Write about evil: how you understand it (or don’t), what you think it means, or a way it’s manifested, either in the world at large or in your life.

Throughout my life I’ve been refining my faith and morality. There are a lot of systems in our world that you can toss in with if you wish and I don’t begrudge anyone their subscription to those models. For myself, I’ve found the best morality to be expressed in The Golden Rule. It’s from this particular framework that I draw my understanding of evil. The rule itself is simple: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” and concludes there. No prohibitions, no strictures, no exceptions. I find this to be very similar to the Bantu concept of Ubuntu. To express your humanity in your relationships with others. I find this to be delightfully and elegantly terse. Nothing longwinded, nothing complicated to understand.

So then evil, it would be the opposite of good and good is defined by the rules of morality. In my case it would be to stray from the Golden Rule, to treat others without any concern for how they treat you. It’s really a matter of spiritual inequality, and I see it as a matter of the grossest ignorance. There are differing levels of evil, there’s the simple kind where people are selfish and ignorant about how their behavior impacts those around them, they spend their lives without any seriously close relationships because they simply cannot be trusted. They can’t form any bond beyond a power relationship and once that relationship is broken, they are shunned worse than if they were just strangers passing on the street. Then there is the more complex form of evil, the type with the full commission of the will. I think of Iago in Shakespeare’s Othello, especially when he settles as being the villain of the tale. It’s in the planning and plotting of evil acts that this form describes for me. I think one of the most poignant forms of evil, in the complex reckoning is that of betrayal. When you’ve invested in someone else, when you have done your level best according to your morality to treat them with Ubuntu, to behave according to the Golden Rule, when you imbue them with trust and hand a part of yourself to them with that trust and then they perform an evil act by ruining that trust and damaging you in the process, there are few true expressions of evil that rise above this. For me, it’s colored by the will. Being simply barbarous is a mindless evil, but when you apply a personal level of willpower and it’s between individuals then it takes on a more unique and deep sense than simply being a rampaging monster.

My understanding of evil is colored by my recent experiences with betrayal. I think that’s why I select betrayal as one of the pinnacle evils, because it cuts so deep. During that experience the sheer number of corrupted souls was breathtaking. It actually caused a crisis of faith, that people could be so wretched, so nasty, and so powerfully evil to another person. I have retained my optimism through these trials because not a day goes by when I can’t find one instance of people following the Golden Rule. So the awfulness in people isn’t pervasive, it’s localized. It’s this fact that helps me retain my faith in humanity.

Then we get to why evil is stupid. Not simply dumb, which indicates a kind of unknowing ignorance, but actively spurning the best option to pursue ends that are powered by selfishness or bigotry. There is an infinitely greater return on investment when everyone conducts themselves well, in my case, according to the Golden Rule. If you retain your moral center and act rightly, you find yourself cultivating the very best of yourself and others and applying that laser focused will towards whatever goal it is that you and in the workplace, your group, is striving after. The world rewards right action, it rewards honesty and goodness and selflessness and it punishes the evil, the selfish, the dishonest and the betrayers. It is not that a few small acts of evil will ruin your life, but that your behaviors of evil will eventually tint your reputation, in how others see you. It ruins relationships and severs connections and makes you less persuasive and powerful because of all of that. Generally those who have been wronged seek revenge but once they have proceeded through the stages of grief for what was done to them, they settle on a nebulous notion that a nameless and faceless force of the Universe will step in at some point to mete out justice. I quite enjoy the name the Hindu faith places on this force, Karma. For those that are wronged, the destination is simply having faith that Karma will eventually mete out the punishment that is right and appropriate. If nothing else, the understanding of this force, named Karma, offers consolation to the wronged. It also provides the wronged a balm which is far better than revenge, which just leads the victim to be exactly like their transgressors, turning the will of the victim against The Golden Rule, for example. That is why revenge is impossible. To satisfy this deep urge to mete out personal justice you break your own moral code and therefore you are no better than those who wronged you.

Those that are evil reap what they sow. They are eventually recognized as their corrupt souls shine through and they wear that mein as their relationships falter and flag. Evil serves nobody. It leaves both the victim and the perpetrator bereft, lesser than they were before and it does nothing to forward any purpose or goals that anyone has. In a certain Darwinian sense, evil does not serve evolutions design, it does not make you strong, it makes you weak, it lessens you. There is no path that evil illuminates which leads to success or strength. It only leads to a downward spiral of corruption and solitude. Instead of being a wholesome part of a greater whole, you are a malformed clattery piece that simply does not fit and eventually you will jog yourself off your pinion and fall on the floor to be swept up in the dustbin of time.

I have faith that those that wronged me, the betrayers that I have had the misfortune to know professionally will eventually reap what they have sown. It won’t be by my hand, but it will be by fate, or Karma, or whatever you call that force. Misfortune will surround them as they reduce themselves. In many ways, that’s what evil really is, it’s the path of reducing yourself, which goes against the natural order of expanding yourself. You are unwanted, unloved, shunned because you eventually wear your evil, the chains you forge in life you wear afterwards.