Realizing you are evil
Most people see themselves as good. This is just not the case. I think we are born with both potentials but tilt towards evil. Anything too add?
We suppress our dark side too fit into society. I believe good takes work.
"The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself"[15]:284 and represents "a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well."[15]:21
We suppress our dark side too fit into society. I believe good takes work.
"The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself"[15]:284 and represents "a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well."[15]:21
Comments (50)
I look at it more from the point of view of education. I started off very clueless and then all these events and people helped by noticing my mistakes.
Love hurts.
I realized i was evil trough introspection and fantasy. I think it’s important that everyone realizes this about themselves.
But who wants too go down that road. That’s why most people never do it.
I think that one's position on the good or evil of humanity depends on temperament and personality mostly. People who like others think they're ok. People who don't, don't. I like people a lot, individually and in the aggregate. I generally try not to judge people one way or another. I think humans are social and that we tend to like each other, all other things being equal. Of course, all other things are never equal.
Most people don't go down that road because it doesn't take anyone anywhere good.
If you’re going to take this topic seriously (that is, philosophically), then you need to start with defining good and evil. My guess is that during the process of attempting to do so you will find them to be rather useless terms; they’re too vague and subjective to be of any use in any universal way. But perhaps you’ll surprise me.
Having said that, I agree that humans are capable of just about any act when placed in the right environment/circumstances. We all have natural abilities and limitations, of course, but I don’t think those are particularly relevant to the discussion. However, I don’t feel the need to label our general inclinations/actions as good or evil in the absolute sense of the terms.
Good and evil seem to me to be almost indefinable theological categories. I don't know many people who think they are good. I think more accurately people imagine they are 'not evil'. That said, many people think they are bad (often indefinably so), hence the proliferation of self-help paraphernalia and substance use to distract or attempt to divert from what one imagines one's nature to be.
Most people i know think they are good. But let that be another thing.
It does take you somewhere good. It's only by being able too be evil that you can be good
Evil? Maybe not. Confused, lost, broken, fractured.... These may explain the above rather than evil per say.
Is the action evil or the person who does it? Are the consequences evil, or the intention behind it? Or both, or none? Can you do an evil thing to accomplish a greater good?
You have to kinda be able to be a evil person too do good. Or else, you can't do anyone anything
- Being an animal without conscious ie. not knowing any better (ignorance)
- Wickedness, selfishness, greed, any of the "sins" (knowing better but choosing to act otherwise for material or emotional gain ie. superfluous or immoral profit or one's "jollies" often regardless of future consequence, closely related to ignorance)
- Mental illness (ignorance)
None of these are in and of themself, evil, per se. You'll know evil when you see it. Or, perhaps not. That is what they call "insidious" in the business.
True evil is rare in this indebted, overpopulated world. Everyone believes themselves to be justified, that benefit will always outweigh risk, that success outweighs sacrifice, in other words "only God can judge me". But when that happens however, hypocrites and the lukewarm are revealed and tunes are changed rather quickly. At such a point however, such changes are typically futile.
A later text from Isaiah says "All we, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way."
Even if we were not cursed with original sin, we are a moral error-prone lot, and like stupid sheep, we wander off into the weeds and sin, especially if the weeds are high enough so others can't see what we are up to.
Following the non-theological approaches of Darwin and Freud, we descended from apes and have the emotional features of our nearest non-human relative, Pan troglodytes, aka, the chimpanzee. We have the emotional drives of the chimp hitched to greatly enhanced intellectual power with which we carry out our red-hot urges with a vengeance. That gets us into all sorts of trouble again and again and again and again...
We try to be good, and sometimes we are. If we are phlegmatic and lethargic (like, dull and lazy) we probably will behave acceptably well most of the time. Ambitious energetic go-getters run larger risks of behaving badly, because they inevitably find that somebody is in their fucking way.
The evolution idea is interesting because young chimps petrol the boarder and if they see another chimp tribe and outnumber them, they kill them. It's like war, like we do.
Yes, but that does not make the lazy people good. If they had the upper hand, what then?
So you have defined what evil is. You're not really asking anyone else.
I'm hearing a lot of echos of Jordan Peterson around these parts.
Yes i have gained alot of knowledge from him. I'm not taking credit for these ideas. I mean you do get your knowledge somewhere, and i surely didn't think them up
It's a definition, sure. But more like a journalist's (narrow) definition than a philosophical one. Are you saying evil can't happen if the protagonist is not enjoying it?
I think that great harm can be done in telling people that they are evil. I think that your quote on the shadow may be taken from Jung, you do not say.I am not sure that it is simply that evil needs to be defined, but more considered on a critical level. Part of the problem may be that some people may have sought to define evil, and in doing so have projected it onto others. It can be too easy to see the evil in Sadaam Hussein and the politicians etc.
When I say that harm can be done through telling people that they are evil, I am thinking of the way people have been labelled as sinners, and how many, especially Catholics and others brought up in certain religious backgrounds, have grown up with guilt complexes.The consideration of what is evil is extremely complex. However, if you are speaking about Jung's idea of the shadow, I think that this needs to be seen more about potential for destruction, towards self or others.
No. It’s still evil but not at the same level.
I don’t think people will say that the holocaust wasn’t evil. And most people participated in it. And we are most likely as most people. Sometimes you can’t reduce things.
Your answer seems to be in response to mine, and I will say that I would certainly say that the holocaust was evil. Here, I am thinking that we are using the word evil, in its sense of the devastation caused, rather than in just the conventional moral sense, although they are interconnected.
If you are framing your thinking, in the context of Jung's view of the shadow, which is a very complex topic, he is suggesting that we need to work on ourselves in such a way that aspects of ourselves, which are conventionally viewed as evil, are integrated so that they are less toxic. An obvious example would be that we need to cope with feelings of anger in ways which are not harmful.
Yes agree with that. But i think we should also see how we too could be nazi guards (not necessarily racist)
Evil, in my opinion, requires an intention to hurt. The degree to which one produces suffering unintentionally, I call that ignorance.
I don't agree that most people are tilted towards evil, though maybe there is something to be said for most people doing harm as a result of their ignorance.
On the same theme, there may also be something to be said for people doing bad things when they are damaged.
I'm not sure evil is a useful concept, but insofar as evil might be defined relative to the above, I think it requires malicious aforethought - that is, not merely knowingly doing wrong, but choosing to do wrong for the purpose of causing harm to others.
I agree with...
...above!
I also read and agree to a large extent, but would point to the fact that there is religion, politics, philosophy, law and economics, to morally regulate human behaviours. Sure, we may:
Quoting Bitter Crank
..but would rather do so in a world where human behaviour is morally regulated. Hence the speculation that, people support law and order, not because they themselves need telling what to do, but as a control upon the behaviours of their fellow man.
I agree with Tzeentch that most people aren't "tilted" towards evil, but the right situations or circumstances can allow us to see sides of ourselves that we wouldn't normally see. People don't fully know themselves.
For instance, sure, there's you right now behind your computer screen, but there's also a version of you that's tired, hungry, and under a ton of stress.... and if you take those conditions over weeks or months it can reveal a side of you that you never knew you had. Institutions shape people.
I've always subscribed to the notion that there is an equal amount of good and bad in everything...including people.
Good makes bad, bad makes good. How can it be any other way?
I think experience, awareness and circumstance are pretty much all that distinguishes us from people in Nazi Germany who did terrible things. I think we need to recognise our own capacity to head down that road alongside our capacity to ensure something like that never happens again.
But I don’t believe that labelling what they did ‘evil’ helps us in this. It only encourages us to disassociate ourselves from it. That is evil; I’m not evil; therefore I could never do that. Problem solved. This prevents us from recognising ourselves in people like Hitler, who would have genuinely felt that he was solving his country’s problems.
As for tilting towards evil, I do think our kind of ‘default’ - whenever we anticipate a lack of energy, time, resources, etc - is towards ignorance, isolation and exclusion. I think what we often refer to as ‘evil’ in human behaviour stems from this default.
But one could say with more confidence that our current market society is, at best, quite pathological what with endless consumption, pointless competition and survival of the fittest.
It's a hard problem.
You seem to be starting from the position that a person has a "true self", a "core" and that this "core" is permanent, unchangeable, and knowable.
While such a position is convenient when it comes to judging and condemning people, it's also impossible to prove it.
Well, animals seem to get along just fine. Some "less evolved" cultures where materialism is not as pronounced as in "more evolved" ones seem to be doing OK too.
So, I'm not sure we "tilt towards evil" naturally. Maybe it tends to happen in certain environments and circumstances more than in others.
But in general, we want good for ourselves and in most cases we feel good when we do good for others. Evil seems to be an aberration that society needs to suppress in order to protect itself.
I agree with you, and two quotes come to mind:
"68. “I did that,” says my memory. “I could not have done that,” says my pride, and remains inexorable. Eventually—the memory yields." (Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil)
"The prayer: ‘lead me not into temptation’ means ‘do not let me see who I am’." (Arthur Schopenhauer - The World as Will and Representation: Volume 1)
I also think that even the kindest and most even-tempered person has the potential for mean-spiritedness and cruelty, and to take pleasure in it.
But evil could become weaker and weaker with each generation.
In the old days behavioral aberrations were judged in terms of ethics. Nowadays political correctness tends to provide the standard of reference in determining what does or does not constitute aberration. As society and culture become more and more politicized, clear distinctions between what is ethically right or wrong, or good and evil, become blurred.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/10719/non-violent-communication
Female masturbation is a wondrous, joyful, beautiful thing, and so are you.
. There is no good and there is no evil ...
. There are human beings ... Whose nature is in TAO ...
. Those who are aware of it are wise beings ...
. Those who are not ... are the ignorants ... they may be knowledgeable ... they may have theories about Life ... but they don't have Life ...
. The wise Lives ... The ignorant pretends to Live ...
How fragile we are!
You suppress what society has brainwashed you into thinking is bad so you can avoid shame.
Solution is to change your mind about it and accept it as good.
Example of this would be feminist brainwashing men into thinking their masculinity is toxic.
Once you accept it as good inside yourself then the external insults will have no effect.
Do it and make god proud. Show the world what the universe created!
The universe doesn't make mistakes. and nothing exists except the universe.
Forget being good. Work on becoming whole.
So you can see why many previous comments have questioned the validity of ‘good’ usage on the internet, where our identity is temporarily veiled by a mask of anonymity and the entities and interests we represent are implicit rather than explicit. For me it wouldn’t be surprising if you were to meet some of them in person that they would not surprise you with the exactitude of what they consider the right and proper way.
Yes: what is meant by “good” and “evil”?
Before that’s answered, we’re talking passed each other.
When a being is developed with conditioning that make him good he is good, when conditioned to do evil, he is evil. Once you reach a certain age in development, maturity, you are by the states ruling, free to act on these potentials. As reason befits them, so they act.
Some people's goodness is stronger than their evil side, and visa versa.
There is also genetics to consider, but I am a philosopher not a geneticist. I can only claim that some people are more prone to act certain ways, behave, more or less towards moral degrees, because of their genetics. .
Having a Moral Sense is very important. Since most religions teach of doing good and being good, religious culture offers good people
To act for good in and of itself is another step up the chain of moral notation..
I don’t believe one can choose unless they taste both goodness and evil. I myself am acutely aware of my worst and most toxic behaviour. It makes me unsettled and ashamed to consider it. Sad in fact. Even disgusted. However without fully embracing and recognising this never ending potential to be “the worst” could I ever steer clear of it.
If something is hidden from you by yourself, if you are dishonest with yourself, if you pretend that you could never possibly be so terrible, that is the exact moment when you are at most risk of behaving in such a way. No one is infallible. Those who believe they cannot be at fault have no capacity to correct themselves for the better.
This is why self- reflection and contemplation plays such a huge role in all religions as well as meditation, learning and self awareness.
Consider a psychopath, their inability to empathise with another means they simply cannot ever admit fault. Guilt is not a feature of their emotional environment. Therefore it’s open season on all behaviours which can meet a personal goal - manipulation, back-stabbing, exploitation etc.
We live in a society that rewards psychopathy, morally bankrupt people. The gooder you are in this society, the worse off you'll be. That's the game. In general it's a cruel reality we're in, full of suffering, each of us contributes to one way or the other. So yes, most of the "good" people are actually bad when you take into account many many things.
A society? Try a world. It was much worse before, at least now people have to at least pretend to follow accountability, morality, social contract(s), etc. Democratically elected leaders. A macabre game of hot potato, where all the chefs know each other.
Quoting RAW
The more naive you are in this society, the worse off you'll be. Which fools far too often equate with innocence. Which as the songs go, can never last.. Naturally very few learn to walk the line and balance between opposing concepts, to gaze into the abyss without having it gaze into you, mostly because everybody's life is different and one man's reluctance to trust or distrust can and often is the difference between wealth, poverty, happiness, despair, and yes even life and death. That may be the game, but not everyone wants to play it. This is why people create groups of mutual benefit. Clubs, nations, religions, cults, what have you.
Quoting RAW
I've seen worse.
Quoting RAW
Sure, and the light in my room distracts me from true peace and contemplation by ever so annoyingly illuminating the contents of said room. Therefore, the light is actually the dark when absolutely no one takes into account anything.
:-) You've been outside the torture chamber, witnessed even worse?