Last night a friend of mine came over and we had a very hot debate over the issue of evil. Oddly she had said "The problem with the world today is that people still believe in evil" and I had just said to a friend earlier "The problem with the world today is that people no longer believe in Evil....they think everyone can be rehabilitated and changed."

My example was Saddam Hussein. To me the man was evil. To me the definition of evil or the gague is the the amount of indifference you have towards evil acts that you are doing.

My friend stated that there is no evil. She used the example of a date rapist who is only raping the girl because he feels compelled to prove how "macho" he is.

She also used the example of people she had met in Africa who had witnessed murders of children, one man in particular had participated in the murder of a child who had his limbs cut off by another man. He was there and saw it and went along with it although he expressed remorse later. He was sorry? So was he evil or did he just do an evil thing?

I thought the man's remorse was an indication that he was not "evil" but said that there are some people who are totally sane and have no remorse whatsoever. To me these people are evil.

My friend said that the problem was people like me who see things in terms of black and white when reality is actually shades of grey.

To which I replied that I thought the problem was people like her who only saw the grey because the majority of life is grey but black and white DO exist. For every Ghandi there is a person on the very opposite end of the spectrum who would be evil.


Anyway I got so upset over this conversation because it seems like a lot of people in this world are like this girl. They don't believe that people can be evil and therefor there is no real effort to draw boundaries around human dignity and decency.

Sometimes I feel soooo old fashioned like I am the only one who sees things this way.

I posted this elsewhere but was curious what the replies here would be.

If, by "evil", you mean a malign, sentient forces or entity, then I would answer no.

However, if you mean evil as an opposite to what is considered good, then the answer is yes. People can commit evil acts, and behave in evil ways. We can see this in the papers and on the news every single day.

People can be classified as evil, due to the nature of their acts and their behavior towards others.

Do you believe in good?

If you think "good" acts that is made from a selfish point of view I don't think you will find much good in this world. My point being its all in how you see things.

Yes I believe in Good. I think playing word games with reality is the fine art of the liberals in this country that have gone off the deep end.

Do I believe in Good? Yes. Do I believe in Evil? Yes. Oddly though I only consider Evil a human quality.

Well I believe in both evil and good myself. But I see things very logical so its easy for me to draw logical conclusions like where the is 'a' there must also be 'b'. shadow/light // good/evil // ying/yang. to deny the excistance of evil is to me ignorance. And humans are not the only ones who posses evil, the anaconda likes to shallow its pray whole spit it up again and eat it a second time while its still alive. Its easy to find evil if you look at the world with logic, also the reason I find "I only find evil a human quality' to be somewhat ignorant FROM MY POINT OF VIEW

There are plain bad people. They may or may not be evil, but evil exists. If your an athesist, that evil would be a human quality.

If your religious, on the other hand...evil would be something outside the bounds of the physical world, manifested by the devil, demons etc. I tend to be religious in that regard.

Evil? Yes there is evil in our world, the difficulty is that each of us defines it differently, and within each that changes with time, experiences and, circumstances. For example; I see killing another person as evil, yet in the Army I did exactly that, often with no reason beyond my commanding officer ordered us to do so. I don't regret that nor feel any remorse for doing as I was ordered because that was the situation I was in at the time. Would I feel guilt and remorse if I killed somebody today? Yes very much so.

As for a pure evil that all would agree on, or an entity of such evil, no I don't think that exists.

Good Point Aztec. I believe that energy is shared among living creatures and that humans share an energy. So the idea that evil is human is based on the fact that I define evil as knowing indifference to the pain you are causing another creature.

A person the rips the skin off an animal to make a fur coat is evil in my opinion.

A lion eating a zebra is just surviving.

You are a great person to talk to about this. Did you ever physically one on one kill a person? Or was it shooting at a distance. I used this example as well in my debate. For example in Nazi Germany the captain in the quarters removed from all the action who ordered the execution of people might not be evil. But a soldier who executed them over and over again with no remorse would be evil in my opinion.

My point was that some animals enjoy "playing" or "torturing" their food or victims before they put it into use (one use is eating it for survival).

I don't belive we "share" any energy but watch this little video clip and tell me if that was evil -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJmP_MBuD7w

its an old topic really... evil equates to cowardice in a predatory concept , its whole nature is based on deceit and cowardice witch is of course why the targets begin as small animals, children, women, the ailing etc....clear that up for ya there?




dethklok rawks!

Thank God for concrete, grounded, Earthly laws and regulations.

When God created man he saw that it was good.
I think, he didn't realized that man is going to be evil.
So he invented the commandments...and the story continues.

I respect your POV, but I believe that our soul is perfect. Some are merely mentally confused, deranged, or affected. Some are able to be cured while others are beyond hope, at least in this particular lifetime. The great thing about the soul is its eternal nature. One's mind is never the soul. And one reincarnates..., to hopefully learn, to be the subject of learning (to be made as an example), and/or move on. There are no accidents. As long as mind confusion exists, man-made rules and regulations are inevitable, essential.

I never believed in inherent evil. There are no evil entities in this world (or the next), just lost souls. On earth, they're merely messed up in the head, but that's curable, in the end, especially if we have many lifetimes ahead of us, no doubt.

This world is a perfect machinery to polish us up like gemstones.


"You may not like it now but you will" -- Adam and the Ants

This idea of perfect souls is what I mean. It almost treats evil people like they are victims of their own behavior. Some people CHOOSE to be evil. They want to be this way and don't want to be rehabilitated or changed. Not all but enough to make me believe in evil.

Like I said, "One's mind is never the soul... On earth, they're merely messed up in the head, but that's curable, in the end, especially if we have many lifetimes ahead of us, no doubt. This world is a perfect machinery to polish us up like gemstones. Thank God for concrete, grounded, Earthly laws and regulations."

I just looked up the meaning of evil in the dictionary ( I like to be thorough) and based on the various meanings it listed, yes absolutely I agree that evil exists in some people......
Now, in my opinion, it may not manifest itself all the time but it lays there dormant until that individual decides to act upon it. For example, you might hear of a person who lived an exemplary life until he/she reached 50 years of age and decided one day to go on a killing spree...

On the other side of the coin, you might have a child who exhibits evil behaviour from a young age and continues this well into adulthood......Perfect example being one of the animals convicted for the murder of Australian Anita Cobby (very well-known case)......Witnesses reported actually feeling the evil emanating from him whenever he was around them and described the terrible deeds he commited as a child........

I don't know if they're born with it or acquire it along the way but it exists in my view.......

I guess I think those teenagers that beat up on homeless people are evil. For me, evil is the inability to see yourself as part of the greater Whole, combined with a sadistic, animalistic compulsion to prey upon the Whole.

I guess in some ways I feel like the best thing that could happen to those kids is that they themselves should end up homeless and begging for the next ten years. But that assumes that there's a goal in life-- enlightenment. Probably an idealization that I've cooked up to convince myself that the world is fair...

[yuck-- I shouldn't post on the internet after having knocked off half a bottle of wine...]

Saints and mystics say that a person carries his or her accumulated (mental) patterns to the next lifetime and so on. They call these patterns as karma. Physical ailments, tensions, disposition, and so on are karmic symptoms..., so I've read and also heard them say. Through certain mystical and/or yoga practices, one might be able to lighten up one's 'load,' purify one's body and mind, through God's grace of course, especially if one is tired of carrying one's heavy load due to the polishing affects of this world. This world, as you and I know, can be very demanding, especially if one is too dense to listen to the many warnings presented. Again, the world, in itself, is ample of a teacher, at least in my experience since I'm too chicken to find out the (many) worst it could do, if you know what I mean.

Just a thought.

I could only say that the world is fair since I couldn't see the whole picture. Besides, if my God is perfect, then this world is also that. The soul is eternal, after all, with many lifetimes at that.

Just a thought.

Would you like me to send one ?...lol..

For Mercy has a human heart,
Pity, a human face...
-- William Blake


Maybe evil is the absence of pity...?




photo by Margaret Bourke-White (photographer for Life magazine)

Wow Check out my thread on Innocence versus experience discussing William Blake Siara.

That's my definition as well.

The amount of indifference in the face of human suffering at ones own hands is the measure of Evil for me.

but seriously speaking...there are evil entities.

Some entities may think they're evil, but thinking is not the same as being. And yes, there are mean people in this world. And to be mean, one has to be conscious of this act. And I have no doubt that everyone is capable of being mean, if you know what I mean. But being mean is not evil, but it could lead to sin, and that's entirely another matter.

"Evil" is so profound that it's beyond our Earthly comprehention, beyond Earthly definition. Mean, on the other hand, is very libidinal, and yet, it could pierce the soul. Murder is a great example.

Greed is greed. Evil is beyond our comprehension. If a person feels evil at all, then that person is far away from the light of God (while on Earth).

Well. I have to interrupt the flow and say that I don't believe in evil whatsoever.

There are things taht break the social contract and are bad for society or good for society but I don't think these things can be put down to a universal evil or the like. People do things that others don't like but they rarely think themselves that they are doing the wrong thing.

They might have many diverse reasons for doing it ranging from religious scriptures to statism to reasons that make sense only to them. But the fact is very few people commit an act in the belief that what they are doing is evil... There fore if they think they are doing the right thing then how can they be considered evil? The only possible way to call them evil would be to compare their actions to that of the social contract or the norm of the society.

Unfortunately the Society Norm differs across different cultures. Suicide I think is the best example of this. Considered one of the greatest of evils by the Church yet it was considered quite honorable by the Japanese. Thus if the the norm is capable of changing then how can it be considered that evil can ever truly exist.

So you think that the men in Rwanda hatched up the faces and bodies of children were just taking a break from the social contract?

This isn't evil to you?

Certainly I believe that that was unjustifiable TrueThat, yet in other times it was considered quite natural to kill the children of an eniemy.

This has been spoken upon quite often with God him self doing it to the Egyptian firstborn. This is justified in the Bible which is considered the book of absolute good, so yes I think the Rwandans were commiting an act that could be considered evil by the standards of today in my country, my culture but I have no Idea of how they rationalizd it.

I truly doubt that a mentally healthy person could set out to kill a bunch of children for no reason whatsoever and even if the reason was not understandable by the majority of people it is still there...

And please note this is not trying to justify there acts or anything but I do not believe in evil.

In my eyes there cant be evil if there is no good. But in my opinion there are people who are evil. Like when someone does something that they know is bad and they have no remorse what so ever. I would like to think that people can change, but if a person changes in my opinion they were never evil in the first place or they faked the whole change..........

There are "evil" or bad people in this world that are not even capable of remorse. I think there are truely some bad people out there. Look at serial killers. I would call those people absolutely evil.

Too complicated and no one to bash...
Darn people having a logical discussion...
This is a very nebulous question isn't it? Very subjective too. I've heard of people being described as purely evil too, never seen it for myself though. Truly mankind commits evil acts, we have no shortage of it. I guess my answer is I believe in evil acts, and people who behave evilly, but I don't think there is such a thing as evil incarnate. At least not in my experience. It's nit-picking and semantic, I know, but it's the best answer I can express.

Sorry, two posts, my computer is acting up.

I'm not sure I believe people are purely evil or purely good (except Jesus), I believe people can commit evil acts or act out of evil intentions, and yet later be truly repentant. Does someone who just stands and watches an act of evil (seeing a child be hacked to death) commit an evil act? Yes, they do, by not doing anything to prevent evil. So, have all of us committed evil acts? I believe all of us have, certainly not as evil as Hitler, or Saddam Hussein, but we have all done something evil, especially because we knew we were doing something was not good, and yet went ahead and did it.

But taking the question from a different perspective, what would be the boundaries of human dignity and decency?

Cruelty is an act. Murder is an act. Evil is not an action. Evil is an ideal, "something that exists only in the imagination." It is supposed to be attached to the soul, but alas, the state of one's soul is already perfect since God(???) created it. And an ideal is man made. And soul is an eternal entity.

If one believes in a perfect, divine, all-powerful, all-knowing, "creator-of-all" entity, then this entity doesn't make any mistakes. A person just simply doesn't see the whole picture, the scheme of things.

If one believes in karma (the law of patterns), and reincarnation, then everybody in this world will eventually learn whatever it is that is neeeded to be learned. And this world is one of the perfect teachers for that. "There are no accidents," so people say.

I see these teachings happening all the time. One only needs to stop, look, and listen. Even if one is not alert, the teachings will present themselves, regardless. Surely, one must agree.

One's bad luck, maybe anothers fortune (or learned lesson without going through the harshness of the teaching if one is wise enough to stop, look, and listen earlier in one's life).

JUST A THOUGHT.

Pity = Empathy (or at least is a very close synonym, please don't go all dictionary on me, people), the most human of God-endowed emotions. I think you're right in that respect. I would say that the absence of pity/empathy is definitely one characteristic of evil. Very well said.

But as Metallica says, "Am I evil? Yes, I am. Am I evil? I am man." Song: Am I Evil? Album: Kill Em All

If humans are endowed by their Creator with these sympathies for each other and connections that should keep us from doing these barbaric things to each other, how to explain what gets into people to make them do them? Humanists say they are left-over survival impulses of some animalistic nature, psychiatrists excuse it as mental illness or personality disorder usually.

These impulses clearly override normal, rational behavior. What do you think it is?

I'd like to chime in... I think evil does exist, just as good exists, but I think both are in every persons' nature. But like all characteristics, you can be more than the other.

As for the Rwanda comment, the genocide was led by, what I consider, terrorists... and terrorists are evil. They were Two extremist Hutu militia groups, not sure of the names, but they had a large amount of power, they controlled the food, the water and a lot of the money. You were either with them or against them, and the ones who were against them, died along with the Tutsi.

But I don't believe every person who participated in the killing was evil. Because they were forced by fear of dying as well. Which is the case in all battles. I'm not saying that's right... but it is a strong reason and I'm sure they regret it. And regret for the bad things you've done, I think, is a good characteristic.

I don't believe in good or evil(right or wrong), I believe in perspective and opinion. There are too many shades of gray for such a thing as "Good" and "Evil" to exist.

I have personal definitions of what is right and wrong but there is no universal Right and Wrong.

Quote Time!
"Evil when you are in its grasp is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty."
"One man's heaven is another man's hell."
"If there wasn't any evil then there wouldn't be any good, so i guess its good to be evil sometimes."

So am I right to suggest that what you're stating here is that as long as a person doesn't think they're doing something evil, e.g. raping and killing children, then we can't call them evil ? We just don't agree with their actions because it's breaking the social norm and not because it's evil ?

Am I reading you right ?

I've also heard of a belief system which states that we're free of "evil" deeds as long as we still haven't spoken to God directly, get His direct commands, rules, etc. But once we get this direct communication with Him, then we better follow this personal, direct-to-you rules at all cost, no matter what.

Before this direct connection occur, all (and I mean everything!) "evil" actions are FORGIVEN since "we do not know what we do," so to speak. Basically, we're in the dark as long as we don't hear anything from God. Ignorance is one's defense. Just another POV. But, could one live with the consequences?

There are two sides to a coin.

I believe that there are some pretty screwed up people in this world. Born that way or grown that way, people who lack the ability to feel for others, to think about consequences, etc.(?)

My opinion: It's both absurd and really arrogant to believe that there are invisible forces/beings of "good" and "evil" playing tug-o-war with our souls.

EVIL? You ask such a question if there is evil? How dare you? I will tell you of evil beyond measure. Evil is when I buy a jelly donut and they forget the jelly part. Or when I ask ask for ranch dressing and the evil witch gives me the devils food called bleu cheese. Who other than an evil person eats moldy cheese? The mailman forgot to pick up my outgoing mail the other day with my subscrition to "high times" magazine in it. Or when I stand in a check out line and some lady's evil kid says, "Look mommy, that man is fatter than daddy!" Why are all the good foods named after an evil race like the french. French fries, french toast, french bread etc... Why when I go to a confessional the priest laughs just like my psychiatrist? Why does evil spelled backward say "live" that one bugs the hell out of me. Yeah evil is everywhere.

When people commit acts that are considered evil the person who is doing them doesn't feel like he is doing evil. You and I will conclude that it is 'evil' but that doesn't make us right. We can call them whatever we want but that doesn't make it so.

For example if I where to murder someone it would be considered wrong...but if I am a soldier killing somebody I'm doing good.
Lets say I'm a con artist and trick rich people out of their money, thats considered wrong...but if I donate the money to Cancer research its considered an act of charity.

I don't consider Hitler to be an Evil man. I consider him to be a murderer. Hitler thought he was doing good...Hitler never thought to himself "I'm going to be an evil bastard today". We just thought otherwise.

As I said before there are to many shades of gray for a such a thing as good and evil to universally exist.

Certainly that is considered "evil" in our day and age and personally I think anyone who commits such a crime should be drawn and quatered, yet were the social norm different it could be considered quite normal.

In far earlier days rape was not considered a sin as women had far less right to object, indeed recently senior Muslim clerics in Australia have made the statement that some women are askin gto be raped and the like. Personally I think this is a load of garbage yet Sheik Hilaly, one of the most senior Muslim Clerics in Australia considered and the leader of Many of Australian Muslims felt it to be so true that he made a public statement.

Does his making this statement automatically make him "evil" or is it deeper then that. Was his statement caused by his cultural coniditioning perhaps. Is his "social contract" different to ours because of his beliefs or position?

Personally I could not tolerate the idea of someone raping and killing a child but I don't consider it to be the cause of an "evil" force or the like.

I realise that this doesn't directly answer the question, for I can think of no way the social norm could deteriorate sufficiently to make the rape and murder of children even considered anything other then "evil". However it is the best I can think of.


Perhaps it would be best to say that I believe that anything that breaks or damages the human social contract can be considered "Bad" or in extreme cases "evil", however anything that follows or strengthens that contract is considered "good" or the like. This would explain while at different times acts that today would be considered abhorent, such as the genocide of enemy tribes were once considered an acceptable part of war but is now considered as evil an act as any.

Anyway I hope that gives a small insight into how I feel. I apologise that I can not be more erudite in my explanation but alas my English skills are not the greatest...

Your English is fine, no worries at all.....BTW You made your point clearer with this post and you bring up some valid points...

evil is real......

I do not believe in evil; only the absence of good. Kinda like light/dark - dark is defined as the absence of light. So it's not so much it's own thing as it is the lack of something else. If you turn on a lightswitch, it fills the dark. If you turn on the goodswitch, it fills the evil.

Though sometimes I think some people have a malfunctioning goodswitch.

For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst? ---Kahlil Gibran

Evil is, good or truth misplaced. --Mahatma Gandhi

Evil is getting home and realizing that the Devil worshipping brat at McRonalds purposefully gave you the wrong order. Hey! I just got an idea. Remember that thing in the seventies where everyone had a saying for what love is? Like love is a warm pu**y? Let's start one for what evil is?

I do believe in evil. Both a person's actions & the person him/herself. Since it's the person himself who thought of the 'evil idea.' That's my opinion really. ^^;; But I could be wrong.