What about evil? - part 1: a scheme for evil

Shall we start with the topic of evil. My brother's question was "what is evil?" Of course the question that disturbs people more is, "why is evil?" But we'll deal with that in a later blog.

As I see it, bad behavior comes in a range from the annoying and irritating at one end to evil at the other end. In other words, evil is, essentially just really really bad behavior.

At the least-bad end of the spectrum, annoyance and irritation might include people driving too slowly or too fast (depending on your own preference) or clipping their toenails in public, or talking loudly on cell phones - well maybe just talking loudly in public with or without a cell phone. Of course that one is contingent on the particular culture - some are more comfortable with loudness than others. So shall we say exceeding the particular cultural tolerance level for loudness - and also its tolerance for excessive personal disclosure (the TMI situation).

I'd put the next level down at rudeness, thoughtlessness, selfishness. Some people consider cell phone etiquette at this level! Whatever..... cultural norms of etiquette are supposed to normalize public behavior and relationships to minimize the inevitable bumps and bruises of living with other people. This level of bad behavior is more bad than annoyances but not to the level of unethical.

This would, in my scheme of things, include benefitting yourself (or your people) at the expense of others, exploiting others, meanness, angry words and actions, fighting, hurting others physically, emotionally, or mentally. Of course all this also is dependent on other factors like the degree of meanness or hurting, the number of people affected, the frequency of the behavior, and whether it is a random occurrence or embedded in the everyday expressions of someone's personality. At certain points all of these types of bad behavior move down to the level of unethical, and then into criminal and finally into evil.

Another factor determining the level of bad behavior has to do with the participants involved. A fight between antagonists with relatively similar capabilities is a bit worse than rudeness but not yet unethical. But if it is beating up someone weaker, smaller, or less powerful, then it's unethical and tending more toward the evil end of the spectrum. Exploiting others for personal gain is bad behavior. Using unequal resources of social, political, economic, financial, and educational power to exploit those with less resources is verging on evil.

see next blog for a plunge into the wicked end of the pool