“You’re semi-evil. You’re quasi-evil. You’re the margarine of evil. You’re the Diet Coke of evil. Just one calorie, not evil enough.” – Austin Powers
I heard that Kim Jong Un was evil because he had no Seoul.
Evil.
Several of my posts have been about Evil recently. I use the capital E because, in my conception of the world, Evil is a force. I know your mileage may vary, but I think that today’s post can benefit you regardless of your belief system. Stick with me on this one. I brought cookies and juice boxes for halftime.
Normally, I had thought of Evil (when I thought of it) as just plain Evil. The idea that there were different kinds of Evil wasn’t something that I dwelled on. Bad is bad, so why categorize it? It’s like determining if Biden’s morning Depends™ is worse than his night time Depends© – he calls them both Executive Odors and then talks about Corn Pop.
Well, it turns out that for me, when I read about these categories it made Evil easier for me to see. It also made the progression of Evil easier for me to understand. And if I could better see Evil and understand Evil, I could anticipate Evil. Most importantly, I could try to avoid personally being Evil.
And that’s why I thought this was worthy of a Friday post, where I normally write about health. What could be healthier (for your mind, if not your soul) than not being Evil?
The first form of Evil is one that most often came to mind when I thought of Evil, and that is Luciferian Evil. Describing this type of Evil is easy: “If it feels good, do it.”
What feels like the United States but isn’t? Washington, D.C.
If that sounds familiar, the entire decade of the 1960s and most of the 1970s was dedicated to exactly that phrase. Regardless of social conviction, regardless of taboo, regardless of the impact upon society, the idea was to live for yourself. How else would you explain disco music?
In theory, that’s a great idea. (Not disco, but living for yourself.) In practice, however, living only for yourself has an amazing cost. I’ll admit that I know this because, at one phase of my life, I thought that this was just fine.
Oh, not in the way of stealing things, or breaking things, but in the realm of personal relationships. Let’s just say I had a large number of girlfriends, some of whom may have had self-esteem issues. We’ll leave it at that.
Doing what feels good at the expense of the context of a traditional relationship has consequences. In the end, it feels empty. Lust is never as good as love, though it was easier to find at 11:30 on a Friday night.
I don’t have a problem with low self-esteem, considering how awesome I am.
Living life just for pleasure ended up making me feel lonely and empty and nihilistic – the very partnership that a stable traditional marriage brings was what was avoided. But, you know, it felt good. That makes it okay. Right?
Well, no. That’s what makes it Evil. When I gave that up? Life became better.
The second type of Evil is more Evil than the first one. Dr. Bruce Charlton (LINK) referenced it as Ahrimanic Evil*. (Dark Brightness (LINK) had the excellent original post I read and the link to Charlton’s site.)
Ahrimanic Evil requires Luciferian Evil to open the door. “If it feels good, do it” seems to lead to “everyone should follow the value system of the material world and globalist systems. It’s for their own good.” That coercion is Ahrimanic Evil.
Just as Luciferian Evil removes the spirituality out of sex, Ahrimanic Evil removes the virtue out of sacrifice for society. If you’re against the soul-destroying, controlling, Chinese Social Credit system, what you’re really opposing is Ahrimanic Evil.
I hear that the unit of mass George Soros uses is the pentagram.
The soulless Yuppie of the 1980s became the architect of the Ahrimanic control structures of political correctness and cancel culture. Ahrimanic Evil wants you to live in pods and eat bugs and take the vaccine. Fun? Not on this Evil. It’s about the relentless and constant pursuit of material success.
It seems like, since 1990 or so, we’ve been living in a world based on materialism, denying the spiritual or natural component of human existence. The libertine (not libertarian) excesses of the 1960s and 1970s gave way in the 1990s to full-on materialism. If it’s good for the economy, it’s perfect. Free trade, open borders? Who cares about what the consequences are to society as long as the economic systems function?
I’ll admit, in the 1990s I was seduced by this model. I worried more about economic systems than I did about the social structure of the United States. Was I for NAFTA then? Yeah. What could go wrong?
A lot. It looks like Ross Perot was right. But during that time I was following the same model – I pursued my career as a top priority. Yup, I’ve tried to put that Evil behind me, too.
Want it, buy it, forget it.
The last stage that Charlton mentions is Sorathic Evil. It is the most evil of the three Evils.
Sorathic Evil requires the progress from Luciferian to Ahrimanic Evil in society. In practice, you’d think that having a global police surveillance state was the worst thing you could think of. You’ve seen all the films, right, and listened to Pink Floyd’s The Wall, which was (sort of) an attack on the Ahrimanic Evil they saw coming.
But what is this final Evil?
Destruction. Hate. Spite.
You’d think that Evil would be happy with the image, in Orwell’s words with this: “imagine a boot stamping a human face forever.” Total control, through the end of time.
Nope. That’s not enough. Sorathic Evil requires destruction. And, I’ll admit that I felt that way once or twice. It, like the lustfulness or materialism, is soul-destroying. After I released feeling that way, I felt immediately better, like a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders.
The end state of Sorathic Evil is despair. It is envy. It is the desire for the destruction of others for no other reason than you want them to be destroyed. But as we have seen recently, the destruction of others is not enough: Trump transgressed the Ahrimanic system, so Trump (and all who supported him) must be (in their minds) destroyed.
If it were just about justice, that would be simple enough – the absence of Trump was the win for the Left. After Obama ceased to be President, I ceased to care about him. Leftists, the current embodiment of Luciferian, Ahrimanic, and Sorathic Evil, want Trump and his supporters to suffer. If we all changed to their viewpoint today, it would not be enough.
I interviewed to be a mime once – but I didn’t get the job. Must have been something I said.
Imagine Cambodia times the Cultural Revolution times the Holodomor. Squared. That is the future the Left wants for us, and I’ll be writing about that for Monday’s post. And that is the Evil we face.
What they fail to realize is that is the future that they will also get for themselves if they are successful. There won’t be any Gender Studies Majors on the Central Committee. The Left would line up the Leftist professors to be shot far faster than the Right ever would.
The only way to feed the Beast is to make people suffer.
I’m not going to say I’m a great person. I regularly meet with and interact with people who are far better people than I will ever be. I will say, I try. But by having lived through and let go of these three types of Evil, I immediately felt better.
The other thing I’ve learned is that Good is stronger than Evil. Good fills the void, while Evil only brings additional hunger.
We’re not done.
This isn’t over.
*(As far as the terms Charlton references, you don’t need to follow the rabbit trail as to where he got the names for the Evils and points I’m making in this post. It gets a bit esoteric, and you can spend hours, days or weeks wandering down there, but Charlton points the way if you are interested. Beware, it’s filled with esoteric weirdness.)
Even as someone who rejects organized religion as a whole, it is clear that there is evil in the world. Ironically enough a lot of evil comes in the guise of organized religion but that is a whole different topic. It is pretty easy to find obvious examples of evil: Pol Pot, Stalin, Jared Kushner. What is harder is to see the evil lurking with yourself. What would you do if there were no consequences to your actions? Ponder that quietly to yourself, it might give you the shakes. Yep, we can mock crazy celebrities but if you had the fame and fortune of a LeBron James, would you be a stable and normal person?
I know George Soros is evil and Kamala Harris is a wicked person but many of those same flaws reside in each of us.
I have often thought the reason (well, not “the” reason, but “a” reason) that I wasn’t wealthy at a young age is exactly that: what bounds would I know? Might be why so many stars are jerks. And weird.
How disorganised does “religion” have to be before it’s acceptable?
I know, I know. Snarky. I decided to let it stand, however, because I realized it’s actually a fair question. Assuming you actually mean “religion” and not Christianity*, at what level of size and organisation, does a social institution head for the crapper? Is it inevitable?
(Also the possibility of no consequences for your actions is a necessary impossibility, like backwards entropy or dry water. We already sort of know what “I don’t have to face the consequences of my choices, somebody else does” looks like. It’s all around us. BLM. Anti-fa. Nearly every pol ever. Peacetime officers, most of the bureaucracy, etc. Is this what you meant?)
*Non-word-dorks please opine. Is the habit of saying “religion” when what’s actually meant is Christianity (to the extent that neither the virtues nor vices imputed to same would apply to either Islam or Thor-worship) a serious flaw? Or is it just like my irritation when people say “technology” when what they mean is computers (and only computers), I.e. I am being a dewberry?
What part of “mountains of skulls, rivers of blood, and oceans of tears” confuses people?
Am I summarizing what’s in store for us all too plainly for people to understand? Is it too simple?
I have no desire to utterly crush the Enemy for the sake of destruction. I simply love my people, want to protect them from the danger they seem to refuse to see, and ensure that there is a future for my people and my culture. The only way to prevent genocide (that is literally what the American people are facing in the near future) is to fight back, better and harder.
My lengthy and lovingly crafted discourse on Good and Evil just vanished when I hit Post Comment. Sigh. Somebody must be trying to tell me something.
My main point, summarized, is that in “capitalism vs. socialism” and also “democracy vs. feudalism”, both our system of capitalism and our voters in democracy seem to embrace the values of hedonism, materialism and subjugation (my Cliff notes substitutions for Luciferian, Ahrimanic and Sorathic Evil) rather than altruism, austerity/asceticism and compassion/empathy (anonym “Good” alternatives). However, this realization does not make socialism and feudalism the preferred alternatives. Thus, we live in a state of cognitive dissonance which can only be resolved via a commitment to Truth, the amoral yardstick used to measure our relative closeness to the moral goalposts of Good or Evil. So good luck to us all while wading through our world of increasing censorship, propaganda and Lies told to us not only by other but by ourselves.
I’m too wordy anyway. And I post too many links. 🙂
Yes – and there is a categorical difference when defending oneself. If we were just left alone, the mountains, oceans, and rivers need not exist at all.
If I understand your apparently excellent summary attempt on the subject of Evil, I believe I can characterize (and probably oversimplify) Luciferian, Ahrimanic and Sorathic Evil as hedonism for self, materialism of things and subjugation of others. The general opposite (and therefore Good?) versions of these would be altruism, austerity/asceticism and empathy/compassion. Certainly such traits (and goodness in general) seem to be in short supply today…
Today our choices seem to be as stark as Good Vs. Evil. Our choice of economic system teeters between capitalism and socialism. Our choice of government teeters between democracy and feudalism, with anarchy ever hovering in the wings…
I personally support capitalism and democracy, as I am sure all here do. But in our hearts we know that both have serious flaws. Capitalism as a system is based on hedonism, materialism and subjugation a lot more than it is based on altruism, austerity and compassion. Democracy does not lead to good governance when a majority of voters embrace the former traits and not the latter ones. Do these realizations automatically make socialism and feudalism better alternatives? Hell, no.
So, cognitive dissonance. A frame of mind I find myself in most of the time.
The only thing that can cut thru the cognitive dissonance surrounding our relationship with Good Vs. Evil is Truth. Good and Evil are moral goals. Truth is amoral. Truth is the measuring stick telling you how close or far away from being Good or Evil. And real Truth is as rare as a unicorn. Truth can be very painful. Lies are so much easier to generate and to swallow, whether manufactured by others or by ourselves.
So to fight Evil, first make a commitment to Truth. With all the censorship, propaganda and lies currently in our path, just learning the Truth is the first challenge, and a necessary one.
If I understand your apparently excellent summary attempt on the subject of Evil, I believe I can characterize (and probably oversimplify) Luciferian, Ahrimanic and Sorathic Evil as hedonism for self, materialism of things and subjugation of others. The general opposite (and therefore Good?) versions of these would be altruism, austerity/asceticism and empathy/compassion. Certainly such traits (and goodness in general) seem to be in short supply today…
Today our choices seem to be as stark as Good Vs. Evil. Our choice of economic system teeters between capitalism and socialism. Our choice of government teeters between democracy and feudalism, with anarchy ever hovering in the wings…
I personally support capitalism and democracy, as I am sure all here do. But in our hearts we know that both have serious flaws. Capitalism as a system is based on hedonism, materialism and subjugation a lot more than it is based on altruism, austerity and compassion. Democracy does not lead to good governance when a majority of voters embrace the former traits and not the latter ones. Do these realizations automatically make socialism and feudalism better alternatives? Hell, no.
So, cognitive dissonance. A frame of mind I find myself in most of the time.
The only thing that can cut thru the cognitive dissonance surrounding our relationship with Good Vs. Evil is Truth. Good and Evil are moral goals. Truth is amoral. Truth is the measuring stick telling you how close or far away from being Good or Evil. And real Truth is as rare as a unicorn. Truth can be very painful. Lies are so much easier to generate and to swallow, whether manufactured by others or by ourselves.
So to fight Evil, first make a commitment to Truth. With all the censorship, propaganda and lies currently in our path, just learning the Truth is the first challenge, and a necessary one.
Sigh. Two attempts at commenting just vanished without the moderation comment. Maybe I am hitting the filter too hard with my lengthy freshman level philosophy? 🙂
Go Team Good!
I bet it’s that your comment was just toooooo good!
Ave Virtu! Moritori te salutamus!
Thanks for including the note about the names Charlton uses. I was about to jump in and try to figure it out. Now I can spend that time looking into the movie set Herr Bidenreich appeared to be signing Executive Orders in; it couldn’t have been the Oval Office. The Oval Office looks out on the Rose Garden, not a parking lot.
We live in weird times.
I did, Lord I did. Just don’t. You end up in the middle of theosophical speculation. His ideas are good to use to describe what we are seeing, but all three rage against the light.
Agreed. Oh, and I’m still locked out of commenting at your place. Just know I stop by!
Very weird times. Yeah, I was (as part of a study tangent around the year 2000) looking into a related source.
No bottom. And nothing that was useful (to me).
This? This was useful as a means of categorizing. Nothing more.
It is interesting you post on “Evil”. For many years that word never crossed my lips but in the last few recent years as I was really awakened to what’s going on around me I have verbally acknowledged that evil exists to others and it is really a strange feeling to do that. Since most of us try to do good all our lives. Keep doing what your doing and thank you.
Thank you! We’ll keep up the Good fight!
Like all reputable latter-day Sophists, I draw my life lessons and essential tenets from pop culture references or heavy metal lyrics. Fortunately, there were many sources to draw from in the decades before The World Lost Its Collective Sense Of Humor. Before, that is, all modern movies, books, music and comics became insufferably ‘woke’, as hyper-sensitive and humorless as Karen from HR.
On the subject of Evil, and its kissin’ cousin, Power, I present the neatest summary of the current state of affairs in this wretched, Covid-addled formerly great nation of ours to be found anywhere in the pop canon:
“So, Lone Star, now you see that evil will always triumph, because good is dumb.”
Let this be a lesson to all of you would-be Goody Two-Shoes out there, respecting the rights of others and taking no more for yourself than you are entitled to. Evil ain’t lookin’ for a fair fight, and if you expect one, well, re-read the quote above.
Yes. Evil wants to to run away, scared, because it knows that in a real fight it has no chance.
“Be wise as serpents and gentle as doves”
The world must be both good enough to be worth the pain of fighting for her, and wicked enough need the fight. Men must be passionate and full of fire but utterly constrained. Our morals are like nuclear reactors and our lives like a steeplechase race.
And speaking of Dick Francis, I am re-reading his books with the daughter-product.
Before, that is, all modern movies, books, music and comics became insufferably ‘woke’
The Dick Francis adventures were and are great stories. Well I told. The heroes are brave and loyal, and capable and kind.
But all the seeds of wokeness are there. Persuading us that we can still be virtuous, if we only embrace some vices. And if the Christian God says that this vice (which seems so important to you) or worse, this neutral thing which others can enjoy, you must eschew, well… He probably isn’t real. So carry on.
But now all we have left is the Wokeness, and there is no virtue, and precious little story left.We ate our seed corn. We gelded ourselves, and wondered where all the children disappeared to.
It’s rather unnerving.
Excellent post JW. Thanks!
Thank you, sir!
Comrade Marx the avowed Satanist was a true believer in materialism and universal egalitarianism.
No better combination has ever been found for nation or civilization wrecking.
If you look up his poems and dramas you’ll see that destruction is all that he was after and utopia is not on the menu.
The controllers are now pursuing their interests and they don’t care what we think about it.
Like a thug out on the street they are in a WTF are you gonna do about it mode.
Evil always consumes itself and the woke Red Guards don’t have the attention span to read up on the Jacobins or to learn about what happens when useful idiot status expires.
True dat.
And, by the way, yours is a serious contender for the title of Best Username Ever.
True – the self-consumption is, after all, the end point. And it always ends that way.
Okay. After that comment about Orobourus, you have to read Orthodoxy by Chesterton.
Or did you beat me to it?
Nope. I’ll accept the charge, however.
The Jacobins at least gave us the Marseilleises. Very catchy.
All right, so I escaped from high school in 1972, and did my early adulthood in the 70s. Not apologizing for that. But if you want to use “disco” as some kind of one-word shorthand for pop-music garbage, I have a list for your comparative consideration:
> Punk
> Death metal
> Alternative
> Grunge
> Emo
> And, saving the worst for last, hip-hop / rap
Let’s rethink this a little. Disco was far short of musical excellence. It wasn’t Beethoven, Bach, or Mozart. It wasn’t even Pink Floyd, King Crimson, or Steely Dan, not by a long way. But against the backdrop of the list above: if the late Donna Summer was a Bad Girl, all I can say is, “beep-beep, toot-toot.” She works (worked) hard for the money.
Okay, boomer out. Carry on.
But there still is the stain of, “Disco Duck.”
Mr. James, disco was lovely to roller-skate to. Really fond memories of that.
(If you read Hans Brinker multiple times as a teen, well, roller skates are as close as you’ll get in most of the U.S.)
I don’t remember where I read this. And I apologize to anyone that experiences substantial perspective shift because of what I’m about to share…
What is evil? (In addition to agreeing with all that you have said) a large part of “evil“ is simple selfishness…
depending upon how inconsiderate you may be of others, that may greatly assist with your indifference to the suffering of others. Of course, i would argue that the life expectancy of someone who might be described as “unselfish” might be proportional to that level of unselfishness of any one particular individual.
In other words, someone might be * SO * unselfish that he or she might lay down their own life so that others might live!
So be careful as you strive to transcend evilness… as you probably can’t oppose evil if you have ceased to draw breath…
Hmmmm . . . it’s like that might have happened before . . .