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Author Topic: Real Evil
mikemunsil
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All too often evil characters are one-dimensional caricatures, not fully fleshed out. Unfortunately, we can mine the news for real examples and use the information there to create more depth in our characterizations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/22/world/europe/22web-karadzic.html?hp


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Zero
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Wow.
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InarticulateBabbler
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Are they selling Hitler T-shirts, too?
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JeanneT
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It's been known to happen, IB. Right here in the US, you might recall if you think about our own neo-nazis.

This is a fascinating description of an evil leader who obviously doesn't consider himself evil--something we've discussed before. I really do believe that it happens.


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InarticulateBabbler
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quote:

It's been known to happen, IB.

Yeah. My comment was sarcasm (however poorly conceived). I think very few "villians" think of themselves as such. The ones that do never amount to much (maybe the equivalent of henchmen, but loners).


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JeanneT
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Sorry. Your sarcasm flew right over my head. I should have heard the swooshing sound.

Edit: But then there is a whole different type of evil--the evil that allows the kind we're talking about in my opinion. An evil that many people manage to justify.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/07/21/italy.drowning/index.html

One of the online comments about this story:

quote:
As Eric above points out quite factually, the Gypsies ("Roma" -- what PC claptrap!) are in fact resonsible for a huge amount of petty crime in Europe. The children of these Gypsy groups are exploited routinely from infancy as tools for criminal enterprise by Gypsy bands, and are by and large already expert pickpockets before they're six or seven years old; by age 12 or 13 they are utterly lost causes to civilized society and have become hardened, recidivist thieves: vicious, heartless, dirty criminals. The sunbathers' passivity at the deaths of two of these filthy thieves was in fact a quite understandable and civilized response. Enough of this mawkish, hypocritical whining over the deaths of such low creatures. Humbug!

And Hitler's solution (and Mussolini's) to the "Roma problem" would suit such a poster--as it unfortunately seems to be close to the solution of the current Italian government. *shaks head*

[This message has been edited by JeanneT (edited July 22, 2008).]


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Elan
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For my part, I don't see people as "evil" as much as operating from the delusions of their imaginations, usually fueled by fears. Afraid someone will get the best of them, afraid of being poor-alone-mocked-etc, afraid someone will attack, afraid of losing a war that, perhaps, is only at that point in their imagination.

If you want to talk pure evil, let's talk carob vs real chocolate.


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JeanneT
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While I find ordering the murder of thousands or millions of people (or standing aside and appauding while someone else does it) to be evil. I guess we can agree to disagree.
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RobertB
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Individuals I've known who I'd classify as 'evil' are either those who took positive pleasure in hurting others, or those who saw others as 'things' to be used for their benefit. There was the mental health client who spent his life intimidating and exploiting vulnerable neighbours, for instance, or the Sierra Leonean warlord who didn't care how many people he killed as long as he got to be President (he nearly succeeded)and got his hands on the country's diamond wealth (which, as Vice-President and Minister of Mines, he did).

Then there's trans-personal evil - I don't really know what to call it. Racism, for instance, is unquestionably, I think, evil. It causes enormous suffering, to the Roma right now in one situation, and to a great many other peoples over time. It's not 'natural', it's been invented. The attitude that black people are somehow 'inferior', for instance, can be traced back to Jamaican plantation owners in the 1770's, who were arguing that black people were more like the great apes than white people, and justifying slavery on that basis.

Every racist individual has learnt it from others, and many, or most, aren't even aware that they're racist. Most of them are perfectly decent human beings in other ways, and their attitudes are constantly reinforced by those around them. You won't tackle that one effectively by labelling the individual as 'evil', yet the sum of it all undoubtedly is evil.


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