Is Evil Real?

[andy06shake]

Then evil wins.

"Evil only wins when good men fail to act."  John Stuart Mill
 
Sometimes, though, we do need to become a thing, in order to defeat that thing.

And in the process, something is lost.

like innocence and empathy, for instance.
 
"What we do in life echoes in eternity." Marcus Aurelius

[Quantum12]

I wonder if real evil exists.


When I look into certain people's eyes then I see more than just sickness, I see darkness.

Are these people also sick, but just in a way that is very scary to me?


Or are they just evil?


The rational part of my human mind wants to call them a part of nature that I must protect myself from. So they aren't evil or good they are just a part of nature that is different than me and my nature.



What do you think?

Is evil real?

My ex girlfriend had almost black eyes. I could not see the pupil. She was evil for sure. She was evil. com and still is.

[LightAngel]

This tells me that you are thinking about the type of 'evil' that is tainted human nature which indeed can be overcome by strength of character, honest engagement, and willpower. Rather than actual demonic evil for which only God's grace is sufficient protection. It's an understandable confusion if you don't have such direct personal experience and certainly most do not and I wouldn't wish it upon those whose paths are not destined to such as it is quite frankly annihilatory.

I would really like to hear more about this, but if nobody wants to share their experiences about this then how can we learn if it is real or not?

I will not make fun of people who had these kind of experiences. 

I am just very curious to learn more.

Besides I have also had strange experiences, but they have only been positive. There is so much we can't explain.

[FlyersFan]

 if nobody wants to share their experiences about this then how can we learn if it is real or not?

It's real.   
Repeating the experiences to an audience isn't healthy for the person who experienced it.
I gave you a link to a well known authentic authorized Catholic exorcists blog that tells you it's real.
Read his blog.   Many entries.   Read his books.   Many first hand accounts.

[Maxmars]

With much respect to the posters here, and the conversation thus far, 

Evil is a perception... and a evaluation of action.

It is both substance and form... a 'state' and a 'result'.

A thing by virtue of it's sensed persistence,
It is either a person, or an object, and a thing "done"... 
because it is somehow perceived as a localized event, and the cause is not 
separate from it, because the "ends" is forced by the "act."

And frustratingly, or not....
If evil exists... so does "good."
And we can't really define that either...

Perception.

People chuckle at slapstick,and cruel comedy... for the sake of fun;
We love to laugh at shame and schadenfreude, stupidity, and foolishness,
don't we?

Someone stumbles and is unhurt, and even he laughs...
but some laugh not with him, but at him...

Is laughing "at" someone potentially evil?

Isn't "evil" all about what quality of yourself you are entertaining?

Or is it a separate agency, with both intent, and responsibility?

Sorry to drop in and not really "add" to your dialogue.... but this
Topic (Thank you LightAngel) has a place in my "and the flight continues"
brain-game... thus I am always revisiting the weirdness that is
moral judgement, and how it interfaces with what I see in my daily life.

I think a case can be made that evil doesn't lend itself to definition...
and I think that who is doing the 'evaluating' changes the answers...

more or less every time.

[Moon68]

Ì have come across demons in human form many many time in my life , dark soulless eyes with nothing good inside who only want to inflict pain and suffering on those weaker around them FF .

But sometimes you have to become evil to defeat evil ,  Dirty job but someone has to do it  ,

Hail Satan and all that 

I strongly disagree.

You don't have to become evil or evil wins.

You sometimes just have to become a bigger monster to beat back the darkness.

[argentus]

Yes, I believe that incarnate evil exists.    I also think it is becoming more profuse, like a communicable disease.  Even in the small town in which I live, it is growing.   I think it is possible that it can be influenced by sociological variables, in the way that in the absence of good, evil is free to prosper.

ETA:  I just read what I wrote.   I don't want to be misunderstood.   I don't consider LGBTQ+ to be evil;  they are people like all of us.    What I'm talking about is people who have appeared to shed their goodness and embraced vileness and corruption.

[Wild Bill]

Then evil wins.

Depends 9n where you are standing FF .

 In jail all the evil rapists , pedophiles and murderers are kept locked away from the general population for THEIR safety , There would be a bloodbath if they put that evil lot out with the lads .

If people wisened up and realised that they live in a open prison anyway the rules of the game would change quickly .

Problem is people are too scared to confront things because of their image or what the neighbours think or in the younger generation someone might unfriendly them on Fake book .

Evil should be frightened back into its dark space but sadly the people we pay to keep it in check ( Police ,Judges ,Lawyers etc etc)  now let them off with a slap on the wrists at worst ,and 99.9 percent of the population is made up of yellow bellies these days  

 
Then evil wins.

[Wild Bill]

I don't think you have to become "evil" to defeat evil, maybe you just have to become smarter.

Some people just want to be left alone Light Angel https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/1227976...-the-hands.

Beware the quiet people In  life

[Maxmars]

Alexandr Solzhenitsyn should be required reading...

He had a way of seeing the underneath of things...