start. Evil? I dunno, he seems to stupid and pitiable to be evil. They say even Hitler was capable of kindness. They say he had the most beautiful eyes.
Just supposing there are people walking around who are actually evil? How did they become evil? Surely they weren’t born that way? I’ve met children who were fierce, angry, bitter, violent… but never a trace of evil. So, what? Something happens to them, a transformation? Why? I imagine they’d have to experience something so awful that they gave up all hope.
Evil seems to imply a loss of what we consider human. An inability to feel emotions; sympathy, benevolence, sorrow and love. This seems to push evil into the realm of psychiatric disorders. Is evil a moral issue, or a clinical matter?
I still can’t believe that there is anyone truly evil walking this earth. We all have the capacity to do evil, and some of us choose to. Surely we must all have the capacity to do good, no matter how deeply we have buried it? Believing that there are evil people seems like taking the easy way out. As Alexander Solzhenitsyn so eloquently puts it, “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being, and who is willing to destroy his own heart?”
Posted by Fionnaigh at July 28, 2003 10:16 AMThats an amazing quote (the last one) I suppose it is in the eye of the beholder...I used to think there was know such thing as an evil person. There are some killers who show no remorse. They are so detached from the crimes they commit. Are they evil or unwell? I've been in situations where I'm the wrong side of certain people over very important issues (that I can't mention)...I felt a horrible evil coming from the 'opposition'...it was wierd and scary.
But I still don't know the answer ...
xx
You quoted someone...
“I used to say exactly the same thing,” she said. “But now… I’ve lived a little longer. I’ve met people who chill the air around them.”
Yes, I have met people like that, too. They are called Sociopaths, or Clinical Psychopaths. Although I didn't spend much time or look very far - I was raised by one. The factor of getting older and more experienced was more an issue of realising the prevalence of that mentality, rather than naiively dismissing that person as an anomaly.
I have met at least three obvious sociopaths. Interestingly, those three were all females (and all used that fact as a manipulation/excuse strategy.)
The "chill" is when their false pretenses drop, and you suddenly see their *emotional* chill - their total lack of empathy.
And total lack of empathy goes along with a total fixation upon Getting What They Want, regardless of the negative impact upon anyone else. Of course, they are also eager to deny/minimise that impact. Getting What They Want justifies (in their minds) *any* level of lying, abuse, etc.
Desire run wild and mindless.
William Burroughs once said, "The face of 'evil' is always the face of total need."
OTOH, plenty of allegedly "nice" people demonstrate an appalling lack of empathy when you look just below the surface. "Nice" people are often quite confused and even angered by the suggestion that another human being might have feelings or values which aren't convenient or validating to the "nice" person.
-V. (What, me cynical?)
You made a really interesting point when you talked about evil as an absence of what we call human "An inability to feel emotions; sympathy, benevolence, sorrow and love." I tend to agree. I don't think evil should be pushed into psychiatric illness tho. Evil is still a human trait. Animals aren't evil. Maybe the humanness you were talking about is a lack of human social characteristics? Not individual morality?
I'm not sure.
Hannah Arendt talked about "the banality of evil" - the efficiency of the gas chambers.
More to think about...