Okay, we’re going to try this once again. An evil people vote-off. And to keep it under control, I’ve started us with a list of evil people - no Jesus this time. The list was collected (in chronological order to keep it fair) from the following lists of evil people:
The Evil 100 - Martin Gilman Wolcott or Stephan J. Spignesi
The Most Evil Dictators in History - Shelley Klein
The Most Evil Men and Women in History - Miranda Twiss
The Most Evil Mobsters in History - Lauren Carter
The Most Evil Women in History - Shelley Klein
The Most Evil Pirates in History - Shelley Klein
Tyrants: History’s 100 Most Evil Despots & Dictators - Nigel Cawthorne
Tyrants: The World’s 20 Worst Living Dictators - David Wallechinsky
Here’s how it’s going to work (assuming it works). The voting rounds will run for three days and then I’ll count the votes and announce who’s voted out. You’re voting on who should be eliminated from the list - ie the least evil. In theory the last person left on the list will be the most evil person in history.
Because of the large number of people on the list, we’ll be doing multiple votes. To start out you can vote to eliminate up to ten people per round. Each vote has to be for a seperate person - you cannot submit multiple votes for the same person in a single round.
But to complicate things, everyone also gets five “hold” votes per round. These are for people you think are really evil and deserve to stay on the list but other people are trying to vote out. Each hold vote a person receives will be subtracted from their elimination total. So if ten people vote to eliminate Hitler but three people vote to hold him, Hitler will get a total of seven elimination votes. Again, you cannot submit multiple votes for the same person in a single round. You also cannot vote to eliminate and hold the same person in a single round, because that’s just being silly.
So, in the early rounds, you can vote to eliminate up to ten people and to hold up to five people. You don’t have to use all your votes if you don’t want to and you can vote just for eliminations or just for holds. The ten people who have the highest elimination totals in each round will be removed. Once the list is reduced some, I drop the amount of votes and removals per round.
Akhenaton (14th Century BC) Pharoah of Egypt
Sennacherib (8th century BC) King of Assyria
Pheidon of Argos (7th century BC) Tyrant of Athens
Lucius Tarquinius Superbus (535–496 BC) “Tarquin the Proud” King of Rome
Polycrates (6th century BC) Tyrant of Samos
Alexander III (356–323 BC) “Alexander the Great” King of Macedonia
Qin Shi Huang (259–210 BC) Emperor of China
Herod I (74-4 BC) King of Judaea
Augustus (63 BC - 14 AD) Emperor of Rome
Caligula (12-41 AD) Emperor of Rome
Agrippina (15-59 AD) “Empress” of Rome
Valeria Messalina (c.18-48 AD) “Empress” of Rome
Nero (37-68 AD) Emperor of Rome
Domitian (51-96 AD) Emperor of Rome
Attila (406–453) King of the Huns
Fredegund (6th century AD) Queen of the Franks
Wu Zetian aka Wu Hou (625-705) Empress of China
Harun al-Rashid (763-809) Caliph of Baghdad
Olga (890-969) Regent of Russia
Basil II (958–1025) “Basil the Bulgar Slayer” Byzantine Emperor
Genghis Khan (1162–1227) Ruler of the Mongols
John (1167-1216) King of England
Peter (1334-1369) “Pedro the Cruel” King of Castile
Timur (1336-1405) “Tamerlane” Ruler of Samarkand
Gian Galeazzo Visconti (1351-1402) Duke of Milan
Gilles de Rais (1404-1440) Serial killer
Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498) Grand Inquisitor of Spain
Vlad III aka Dracula (1431-1476) “Vlad the Impaler” Count of Wallachia
Richard III (1452–1485) King of England
Cesare Borgia (1475–1507) Duke and Cardinal
Francisco Pizarro (c.1473–1541) Conquerer of the Incas
Hernan Cortes (1485–1547) Conquerer of the Aztec
Henry VIII (1491-1547) King of England
Mary I (1516-1558) “Bloody Mary” Queen of England
Catherine de’Medici (1519-1589) Regent of France
Ivan IV Vasilyevich (1530-1584) “Ivan the Terrible” Tsar of Russia
Grainne Ni Mhaille aka Grace O’Malley (c.1530–c.1603) Pirate
Toyotomi Hideyoshi (c.1536-1598) Ruler of Japan
Mary Stewart (1542-1587) Queen of Scotland
William Kidd (c.1645–1701) Pirate
Boris Godunov (c.1551-1605) Tsar of Russia
Elizabeth Bathory (1560–1614) Countess of Transylvania serial killer
Charles I (1600-1649) King of England
Aurangzeb (1618-1707) Mughal Emperor of India
Francois l’Olonnais (c.1635-c.1668) Pirate
Henry Morgan (c.1635-1688) Pirate
Henry Every (c.1656-c.1699) Pirate
Peter I (1672-1725) “Peter the Great” Tsar of Russia
Edward “Blackbeard” Teach (c.1680–1718) Pirate
John “Calico Jack” Rackham (1682-1720) Pirate
Bartholomew Roberts (1682-1722) Pirate
Edward Low (c.1690–c.1724) Pirate
Nader Shah (c.1693-1747) Shah of Persia
Frederick William I (1688–1740) King of Prussia
Anne Bonny (1702-1782) Pirate
Edward England (birth unknown - died c.1720) Pirate
William Lewis (birth unknown - died 1727) Pirate
Catherine II (1729-1796) “Catherine the Great” Tsarina of Russia
George III (1738-1820) King of England
Donatien Alphonse Francois, Marquis de Sade (1740-1814) Promoter of sadism
Tipu Sultan (1750-1799) Sultan of Mysore
Louis XVI (1754–1793) King of France
Paul I (1754-1801) Tsar of Russia
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) French Revoultionary leader
Jose Gaspar Rodriguez de Francia (1766–1840) Dictator of Paraguay
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821) Emperor of France
Jean Laffite (c.1776–c.1823) Pirate
Ranavalona I (c.1782–1861) Queen of Madagascar
Agustin de Iturbide (1783–1824) Dictator of Mexico
Cheng I Soa (1784-1844) - Pirate
Ludwig I (1786–1868) King of Bavaria
Shaka (c.1787–1828) Leader of the Zulu
Juan Manuel de Rosas (1793-1877) Dictator of Argentina
Benito de Soto (1805-1830) Pirate
Ferdinand II (1810–1859) King of Naples and Sicily
Hong Xiuquan (1814-1864) “Heavenly King” Warlord of China
Francisco Solano Lopez (1826-1870) Dictator of Paraguay
Antonio Guzman Blanco (1829-1899) President of Venezuela
Grace Marks (born 1828 death unknown) Murderer
Porfirio Diaz (1830-1915) President of Mexico
Mary Ann Cotton (1832-1873) Serial killer
Cixi (1835-1908) “Tzu-hsi” Doweger Empress of China
Leopold II (1835-1909) King of Belgium
John Wilkes Booth (1838-18565) Assassin
Charles Guiteau (1841-1882) Assassin
Ludwig II (1845-1886) King of Bavaria
Jane Toppan (1854-1938) Serial killer
Theodore II (1855-1868) Emperor of Ethiopia
Wilhelm II (1859-1941) Emperor of Germany
Lizzie Borden (1860-1927) Accused murderer
H.H. Holmes aka Herman Webster Mudgett (1861-1896) Serial killer
Mwanga II (1868-1903) Kabaka of Buganda
Henri Desire Landru (1869-1922) Serial killer
Grigori Rasputin (1869-1916) Russian mystic
Albert Fish (1870-1936) Serial killer
Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924) Leader of the Soviet Union
Leon Czolgosz (1873-1901) Assassin
Mehmed Talat aka Talat Pasha (1874–1921) Leader of Turkey
Syngman Rhee (1875-1965) President of South Korea
Joseph Stalin (1878-1953) Leader of the Soviet Union
Fritz Haarmann (1879-1925) Serial killer
Ismail Enver aka Enver Pasha (1881-1922) Leader of Turkey
Peter Kurten (1883-1931) Serial killer
Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) Dictator of Italy
Hideki Tojo (1884-1948) Leader of Japan
Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975) Ruler of Republic of China
Jack the Ripper (circa 1888) Serial killer
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) Fuhrer of Germany
Antonio de Oliveira Salazar (1889-1970) Ruler of Portugal
Frank Costello (1891-1973) Gangster
George “Bugs” Moran (1891-1957) Gangster
Carl Panzram (1891-1930) Serial killer
Rafael Trujillo (1891-1961) Dictator of the Domincan Republic
Francisco Franco (1892-1975) Dictator of Spain
Dean O’Banion (1892-1924) Gangster
Mao Tse-tung (1893-1976) Leader of People’s Republic of China
Juan Peron (1895-1974) President of Argentina
Anastasio Somoza Garcia (1896-1956) Dictator of Nicaragua
Louis “Lepke” Buchalter (1897-1944) Gangster
Vito Genovese (1897-1969) Gangster
Charles “Lucky” Luciano (1897-1962) Gangster
Earle Nelson (1897-1928) Serial killer
Marcel Petiot (1897-1946) Serial killer
Al Capone (1899-1947) Gangster
Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945) Head of SS
Fulgencio Batista (1901-1973) Dictator of Cuba
Jake Bird (1901-1940) Serial killer
Ngo Dinh Diem (1901-1963) President of South Vietnam
Sukarno (1901-1970) President of Indonesia
Carlo Gambino (1902-1976) Gangster
Ruhollah Khomeini (1902-1989) Ruler of Iran
Meyer Lansky (1902-1983) Gangster
Dutch Schultz (1902-1935) Gangster
Joseph Bonanno (1905-2002) Gangster
Ed Gein (1906-1984) Serial killer
Adolf Eichmann (1906-1962) Nazi
Ilse Koch (1906-1967) Nazi
Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel (1906-1947) Gangster
Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier (1907-1971) President of Haiti
Sam Giancana (1908-1975) Gangster
Enver Hoxha (1908-1985) Leader of Albania
Bruno Ludke (1908-1944) Serial killer
John George Haigh (1909-1949) Serial killer)
Kwame Nkrumah (1909-1972) Leader of Ghana
Josef Mengele (1911-1979) Nazi doctor
Kim Il-sung (1912-1994) Leader of North Korea
Alfredo Stroessner (1912-2006) Dictator of Paraguay
Paul Castellano (1915-1985) Gangster
Augusto Pinochet (1915-2006) President of Chile
Elena Ceausescu (1916-1989) Co-leader of Romania
Ferdinand Marcos (1917-1989) President of the Philippines
Nicolae Ceasescu (1918-1989) President of Romania
Jean-Bedel Bokassa (1921-1996) Ruler of the Central African Republic
Howard Unruh (1921-2009) Spree killer
Robert Mugabe (born 1924) President of Zimbabwe
Abdullah bin Aziz Al Saud (born 1924) King of Saudi Arabia
Idi Amin (1925-2003) President of Uganda
Fidel Castro (born 1926) President of Cuba
Efrain Rios Montt (born 1926) Dictator of Guatemala
Marie Noe (born 1928) Serial killer
Pol Pot (1928-1998) Leader of Cambodia
Mobutu Sese Seko (1930-1997) Dictator of the Congo
Albert DeSalvo (1931-1973) “The Boston Strangler” serial killer
Jim Jones (1931-1978) Founder of the People’s Temple
Paul Biya (born 1933) President of Cameroon
Donald “Pee Wee” Gaskins (1933-1991) Serial killer
Joachim Kroll (1933-1991) Serial killer
Than Shwe (born 1933) Dictator of Myanmar
Charles Manson (born 1934) Leader of serial killings
Richard Kuklinski (1935-2006) Contract killer
James Porter (1935-2005) Priest, child abuser
Andrei Chikatilo (1936-1994) Serial killer
Henry Lee Lucas (1936-2001) Serial killer
Choummaly Sayasone (born 1936) Ruler of Laos
Audrey Marie Hilley (1937-1987) Murderer
Mengistu Haile Mariam (born 1937) Ruler of Ethiopia
Saddam Hussein (1937-2006) President of Iraq
Ian Brady (born 1938) and Myra Hindley (1942-2002) serial killers
Islam Karimov (born 1938) President of Uzbekistan
Charles Starkweather (1938-1959) and Caril Ann Fugate (born 1943) Spree killers
Dean Corll (1939-1973) Serial killer
Ali Khamenei (born 1939) Leader of Iran
Lee Harvey Oswald (1939-1963) Assassin
John Gotti (1940-2002) Gangster
Saparmurat Niyazov (1940-2006) President of Turkmenistan
Slobodan Milosevic (1941-2006) President of Serbia
Kim Jong-il (born 1941) Ruler of North Korea
Richard Speck (1941-1991) Serial killer
Fred West (1941-1975) and Rosemary West (born 1953) Serial killers
Charles Whitman (1941-1966) Spree killer
John Wayne Gacy (1942-1994) Serial killer
Muammar al-Gaddafi (born 1942) President of Libya
Hissene Habre (born 1942) Dictator of Chad
Hu Jintao (born 1942) Leader of People’s Republic of China
James Oliver Huberty (1942-1984) Spree killer
Theodore Kaczynski (born 1942) “The Unabomber” terrorist
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo (born 1942) Dictator of Equatorial Guinea
Frederick Cowan (1943-1977) Spree killer
Gary Heidnik (1943-1999) Serial killer
Pervez Musharraf (born 1943) President of Pakistan
Omar al-Bashir (born 1944) President of Sudan
Isaias Afwerki (born 1945) President of Eritrea
Sammy Gravano (born 1945) Gangster
Leonard Lake (1945-1985) and Charles Ng (born 1960) Serial killers
Dennis Nilsen (born 1945) Serial killer
Ted Bundy (1946-1989) Serial killer
Peter Sutcliffe (born 1946) “The Yorkshire Ripper” serial killer
Edmund Kemper III (born 1948) Serial killer
Pedro Lopez (born 1948) Serial killer
Mark Essex (1949-1973) Spree killer
Gary Ridgway (born 1949) “The Green River Killer” serial killer
Kenneth Bianchi (born 1951) and Angelo Buono Jr. (1934-2002) “The Hillside Starnglers” serial killers
Samuel Doe (1951-1990) Dictator of Liberia
Gerald Stano (1951-1998) Serial killer
Nikolai Dzhurmongaliev (born 1952) Serial killer
Thomas Hamilton (1952–1996) Spree killer
David Berkowitz (born 1953) “The Son of Sam” serial killer
Bobby Joe Long (born 1953) Serial killer
Aleksandr Lukashenko (born 1954) President of Belarus
Meles Zenawi (born 1955) Ruler of Ethiopia
George Hennard (1956-1991) Spree killer
Aileen Wuornos (1956-2002) Serial killer
Osama bin Laden (born 1957) Founder of al Qaeda
Anatoly Onoprienko (born 1959) Serial killer
Joel Rifkin (born 1959) Serial killer
The Zodiac Killer (circa 1960’s) Serial killer
Jeffery Dahmer (1960-1994) Serial killer
Michael Ryan (1960-1987) Spree killer
Richard Ramirez (born 1960) Serial killer
Westley Allan Dodd (1961-1993) Serial killer
Paul Bernardo (born 1964) and Karla Homolka (born 1970) Serial killers
Marc Lepine (1964-1989) Spree killer
Moses Sithole (born 1964) Serial killer
Bashar al-Assad (born 1965) President of Syria
Martin Bryant (born 1967) Spree killer
Timothy McVeigh (1968-2001) Terrorist
Mswati III (born 1968) King of Swaziland
Susan Smith (born 1971) Murderer
Eric Harris (1981-1999) and Dylan Klebold (1981-1999) Spree killers
Okay, one more thing. Some of the “people” are actually a pair of people - eg Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. For the purposes of voting they count as a single person. One vote will eliminate or hold both of them.
Not to rain on your parade, but how is this in any way meaningful? No one has a comprehensive knowledge of all the people on this list, their motives, actions and any mitigating factors, and that’s before any attempt at comparing the various ‘evils’ committed.
It’s not a question you can conceivably answer anyway, without subscribing to moral absolutism, and any such system has no unassailable proof. It’s futile.
I like these elimination games, but honestly I think you would be better off starting with a smaller list, eliminating the many of the lesser-known people (e.g. all the pirates, most/all of the serial killers). When we voted for presidents, I was able to read up on those I knew little or nothing about. I cannot do that for 159 people. As I do not know way more than the 10 votes I get, I cannot really participate at this stage. I doubt I am alone in that, and hence it is going to be difficult to get this off the ground.
I could just go down the list and choose the first 10 I don’t know, but that’s not much fun. And if everyone had to do that, the game would be meaningless for quite a few weeks.
Oh, even worse: a lot fo these people may be half-fictional. That is, they really lived but nobody knows exactly what they did, if anything, or why. Much fo what we know about Empress Wu, for instance, could be myth or lies by later historians who didn’t like her.
Hey, I like the list. I think a lot of them should rightly be eliminated (bad press, especially in the ancient world) but I’m good with the list. I don’t recognize everyone, but I think I can place my votes.
The consensus seems to be that the list is too long. I’m open to suggestions.
Do people want me to trim it down myself? That seems pretty arbitrary even to me.
So how about a first voting round to get it down to a smaller size? There’ll be one round with no elimination limit. You can vote to eliminate as many people as you like. I’ll keep the five person hold limit in place. At the end of this round, anyone who’s received at least one elimination vote and no hold vote will be taken off the list.
That should trim the list down quickly. Amarone, you can vote to eliminate all 159 people you’ve never heard of.
Okay, I’ll apparently be the first to submit a list. I’ll vote to eliminate these sixteen people, based on the “I’ve heard some defenses of, as well as attacks on, them” argument:
Augustus (63 BC - 14 AD) Emperor of Rome
Richard III (1452–1485) King of England
Grainne Ni Mhaille aka Grace O’Malley (c.1530–c.1603) Pirate
George III (1738-1820) King of England
Louis XVI (1754–1793) King of France
Jean Laffite (c.1776–c.1823) Pirate
Shaka (c.1787–1828) Leader of the Zulu
Porfirio Diaz (1830-1915) President of Mexico
Syngman Rhee (1875-1965) President of South Korea
Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975) Ruler of Republic of China
Kwame Nkrumah (1909-1972) Leader of Ghana
Fidel Castro (born 1926) President of Cuba
Mengistu Haile Mariam (born 1937) Ruler of Ethiopia
Hu Jintao (born 1942) Leader of People’s Republic of China
Pervez Musharraf (born 1943) President of Pakistan
Isaias Afwerki (born 1945) President of Eritrea
Ill use my holds for these five, not necessarily because I think they constitute the ultimate Evil Quintet but so people who don’t recognize their names now will know their (mis)deeds by the end of the game:
Elizabeth Bathory (1560–1614) Countess of Transylvania serial killer
Leopold II (1835-1909) King of Belgium
Louis “Lepke” Buchalter (1897-1944) Gangster
Alfredo Stroessner (1912-2006) Dictator of Paraguay
Jean-Bedel Bokassa (1921-1996) Ruler of the Central African Republic
Okay, I’ll contribute some people I don’t think really belong on a list of ultimate evil
Going by the rule that they lived so long ago we really don’t know enough about them to judge them.
Akhenaton
Sennacherib
Pheidon of Argos
Lucius Tarquinius Superbus
Polycrates
Building an empire is hard work and you’ve got to break a few eggs
Alexander III
Augustus
Can’t judge somebody who’s anonymous
Jack the Ripper
The Zodiac Killer
May have actually been innocent
William Kidd
Lizzie Borden
Audrey Marie Hilley
British monarchs rarely are worse than any others
John
Richard III
Henry VIII
Mary I
Mary Stewart
Charles I
George III
