My understanding of evil, age 0-10: MY NAME IS SMOG SMOKESLY AND I RUN THE POLLUTION FACTORY, IT PRODUCES POLLUTION!!! MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
My understanding of evil, in my teens: You can’t really boil things down to good and evil. People are complicated. Everyone is the hero of their own story, and someone who seems evil to you is actually doing their best from their own perspective. If you could walk a mile in their shoes, you’d understand. There is no such thing as evil.
My understanding of evil, in my twenties: Look, it’s basically just tribalism. We are all necessarily thrust into competition with one another. There are always going to be winners and losers. Whining about evil is just being upset that you lost the game.
My understanding of evil, in my thirties: MY NAME IS SMOG SMOKESLY AND I RUN THE POLLUTION FACTORY, IT PRODUCES POLLUTION!!! MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
#one of the hardest pills to swallow growing up#was understanding that the world actually isn’t that complicated#it really is just greed#power-lust#cruelty#and hate#that are ruining society#people are making the world worse out of spite#not because they get something out of it#but because they get off on seeing you lose something#evil really is uncomplicated and simple like a saturday morning cartoon#it has been all along#it only pretends to have nuance#because the illusion of complexity makes it saleable to new suckers
You were told evil was nuanced and complicated so you’d be less likely to kill the people destroying the world out of malice.