Evil as a Precondition to Evil

Evil is what evil people do. Evil comes from Evil People they produce it. Or, if you prefer, they are the conduit whereby evil comes into the world. So a system or a machine or an animal can't really be evil. It is only the use of that system or machine or animal by an evil person that creates the evil.

Jay Bryant writes a thoughtful article today at Townhall in which he proposes a discontinuity between the methods of repression of societal control and the use of those tools to create an evil society.

Some other factor is needed beyond the incrementalism of the anarchy-repression continuum. Otherwise you do not get to the Gulag, the gas chambers or the mass graves of Iraq. And that factor is what liberals miss because, well, because they don't believe in it.

That factor is evil - specifically, evil intent on the part of national leaders. A leader who seeks a better life for the people may define that goal in a way that moves up or down the continuum. But that's not what Hitler, Stalin or Saddam was trying to do.

They were not overly harsh on people suspected of crimes, or treason. They invented those charges against utterly innocent people in order to terrorize, bolster their power, serve some ideological objective or feed their blood lust. They were, in a word, evil.

To put it another way, there's no need to worry about John Ashcroft having the kind of power he has (or the even greater power that Patriot Act II will give him) because he's not evil. And therefore we will never go all the way to a Stalinist or Nazi-Like state.

He then lectures us on our inability to perceive evil, a favorite subject of right wing columnists. Just in case you don't know there is Evil in the world. The sort of Evil that motivates Al-Qaeda or a Stalin or a Hitler.

In fact the problem I have with Mr. Bryant isn't that I don't think evil exists, but that I think he short changes what we might call the banal evil.

For example is it evil to gossip about a neighbor out of spite trying to tear him or her down? Although it scarcely compares with sending thousands to their death, it is certainly evil.

Is it evil to, if you are a reporter, out of laziness and ambition to turn in phoney baloney stories? Yes.

These sorts of banal evils are all around us. And a repressive society creates the opportunity to give these evils greater reign. How many witches were burned at Salem because of simple spite? How many Jews went to their death because of Nazi Officer's petty ambition?

Life is all about the desire to act and the power to act. If your desires are evil (even in a banal sense), but you lack the necessary wherewithal to achieve your desires than your desires do very little real harm (except to yourself in a spiritual sense). If you have the power to do evil but your desires are to do good than, again, little danger to your neighbors. If you are a mean or a spiteful or a lazy or an arrogant person, and you are put in a position of power, odds are you will use your power in lousy ways.

This is not to suggest that we need to drop the Patriot Act (although parts of it could certainly go) or abandon law enforcement. It is simply to suggest to that Mr. Bryant is naive when he suggest; ". . . we face, moreover, no danger of becoming evil incrementally. The continuum we are on doesn't go there."