Israel / Palestine

[multitool]

They aren't "normal, everyday" people though are they.

 

[AuroraSaab]

It's a choice to harm people. Very few of us are brought up to not know right from wrong. Traits such as psychopathy and sociopathy are not mental illnesses as such; you don't grow out of them, they aren't treatable in and of themselves. We tend to feel that they must be mentally ill because otherwise it's hard to fathom such behaviour.

Lots of people have unbearable trauma, terrible childhoods etc. Most of them don't end up as horrible people never mind the perpetrators of unspeakable crimes.

 

[Ian H]

And then there's Netanyahu and his cronies.

 

[BoldonLad]

They aren't "normal, everyday" people though are they.

I think we would have to have some definitions, before we could decide that... but, I suspect that, tomorrow, I (or any of us) could be sitting on the Metro, next to such a person, and, not be aware of their potential.

 

[multitool]

I think we would have to have some definitions, before we could decide that... but, I suspect that, tomorrow, I (or any of us) could be sitting on the Metro, next to such a person, and, not be aware of their potential.

Literally by definition they aren't not 'normal'.

If they were, stabbing children would be normal.

 

[BoldonLad]

Literally by definition they aren't not 'normal'.

If they were, stabbing children would be normal.

I was not specifically referring to the stabbing of children. I mentioned Southport only in the context that “evil” was being discussed in that thread. But, I think a clever person like you knew that.

 

[All uphill]

I eat meat. My neighbour is a butcher.

If we lived in an society where everyone else was vegetarian I think my neighbour and I would elicit the kind of horror and cries of "I don't understand" expressed above.

My point is that it is really not too difficult to "other" sentient creatures to the point where we barbecue them.

 

[C R]

I eat meat. My neighbour is a butcher.

If we lived in an society where everyone else was vegetarian I think my neighbour and I would elicit the kind of horror and cries of "I don't understand" expressed above.

My point is that it is really not too difficult to "other" sentient creatures to the point where we barbecue them.

The reality is that evil can be much more mundane and insidious than we might like to admit.

This book should be compulsory reading

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_(novel)

It is the story of two friends growing up in Germany through the thirties. Friedrich, one of the friends is Jewish. The other friend is the narrator, and recounts how little by little Friedrich is turned into a non person by society.

 

[multitool]

I was not specifically referring to the stabbing of children. I mentioned Southport only in the context that “evil” was being discussed in that thread. But, I think a clever person like you knew that.

You were talking about "normal" people committing "some terrible acts, against large numbers of their fellow human beings".

Again, these people are not "normal". They are exceptions. If it was "normal" it would not be worthy of comment.

 

[BoldonLad]

You were talking about "normal" people committing "some terrible acts, against large numbers of their fellow human beings".

Again, these people are not "normal". They are exceptions. If it was "normal" it would not be worthy of comment.

I wonder why I put the word "normal" in quotation marks?, must have been a typo, and/or my lack of vocabulary. 🙂

 

[multitool]

Have you heard of Hannah Arendt?

 

[Rusty Nails]

I have never understood why we expect evil people to appear to be a different sort of person to the rest of us. We all have the capacity for good and bad acts to different extents, and luckily evil is not the norm, but one end of the normal distribution of human behavior.
The concept is perhaps made more complicated by the arguments over nature/nurture but that does not mean that evil is an unnatural phenomenon in humans.

 

[Ian H]

I have never understood why we expect evil people to appear to be a different sort of person to the rest of us. We all have the capacity for good and bad acts to different extents, and luckily evil is not the norm, but one end of the normal distribution of human behavior.
The concept is perhaps made more complicated by the arguments over nature/nurture but that does not mean that evil is an unnatural phenomenon in humans.

Ra, Ra, Rasputin...

 

[Rusty Nails]

Ra, Ra, Rasputin...

It was a shame how he carried on.

 

[AuroraSaab]

If they weren't able to behave normally they would stand out amongst everyone else. Few do; in fact most of those who go on to commit awful acts lead mundane lives, marry, have children. We just don't like to think that people capable of horrific acts live among us, in fact are amongst our neighbours, family, and friends. More comforting to us to say they must be mentally ill rather than accept what seemingly ordinary people are capable of.

Horrific acts are almost always not due to mental illness. It's a combination of circumstances and in those circumstances a choice to act, though obviously what society labels evil has varied over time.