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Topic subjectIt's hard to define evil w/o universal morality
Topic URLhttp://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=22&topic_id=4540&mesg_id=4600
4600, It's hard to define evil w/o universal morality
Posted by McDeezNuts, Thu Jun-26-03 08:20 AM
The only universal morality I can see would be real basic shit, like
- don't murder
- don't rape
- don't steal
- don't hurt people (hard to define "hurt" - but mostly I mean physically - this is really a subset of the first 2)

That's about it.

>Instead of seeing things in terms of "good" and "evil", try
>to see them in terms of things that work out for us, and
>things that don't.

"work out for us"?

>Murder for example, doesn't benefit anybody. It makes
>people's lives miserable, and nobody ever got happy from
>killing anyone (although they probably often thought they
>would).

People do benefit from it. If someone kills their rich parents, and doesn't get caught, now they're rich. For some morally lacking people, this would make them happy. But it's an evil act regardless of whether the person benefits from it or not.

>When somebody commits an act society
>considers evil, it is because at that particular time, they
>thought that it would be a decision that would improve their
>life.

This isn't always true. Those fucks at Columbine and shit like that - they weren't trying to improve their lives when they made those decisions. They were just mad at the world and wanted to hurt people. It didn't make them happy, and they knew it wouldn't make them happy even while they were doing it. So you can't convince me that they thought it would improve their life. They knew their lives would be fucked afterwards, but they didn't care.

Even if somebody loses self-conrol in a fit of rage
>this applies. Because nobody ever does anything that they
>consider as wrong, at least not at the moment they do it.

You've said this before, and I disagree. I've done plenty of things I consider wrong. I knew they were wrong when I did it. I did it anyway. In my case, this only refers to shoplifting or cheating on a test or something relatively mundane, but I knew it was wrong even at the moment I was doing it. People make decisions they know are wrong all the time, for various reasons.

>Evil is not the opposite of good, but desperate
>manifestations of a lack of love.

Interesting idea. I don't think I can agree though.

Which is what we all
>ultimately want - love.

Love or happiness? For most people, love is a requirement for happiness, but not for everyone. Some people truly want to be alone.

Good is the most effective way of
>finding it, evil is self-destructive. But if you have a lack
>of love in your life, whether due to how you were raised or
>because you closed yourself so you didn't receive what was
>sent to you, how could you possibly know that good is the
>way to find happiness?

I think there are people who had plenty of love and were wll-adjusted, but still did "evil" things. Sometimes people just snap.