How to Approach “Evil”
When you approach something you think to be EVIL, you must always begin with a stubborn assumption that the thing you are looking at is NOT EVIL. This means you must try to find proof from various trustworthy sources that there is a reason to the action you considered to be EVIL. I assure you, almost all things in this world are not purely EVIL, as they have an explanation. For example, hearing all the talk about the EVILness of the 9/11 attacks, I decided to approach this my way. Here is what I found:
Gulf War and start of U.S. enmity
Following the Soviet Union’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia. The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 had put the Saudi Arabian ruling House of Saud at risk both from internal dissent and the perceived possibility of further Iraqi expansionism. In the face of seemingly massive Iraqi military presence, Saudi Arabia’s own forces were well armed but outnumbered. Bin Laden offered the services of his Mujahideen to King Fahd to protect Saudi Arabia from the Iraqi army.
After some deliberation the Saudi Monarch refused bin Laden’s offer and instead opted to allow United States and allied forces to deploy on his territory. Bin Laden considered this a treacherous deed. He believed that the presence of foreign troops in the “land of the two mosques” (Mecca and Medina) profaned sacred soil. After speaking publicly against the Saudi government for harboring American troops he was quickly forced into exile to Sudan and his Saudi citizenship was revoked.
Shortly afterwards, the movement which came to be known as al-Qaeda was formed.
Now, whether you think this reason is adequate is your choice, but you must also remember that these religious fanatics actually helped us in the Cold War.
In addition, I addressed this issue only because it was mentioned so much. It is true that there is still some reason to be shocked and angered by Al Quaeda for their terrorist attacks on us. However, there are other countries and people we call EVIL without any real knowledge. Nations like Iran are a different story. In my opinion, Iran is totally justified in wanting to destroy us.
And then that leaves us with North Korea. You can decide this one for yourself.
Let me mention, however, as it doesn’t say so in the wikipedia article, that the history of Korea is basically one of being screwed over by various Asian powers. So yeah, I bet they’re angry. In the end, even the U.S. and the Soviet Union “maltreated” them, and they split into two nations. So I can’t help but feel sorry for Korea.
I tell you, calling something EVIL is very easy, but you have to remember that there are almost no cases where anything is purely GOOD or EVIL. There is almost always a reason behind human actions, and it’s only when you’ve succeeded in understanding how people you once thought were EVIL actually felt at the time, that you can truly begin to understand the world as a whole. And once you experience EVIL in its essence, you can truly stop hating it and start contemplating it.
September 14th, 2006 at 4:17 pm
Yes, true (about the political histories of the various nations/non-state actors with which we’re in conflict), but this doesn’t really get at what evil IS. Or maybe there isn’t a definition to which we can attach ourselves? As has been said before, one person’s evil is another person’s justifiable cause.
What’s your take on Andrew Delbanco’s opinion that without a concept of evil, our society misses out on some of its functionality?
September 14th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
I agree. The concept of evil is one of importance, for some reasons I described. Just because there is no word for evil does not mean it doesn’t exist, or that people can’t see it. The problem is that when they see things that are evil, they feel various emotions instead of being able to express it in words, which keeps people from understanding any kind of underlying cause. If instead of calling something evil people experienced powerful feelings of hatred and fear, they could not possibly want to compromise or understand. The same will happen if evil is not defined clearly enough, because it will then just be used as a word to describe those people or things a person hates and fears. The impact of this can be described by a scenario involving little innocent children:
Polly is having fun with her jump-rope in a park. Suddenly, Joe comes along and pushes her to the ground, taking the jump-rope and walking away to play with it himself.
Now, keep in mind that children, at least for the most part, do not even have a vague definition of evil. The only time evil is used in their lives is in TV shows where good guys beat bad guys who are “evil”. Therefore, the reaction of this child would be to feel sad about losing the jump-rope, then angry at Joe. One way or another, she’d try to get the rope back. She may even want to make Joe feel bad or even hurt hurt him. This is the typical reaction from someone with no definition for evil.
However, lets say Polly had a clear defintion of evil. She would probably try to classify the action taken by Joe to be evil. In the process, the child definition of evil will come up: to do something bad just to be mean. This will probably lead to Polly thinking about WHY Joe took her jump-rope. It will be up to her to realize that while everyone else had friends to play with all the time, Joe had nobody and usually just sat on a bench while everyone else had fun. He probably wanted to play too, and therefore took something to play with from one of the happy children he learned to envy. The result of this realization is much more pleasant than the first result.
This is why evil must never be defined as something a person hates. That definition is as vague as a definition can get. Once evil has a definition, people will try to define things they don’t like as evil, which will almost always lead them to find that the thing was not truly evil after all, and also to begin to understand it. Such a logical state of mind is much better than the blind emotions many people feel right now.
I defined evil as chaos because I wanted for there to be a common definition for the word. In addition, to many people evil is a negative act that lacks reason, usually an extreme act. Therefore, chaos fits the definition people unconsciously assign to the word evil. However, the fact that most things, especially the things we most consider evil, actually have reasons behind them, helps people understand the world from the perspective of the thing they had called evil. Therefore, surprisingly, a defined evil is actually good for society, as it weakens hatred and encourages compromise.
I’m sorry if I rambled…it’s just that I wanted to get this darn point across once and for all.