Evil People

nyarlothothep

Are the worlds ruling elites really evil? Most people are born with human characteristics. Do you think G. Bush et al really are inhumane monsters without consideration for the people "they are elected to serve"??? Are all of the top Wallstreet financiers really a bunch of sociopaths, or do they have human feelings of empathy and so forth. Or is there an evolutionary flaw in the structure of human societies, is it the case that most people are responsible, empathetic individuals and that the 1% lacking in human traits invariably rise to the top by virtue of their ruthlessness to rule over them like kings?

d0gb0y

I think its not a question of them been born evil as that they are taught to be evil. Examples of this are all over history in all time periods. They would also learn to practice greed and this would further influence their contempt for most of mankind.

conceited

They're all "EVIL" muhahaha,:D

d0gb0y

Here is an interesting article that I read not so long ago that goes into the topic a bit.
http://www.agoracosmopolitan.com/home/Frontpage/2008/01/02/02073.html

Kernel

Sociopaths actually have been seen to do quite well in the world. Apparently a conscience is a hindrance to getting ahead nowadays. Anyway, I believe that the notion of evil is oversimplistic. The old human vices of greed, jealousy, fear etc. are always present, but many will use reason and believe that their agenda is correct.

An example of my point would be Hitler sterilising untermenschen. He didn't want to do this just to be a bad ****er, he did it because he believed that he was purifying the gene pool, and preventing many future generations from suffering such genetic afflictions. Of course, it was an oversimplistic notion of eugenics which was popular science at the time.

Kama

Agree with kernel, kinda like the joke that criminology studies failed criminals, successful sociopaths won't get caught.

If you assume a certain amount of sociopaths float upwards through society, you have quite a Occams Razor explanation for 'evil' people being in charge and doing pretty insanely bad things. The argument of The Corporation was that we have a system which encourages and rewards this type of behaviour.

The (assumed) low numbers of sociopaths in the population would fit well evolutionarily; in close groups, not too many pure cheaters can exist. BUt with distancing and mediation in a technological society, peer limitations are softened as a barrier.

The only conspiracy that matters is the conspiracy of the psychopaths against the rest of us.

That pretty much sums up my view on CT

nyarlothothep

I think its that humans can behave in an evil way without being evil...the systematization of evil actions functions to distance their implications from the individual. They are naturalized by their banality. Like the concentration camps, it would be a stretch to say all germans involved in this were evil, rather a system and mindset were established which justified inhumanity. The same could be said for a bunch of villagers stoning someone to death because they have been judged to be this or that. The action becomes justified by appealing to some natural law.

I've seen The Corporation and it does a good job of illustrating of how this systematization operates in capitalism. Its fairly inhumane though you often here it described as the "real world" like its some natural order. Its not, it is completely engineered by people, there is nothing absolute or natural about it, it is an ideological system, a religion in effect. Baudrillard (I think) goes into detail about how the capitalist hegemony seeks to co-opt all ideas into its language of the world, basically in order to naturalize itself.

I don't know whether someone like Cheney for example is genuinely a sociopath. For example he has supported gay rights in congress because his daughter is a lesbian.

Kama

That was what I liked about the Corporation; the argument being that sociopathic tendencies are encouraged and rewarded. The CT of sociopaths can be seen as a cruder simplification of this trend.

Drumpot

Are people born evil? Can people be made evil ?

The answer to both is yes of course.

I dont like to give Bush Jr enough credit to suggest that he fully understands exactly what cancer he has spead throughout the world & in his own country.

Can people not just become immune to the Ills that their actions cause? Do you still watch every advertisement on starving third world countries with the same feeling you might of when you first saw them?

Im not in anyways excusing these actions, more trying to put them into perspective. Its easy to blame the big bad wolf (the banks, the government . . . ) but it always allows us the luxury of not considering the fact that it is in fact society that is Evil and we choose to ignore all evils until it starts effecting ourselves.

Kinda like if your child was knocked over on the road and you knew deep down inside it was possibly your fault for not teaching them the rules of the road, but instead found it easier to blame the driver (irrespective of circumstances).

At the end of the day, I would love to see Bush Jr hang for his crimes against humanity. Hell, I think bigwig bankers should be imprisoned for their incompetence, but at the end of the day the Americans voted bush into power and we have all known Banks are all too powerful for their own good, yet if history has thought us one thing, its that the same mistakes will invariably happen over and over again, just in differant forms or circumstances.

If enough people kick up a fuss anythings possible (ala Hitler).

I had a discussion with my dad a while back talking about how western civilisation is built on the pretence that the rich screw the middle class, the middle class struggle to remain middleclass and the poor always remain at the bottom.

Sh*t roles downhill, its the same in business, in government, in society and in life . . .

nyarlothothep

I dunno man, we have more rights now than we did in medieval times. Americans enjoy more civil rights than they did in the 1950s due to the efforts of political based organizations. Granted its a back and forth struggle between the elites and the people but the tide of history has shown a gradual decrease in overt absolutist power. Technological development and rising prosperity probably have something to do with it and with that its been *capitalized* on.

But obviously the elites want to secure the status quo so we have 8 hour work days (humans are only productive for 4), to tire us out and render us passive, the religion of consumption and increased specialization of workers (like ants in a colony). A divide and conquer strategy, which is expressed in the dog eat dog, looking out for no.uno indoctrinational babble thats covertly peddled by the media.

The internet is one such place that elites can't stand because it gives people the freedom to express views which would never get a hearing in the mainstream media. Granted the technology is used for fascist views and so on but thats freedom of speech. And there is a concerted effort to corporatize it. They will be met with formidable opposition though.

Accepting things as they are is when you let them win. Unity is strength, its a long arduous struggle but not one worth giving up. Bringing elites to task on a constant basis, getting the message out there and consolidating networks of communication is the way to defeat them long term. Without sounding too self righteous even not succeeding is ok as its a struggle which is noble in its own doing.

Drumpot

nyarlothothep

I would agree with alot of what you say (if not it all, I like your ants depiction!).

I do agree things are better and more regulated then they used to be and people have more rights, but it could be argued that we are more controlled with small concessions .

I wouldnt call myself a revolution idealist, but I think western capitalist societys are pretty much owned or run by the rich elite and will fall eventually with the working class pushing out the rich capitalist piggies that currently sit pretty on the throne. They are as corrupt in some way as the nasty dictators, but simply have good PR and have friendly PR policies (eg smoking is bad, we are going to protect the young from those nasty companies, drinking is bad we are going to limit its availability).

I must confess that Im a complete cynic when it comes to anybody in power that has something to lose by doing the right thing but more to gain by doing nothing!

I dont necessarily think that all leaders are evil, but that some are encouraged or nurtured into the wrong side of whats ethically right. I have no time for Bush but prefer to think of him as a completely dumb yokel puppet thats an easily hateable figure for his complete and utter ignorance to what is going on around him (as opposed to an evil calculated dictator).

Just brings me back to the point that its simple to blame one person or a specific institution for the problems of the world.

The alternative is to accept that the world itself as a society is overwhelmingly corrupt, greedy & all simply about the greens . . . Is our world reactive in corruption or proactive in preventing the few take advantage of the many?

I know which point I would rather believe and which one is more palatable, but alas I fear the latter to be more relevant and nearer to the place we live in . .

nyarlothothep

I often vacillate towards that view myself but even if it is pointless its still better than just going with the flow imo.

rexusdiablos

I don't believe their intent is to be evil for the sake of being evil alone. That would denote a camp and outdated villainy.

Kama

I prefer my villainy to be ironic and up-to-date, like a Hipster Hitler...

rexusdiablos

Kama wrote: »

I prefer my villainy to be ironic and up-to-date, like a Hipster Hitler...

Lol, the most evil and vile character I'd concede to would be the Borg Queen or Sarah Palin.

Kama

Damn hoped I'd find a Palin-Borg pic...plenty of Cindy McCain tho...



As an aside, this is how I read Icke initially; reptiles as metaphor for the more sociopathic side of humanity; less mammalian empathy, cold territorial drives etc.

nyarlothothep

I read somewhere that the limbic region is responsible for the more stupid behaviour of humans. Its relative in size to that found in apes. Researchers found similar frequencies in violent clashes between human tribes and comparatively with apes. So maybe evil should be reformulated as grossly primitive behaviour. Einstein stated that we need to completely change our way of thinking in order to survive. I tend to agree with regards to shortsighted actions and petty hatreds. Hawkings has stated we must establish space colonies for survival. We really need to evolve to a higher plateau and imo the time is approaching soon relative to the history of evolution because we are reaching the point where selfish behaviour and violence is going seriously threaten our survival. Transhumanism is a really interesting concept. We could engineer higher intelligence, indefinite life spans and cool cyber ware thought routines like accessing the net from your mind.

Kama

Deeply amused that The Crawling Chaos Itself is discussing evil as having such mundane biological origins...

One view is that 'evil' is a grossly outdated concept, a theological hangover from postulating a Good God; another is the more psychoanalytic view, that 'the eye which sees evil is itself evil'. A disinfo book had a lovely essay once, apropos of the War on Terra, called 'How to Rid the World of Good' on these lines...