Choose an option from the poll.
…because there’s no rational explanation for some people’s actions.
I said yes but I almost always think it’s because of X. I mean, I really don’t believe people are born evil. You can tell me they’re born sociopath or even psychotic but that’s a ‘because’, isn’t it?
Oh f**k yes, and some of them are my patients.
There most certainly are evil people. It’s not necessarily because they’re born that way, because I think it takes a combination of genetics, upbringing, and circumstances to make people that way, because there are plenty of people with horrible mental and emotional disorders that don’t turn out that way or those that have terrible upbringings or end up in the worst circumstances that aren’t evil, and yet we do still see evil people.
That said, I think truly evil people are a lot rarer than some people might imply. You know that politician who always does the opposite of what you think is right? He’s probably not really evil, he and his constituents will just tend to disagree with you. I’m not talking about someone who is clearly crazy, either because they don’t know or don’t really understand society’s rules. Rather, when I think of evil, I think about ones like some well known killers whom I’ve seen interviewed who clearly knew that what they were doing was very wrong before, during, and after doing it, and don’t feel even an ounce of guilt about it. For instance, I remember seeing an interview with a guy where he was describing a murder, and seemed as matter-of-fact about it as I would expect from someone describing a typical work day. And, of course, there’s always the classic examples like Hitler, but that’s sort of cliche for this sort of topic, I think.
…nor is there an irrational explanation either.
More when I get back from work.
There are evil people, in the sense of completely amoral. There are people who have no remorse, and therefore consider nobody’s rewards/punishments but there own.
Maybe, because it depends on what you mean by evil.
If you define evil in some religious, supernatural, objective sense, then I don’t buy into that and I don’t think people are inherently evil, or whatever.
If you define evil to be a particular subset of actions and attitudes that a majority of human society has defined as “evil” then certainly there are evil people.
I said no because I was thinking of the supernatural type of evil, like demonic. I should have given it more thought.
No.
Some people make evil choices. Some people are damaged. No one is irredeemably broken.
What is the Lucifer Effect? link
Evil exists as a byproduct of human choice.
I think my definition of evil is a person who causes harm to another person or animal, without cause. It’s justifiable to kill someone if they’re coming at you with a gun. It’s not justifiable to kill someone just for fun.
So yes, there are evil people. Some are born evil, but most are created by harmful or neglectful parenting.
…there are evil acts committed by sick, broken, damaged people.
How can there be evil in the world but no evil people? To some extent I think we are all sick, broken, and damaged. The sickness, brokenness, and damagedness is what varies.
Exactly as I said: people may commit evil acts, but I do not believe that people are themselves evil. I think the people who commit evil acts are damaged, broken and sick, not evil.
Yeah, but not all of us go around cutting off people’s heads and eating them.
There are people who are predators; who enjoy harming, exploiting & oppressing others and have no compunctions about doing so. Of course one can make the argument that "there’s no objective definition of the word “evil’ so how can you call them evil?” Problem is that amounts to word games; you can call them “evil”, “followers of Ethical System B”, or anything you like and they’ll still be what they are; refusing to use to word “evil” achieves nothing useful.
I disagree.
I know at least one in my family and I’ve known others. From what I hear from people who grew up with her, since I wasn’t around then, she was “that way” from the very beginning and she still is, while smiling, in her 70s. She’s aware of herself, at times it seems, as she would refer to herself as the most horrible person. She tries but she unable to change: she would at times force herself to be kind but inevitably she’s unable to stay the course to achieve it… seems to her disappointment, however momentary it maybe.
Everyone around her alternate from feeling sorry for her to state of enraged beyond expression. We all wish we can see inside of her head to see what might be really ticking in there… it is like an incurable sickness. There is a huge emotional chasm between her and everyone even her own kids whom, after 20+ years of separation from a divorce, she barely managed to get in touch again…
She’s brought up in a very devout Christian family, her father being a well known theologist/pastor. She has attended and been around church all her life. She’s been told of “her ways” by church folks, elders and pastors throughout her life; she bows in acknowledgement however she turns around and she’s right back to her original self.
You don’t know of their existence until you bump into an ice cold being… just as everything in your reality is fine until they are not one moment.
Yes, but how many people think about it? How many people fantasize about doing things they would never actually do? We’ll never know. Some knowledge is not worth having.