What’s Wrong with the World

The men signed of the cross of Christ go gaily in the dark.

About

What’s Wrong with the World is dedicated to the defense of what remains of Christendom, the civilization made by the men of the Cross of Christ. Athwart two hostile Powers we stand: the Jihad and Liberalism...read more

Telling children about evil

(Hurray! After three days or so, Charter finally fixed the connection, so now I can be on-line for more than five minutes at a time!)

At View from the Right, Lawrence Auster raises the interesting subject of how to talk to your children about evil. He does it by highlighting a column by a liberal mother (The New York Times's Judith Warner) who prevaricates with her eight-year-old daughter about the trampling at the Wal-Mart store on Black Friday: "I'm not sure that they knew that they'd done it." Yeah, right.

And yet Warner is rightly concerned about her child's seeing gruesome things that don't belong in her mind--blood-spattered pictures of the Mumbai terrorist attack, for example, or (of all things) a Scholastic novel narrated by a member of the Hitler Youth.

I believe in sheltering children. I just don't think she's approaching it the right way.

The distinction that I think Warner is missing is the distinction between telling children that people are evil and showing children vivid and graphic portrayals of evil acts or their aftermath. Children should be sheltered from the latter. For that matter, I tend to be of the opinion that most of us at any age don't need a lot of vivid and graphic portrayals of evil acts floating around in our heads. But children should not be sheltered from the knowledge that there are evil people out there. They should be told that there are, unequivocally. Indeed, they should be warned to avoid them.

Children often ask why bad guys do what they do. I have discovered that "Because they are evil" is a perfectly legitimate answer. Sometimes it is the only answer and, moreover, the answer that must be given. Like most of us, children like to think that people behave rationally. In a sense, it would make them feel better if evil could be explained. But to explain evil can be to explain it away. The liberal mind is much occupied with explaining evil away--as a result of environment, society, or economics. Notice, too, how the passive verb is becoming the grammatical construction of choice in news stories describing evil acts: "Such-and-such many people were killed today..." Just like that. They "were killed." Not "Muslim terrorists killed such-and-such many people today." Judith Warner describes the Wal-Mart employee as "crushed under the weight of it all." A better statement would be, "A mob killed him by trampling him." For evil is a fact.

So by all means shelter your children from bloody and graphic violence. Don't give your little girl the novel about the Hitler Youth. And when she's a "young adult" (aka, a teenager), don't let her read gory trash. Sheltering is good. And sometimes that will mean that you will say, as I have said more than once and will doubtless say again, "I'm not going to tell you that. You don't need to know that."

But when you do answer, tell the truth. Man is evil, and he does evil because he is evil. And sometimes there is nothing more fundamental to be said.

Comments (43)

Isn't "Because they are evil" a bit too vague? Though I'm not a father, it seems that for children (and the rest of us) naming the probable vices and anti-virtues behind our world's crimes and sins would be more educative.

Murderousness, wrath, envy, greed, sloth, intemperance, pride, these are all useful but underused terms for wicked things.

Elizabeth Anscombe also counseled that we name the vices in an evil act rather than say things like "against the moral law."

I don't disagree with this. But I consider that when it applies it is a more specific version of what I am saying. I think when someone says something like, "But why did Hitler murder all the Jews?" or "But why did the terrorists kill those people in India?" they are looking for some antecedant _cause_. My main point is that it is important to deny any lurking assumption that people do evil acts because they have some perhaps mitigating or semi-justificatory reason for them, or because they are caused to do so by forces outside of themselves. "Because they are evil" is meant to stand in contrast to "Because they were very unhappy," "Because they were not raised right," "Because they didn't really understand what they were doing," "Because someone else had hurt them," "Because they feel they have been treated unfairly," or whatever.

I suppose I would also say that sometimes such specificity _can_ be misleading. For example, contrary to the presently prevalent view, I'm not _at all_ sure "greed" is the best description of the form of evil exhibited by the mob that trampled the Wal-Mart worker. I think there may be another form of evil working there, a kind of anarchistic desire to get their own way, a hatred for restraints on their behavior, a desire to be wild and to show that they won't be stopped, and so forth. They took off the doors. Basically, they stormed the building. "Greed" almost doesn't seem to capture what we are dealing with there.

"Murderousness" is good but is, when a particular murderous act is in question, not much more specific than "evil." It basically means "violently evil, directing one's violence deliberately against the innocent," and so forth.

Good post, Lydia. I agree with you on most of it. All of it, really.

I would only offer a demurral on this: For that matter, I tend to be of the opinion that most of us at any age don't need a lot of vivid and graphic portrayals of evil acts floating around in our heads.

Sometimes, I would argue, we do need a graphic description of wickedness. The WSJ ran a great truly piece of journalism on Bombay; and in most cases I would say all adults should read it. In the starkest terms, the reader is shown the evil of these men, and I firmly believe that with the threat of the Jihad in front of us we must be aware of what we face. This is a duty of the citizen, to know what it is that the the Islamic institution of Jihad is preparing for all of us infidels.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122809281744967855.html?mod=article-outset-box

Well, I guess one could say that "most," "a lot," "vivid," and "graphic," are good weasel phrases for me. How much is a lot, how graphic, etc. But I'm going to restrain myself from going to the link. I have a pretty hearty concern about burning details of torture scenes, for example, to the CD of my mind. I'm quite glad that the Indian doctors who hinted that the Israeli hostages had been tortured refrained from going into detail, nor am I going to try to imagine the details. But I don't think this prevents me from understanding just how evil these guys were nor, perhaps more importantly, what they deserved.

"Because they are evil"

How about: "because they like doing harm to others." ?

the reader is shown the evil of these men

If journalists aren't able to direct our attention away from what evil these men like, they are doing a great disservice by propagating the evil in another form.

This is a duty of the citizen, to know what it is that the the Islamic institution of Jihad is preparing for all of us infidels.

We are also obliged to make vital distinctions, lest we blunder into a shooting war with another civilization. Just before they went on their cocaine & steroid fueled rampage, leading Islamic clerics in that nation issued a fatwa against such barbarians. The Moslems of India have forbidden the burial of the murderer's bodies in their soil. We should take heart from this knowledge and devise our strategies accordingly.

We could begin by reducing our footprint in their lands and redirect critical resources towards the protection of our own. Instead, we seem hell-bent on conforming to bin Laden's narrative as hypocritical, oil-addicted colonizers content to prop-up ruthless puppets, and eager to eradicate the various shades of Islamic life through coerced cultural transformation. At the same time, we leave our borders, ports, social and material infrastructure completely exposed.

The overwhelming number of Moslems have no interest in pursuing a military conquest of the West. Why should they? They must grind-out a daily existence sustained by a set of beliefs. One being that the future belongs to the fertile. Our own colossal spiritual dissipation and resulting stupidities have turned an archaic and stagnant Islam into a mortal threat. Willful forgetting of the past and loss of hope in the future have led to a catastrophic demographic decline.

The fact that the Wall Street Journal and like organs, chronicle the cruelty and carnage left by fanatics, rather than explore the roots of our home-made crisis is itself a sign a deep decay.

You know, if you really want to change the subject, it shouldn't take four paragraphs.

He wants to change the subject, because he's inclined to make exactly the sorts of excuses I, in my previous comment, was arguing we mustn't make. I look back at my earlier comment and see that I did, as I thought, change my list of excuse-making "becauses" so that it didn't include, "Because we are occupying their lands." Sorry. I hereby include it.

Knock it off, Kevin. In this thread, anyway. I'm sorry you don't get the Islamic threat and feel you have to talk about the "overwhelming number of Muslims," about whose ideology and actual sympathies I suspect you really haven't much of a clue. But I won't debate you about it here.

Kevin, can you clarify for me why you think it's evidence of "deep decay" for a major newspaper to chronicle in a clam, objective way exactly what happened in Bombay?

Also, it's not at all clear to me just what in the hell that massacre had to do with American foreign policy. Perhaps you agree with that numbskull Deepak Chopra, who took immediately to the airwaves to explain how American actions inflamed the "moderates" to horrifying violence. (There I go again linking to a WSJ article.)

You know, America fought a mistaken war in Iraq, so these poor inflamed moderates just couldn't help themselves, and went out and found an obscure Jewish hostel so they could torture some Jews to death.

For myself, I maintain that talk of us "blundering into a shooting war with another civilization" is a curious way to describe the way a certain civilization has made war against the West for over a thousand years.

I changed the subject? The Bombay massacre wasn't raised by me, but since it was I thought it important to note two things. The wide revulsion expressed by the Moslems of India and the fact that the killers needed drugs to fortify their resolve. A discussion of evil that fails to note the light within the darkness is usually best left to a secularized mind-set.

There is no moral equivalence in my argument, instead I am questioning the wisdom of our policies. Since the first Gulf War, we've had troops and bases in Saudi Arabia. Wise move? We've also supported unpopular and oppressive regimes with money and troop training. Why?
An indiscriminate Us vs.Them yahooism that blindly accepts all of our moves, like nation-building in alien lands, while refusing to question the motives and reasons for our involvement over there, is exactly what the Bin Ladens of the Middle East want.

We won't debate it here; but this is really rich; whose ideology and actual sympathies I suspect you really haven't much of a clue. I have yet to read any nuance in your argumentation Lydia. Outside of your disdain for suicidal multiculturalism, you refuse to engage in the critical act of occasionally seeing the enemy as he sees himself. When you take that step, you'll note; we are NOT at war with 1 billion people, there are opportunities for exploiting the many differences that exist within Islam and we can self-correct our own self-destructive course. Fail to do so, and you will unwittingly hasten the day when we are embroiled in a monstrously evil war from which we will never recover.

can you clarify for me why you think it's evidence of "deep decay" for a major newspaper to chronicle in a calm, objective way exactly what happened in Bombay?

Paul,
It is easy to report on depravity. It is all our media can do. Analyze the spiritual roots, historical context, economic motives and geopolitical reasoning that helped produce a given situation though is beyond them. It results from a decay that first infects the soul and then clouds the mind.

Also, it's not at all clear to me just what in the hell that massacre had to do with American foreign policy.

I don't think Bombay had a direct link to us, but you seem to, or can you elaborate on; what it is that the the Islamic institution of Jihad is preparing for all of us infidels.

And, yes, Deepak Chopra is my go to guy; a self-hating hustler from the shallow, personal empowerment industry. I'm gonna skip Mass, plug in one of his tapes and feel...better.

I hope you and Lydia, understand that your options are not limited to choosing between the Liberal Death Wish of slow surrender, or a reactive, ineffective and outdated military response to all of Islam. Instead, I hope you realize the latter is actually a product of the former.

They took drugs. That's light in the darkness? Yeah, just some nice boys who can torture Jews to death only if they take drugs. They really aren't so bad. Let's analyze the root causes and economic motives behind their acts. I'm sure that'll help.

Evil. Because they are evil. Say it five times.

And go, Paul!

They took drugs. That's light in the darkness?

Is this a joke? The light is the response the Islamic community had to the atrocity. Why you choose to ignore it is disturbing. The fact that drugs were needed suggests there maybe limits a political religion has in attracting men willing to kill and be killed for its goals. If the promise of 70 virgins and the whole "Koran justifies murdering innocent civilians in cold blood" recruitment pitch is waning, that is good news.


They really aren't so bad.

I don't need sneering implications that I sympathize with killers. 9-11 didn't occur on my TV set, so if it is all the same to you, I'm interested in thwarting the next blow and not setting the stage for WWIV.

Let's analyze the root causes and economic motives behind their acts

Try to respond to my point and not your caricature. An ahistorical viewpoint that is void of self-examination is one too immersed in a war-frenzy to be helpful to anyone but our enemies.

You should ask yourself who will bear the burden of a shooting war with Islam and what will be left of civilization once the unspeakable carnage is over. Islam is a threat because we are weak and dependent, not because it is unified and strong. Your reckless discourse supports that contention.


Hi Lydia, what do you make of the visual impact of showing the results[actions] of evil thinking in images such as the condition that the Jews were literally walking skeletons if they survived at all in WW2. Or, more recently the anti abortion tactic of showing the truth of the product of conception? For me personally, I did see a movie as a 7th grader [what's that, 12-13 year old] of the holocaust footage where bulldozers were pushing bodies into mass graves, lines of humans severely emaciated enduring to live if possible. I believe it has made a profitable/good impact on my life to know in real terms what it looks like when man is acting out evil. It was the same positive effect when I saw the program from Stand to Reason's abortion video which warned and showed the reality of the death in ways that graphic language didn't. It was a similar effect with me, when I saw what the Center for Bioethical Reform was doing, making available visual images for the work of overturning Roe by exposing the truth of abortion.

I call it good and profitable in the sense that it made me aware of the evil I could be capable of if my thinking is allowed to run to the depths of depravity. Some souls will be happy to go there, for me, these experiences will no doubt prevent me from becoming that as I consider as a man I *could* be even more evil. That fear is my guardrail, and guardrails are good even if they scratch the paint and dent the fender if hit.

I know that you meant to consider this as it regards children, but when you spoke of adults, I felt compelled to post.

Brad,

I think you're raising a very interesting question, and it's one that I have an interest in. I suppose I would say, "Watch horrors only in moderation and when you're sure there's a point to your doing so. Don't be quick to do so, and don't be too quick to think that you have a duty to do so." I'm considering making a separate post on this question regarding adults.

Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price--we think the price is worth it.

I believe it has made a profitable/good impact on my life to know in real terms what it looks like when man is acting out evil.

Unfortunately, a society saturated in violent imagery and the utilitarian ethos is likely to produce, as the quote above suggests, many leaders adept at dehumanizing others. They will remain mostly immune to the effects of graphically portrayed evil, or worse, feed on it a frenzy of mindless revenge.

So Kevin, are you equating all graphic imagery as univocal as a set? Also, do you think that if the statistics you quote are accurate, wouldn't visual support go far to convince Albright to a different conclusion? She is a mother after all. I myself didn't believe those statistics at all, and if fact wasn't even sure that Hussein himself hadn't orchestrated the whole thing as propaganda. I think Albright was skeptical of the number anyway. Also, the Iraqi people had the bull by the horns in that whole drama--they could've let go. I guess what I'm saying is that I dont see the relation to the quote and how you are using it to make a point since I dont think the Secretary of State fit the definition you give.

wouldn't visual support go far to convince Albright to a different conclusion? She is a mother after all. I myself didn't believe those statistics at all, and if fact wasn't even sure that Hussein himself hadn't orchestrated the whole thing as propaganda. I think Albright was skeptical of the number anyway

Brad,
At least Albright's response makes you uncomfortable enough so that you feel obligated to retroactively edit it on her behalf. Frankly, anyone so morally confused as to deem such a policy as "worth it", is able to rationalize away pictures as "propaganda" - like claims of W.M.D.'s - or shift the blame for the cruelty elsewhere. I find post-Christian "statesmen" a poor source for moral guidance and prefer the teachings of my Church. The problem of course, is when you apply moral absolutes to your own nation you get accused of relativism and moral equivalence.

There are no shortage of films, shows or pictures showing the effects of war on innocent civilians, yet many can, 50 years later give you an unapoletic defense of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki and a host of other past travesties, while banging the drums for new ones.

Besides your own personal anecdote from 7th Grade, you haven't shown how vivid pictures of human degradation serve to deter barbarism and drive public policy into a more humane direction.

The public has become so desensitized by overexposure to the violence-porn of cinema and the nightly news that they've forgotten that it is the sacred image and likeness of God that is being desecrated.

Another problem with relying on the visceral responses invoked by violent images, is it can lead one to make bad decisions. Would pictures from North Korea's slave camps cause you to launch an invasion of that country?

Also, the Iraqi people had the bull by the horns in that whole drama--they could've let go.

What does that mean, that they deserved the starvation regime? I always thought our quarrel was with the government of Hussein, not the Iraqi people.

Kevin, there is so much going on with your response it's hard to get a sense of direction. Every one of the examples you give are different. There are moral dilemmas that put people in a place where they dont really want to be, to do things they dont want to do, but must do for the sake of good. I dont believe your sense of what "good" is agrees with what my sense of "good" is. Evidence of this is calling Hiroshima and Nagasaki travesties. I'd agree that they are terrible violent acts, but I'm not convinced that they are "travesties", but quite possibly were "good" acts.

I dont want to drive this conversation toward and apologetic for justifying violence against lawless people or regimes, so I wont proceed with that.

As far as showing how images change puplic policy, the slave trade, Arminian genocide, Holocaust, and even the modern debate about abortion are all examples where exposing the ugliness of what was happening got good people into action to change the situation. If you deny this as true, I wouldn't be the one to convince you otherwise.

Evidence of this is calling Hiroshima and Nagasaki travesties. I'd agree that they are terrible violent acts, but I'm not convinced that they are "travesties", but quite possibly were "good" acts.

The outright killing of millions of innocent people were "good" acts?

Now, I've seen everything!

You just unwittingly provided justification for the killing of millions of American innocents in the insidious jihad of radical Muslims and you didn't even know it!

When you start calling "evil", "good" is when you have completely surrendered to evil itself!

I dont want to drive this conversation toward and apologetic for justifying violence against lawless people or regimes, so I wont proceed with that.

Brad, this thread is entitled "Telling children about evil" and it is discouraging, if as adults we can't agree that the carpet-bombing of civilian centers (surely you've seen the pictures), or the use of atomic-bombs against other peoples under the diabolical rubric of "Total War", qualifies as a grave evil. I don't know what the pro-life argument for killing non-combatants could possibly be based on, but it must involve some form of tortured logic that few children could countenance - Thank God! It takes years of modern education and a descent into adulthood before one can possibly rationalize the incineration of other people as a just punishment for their government's inhuman decisions.

Maybe a thread should open under the title; "What our Children Tell us about Evil". We are after all, told to follow a Child.

You just unwittingly provided justification for the killing of millions of American innocents in the insidious jihad of radical Muslims

Exactly, Ari, ceding moral ground to Bronze Age fanatics is the unintended and bitter fruit of the marriage between utilitarianism and American exceptionalism. Let's recover our moral sanity before we stagger any further into the enemy's lair.

The public has become so desensitized by overexposure to the violence-porn of cinema and the nightly news that they've forgotten that it is the sacred image and likeness of God that is being desecrated.

I generally agree with what Kevin states here --

It is the ubiquitous display of such violent images in both television and cinema that causes many individuals these days (especially today's youth) to watch broadcasts as the news to the extent of engendering the response (even if subconsciously), "So what?"

The fact is the rabid manner in which we flood the senses with such violence, the greater the desensitization that occurs whereby the general audience reaches the point of callousness.

It's to the point where even if one were to make a point about just how bad abortion is by showing pictures to that effect; most likely, because of frequent exposure to such materials, the shocking morality of the message becomes lost because it no longer becomes efficacious due to the desensitization that had occurred.

Similarly, I bet if one were to provide the interlocutor Brad visual depictions about the thousands of carcasses and half-dead innocent Japanese civilians that resulted from the atomic bomb attacks; he would, as demonstrated by his previous response, still remain adament in the opinion that it was still a "good" act regardless of it having been an evil committed against numerous innocents. Yet, perhaps there lies another reasoning behind this one as well.


For when I see pictures of the innocent as those below, I find myself often proclaiming, "Blessed be God! How 'Good' Acts as these ever so Magnify the Lord, God of Mercy!"

Hiroshima Hospital

It takes years of modern education and a descent into adulthood before one can possibly rationalize the incineration of other people as a just punishment for their government's inhuman decisions.
This is true, and it is why I am reluctant to go along with Lydia's "because they're evil" as a good explanation for children. It sounds more like a dismissal than a good lesson. A better lesson can be taken, not from the relatively small number so depraved as to love destruction for its own sake, but from the rest of us who are so easily convinced that evil is good and can thus rationalize horrendous crimes into mere unfortunate egg-breaking in the name of a greater good. Apologia for firebombings seem like a good place to start, or the ideology-addled terrorists who shot up Bombay.

To tell you the truth, Cyrus, I _don't_ consider that I belong in a category called "the rest of us" with the murderers in Bombay. They enjoyed what they did. They tortured women personally. They deliberately targeted Jews. They broke into civilian's homes and rooms and shot them directly, individually. That's not "the rest of us." Ideology-addled, yes, I suppose so. Having rationalized horrendous crimes? Well, yes, in one sense, but they also _committed_ the horrendous crimes. Looking their victims in the eyes. That's a special kind of evil.

Yep, it sure is interesting to talk to children, especially older ones, about how people who are basically good can come to countenance evil things. I do that. I think dehydrating the elderly and disabled to death is perhaps the best example along those lines, because so often the people involved really _are_ basically good people and are actually directly confused by the medical profession into believing that it "has to be this way" or something awful like that. (I once had a woman, apropos of the Terri Schiavo case, earnestly reassure me that "dehydration is a normal part of the dying process"--a hospice nurse had told her that.)

But that sort of thing does not cover the Bombay murderers, and it does not cover the crowd that trampled the worker to death, and it does not cover the many, many (not really that small a number) mayhem-loving torturers, rapists, and murderers now on death row or roaming the streets of our big cities.

A better lesson can be taken, not from the relatively small number so depraved as to love destruction for its own sake, but from the rest of us who are so easily convinced that evil is good and can thus rationalize horrendous crimes into mere unfortunate egg-breaking in the name of a greater good.

Amen. On the surface, which is where we are most secure, our motives are pure, our reasoning sound and practical. Thanks to the comfort of distance and abstraction, we are relieved of the burden of responsibility. Not actors, but mere spectators to the moral drama played out within our own souls. Yes, we want victory at any cost, but need not issue the direct order, nor fly the Enola Gray. Should blood appear on our hands we can cling to a torrent of calming words; "how was I to know!", "war is hell" and "everyone agreed - we had no choice". Modern man has sanitized evil so well, he no longer needs God. Ideology, drugs, therapy, sex, amusements - all will suffice. The one thing we dread is silence. And running into stark reminders like this one;

“The line between good and evil is drawn not between nations or parties, but through every human heart.” Dostoevsky

What I said was:

"I'd agree that they are terrible violent acts, but I'm not convinced that they are "travesties", but quite possibly were "good" acts."

With all that's been said above, I'm still not convinced, and I did not if fact call them good acts, but it's possible that those demonstrations of the devastation of neclear weaponry might in fact have saved more lives since those days.[not just immediately after WW2] Nagasaki ought never to have happened, that is on Hirihito and the Imperial family. The agressor in that conflict was Japan, the nation was proud of it's might, a ground war was to come as the Allies were planning to invade Japan to end their imperialistic, [may it be said, evil?] dream. One wouldn't have to stretch the imagination to see that [as war in those days were] huge numbers of civilians were to be at risk as a ground war was coming.

It's a hard thing, having to be put in a position of doing harm for the sake of good.[God does it and has done it, and will yet do it, so dont criticize me for saying it].

So, are the links provided meant to sear my conscience and make me blood thirsty, or to convince me of how terrible it was to involve civilians in war?

They enjoyed what they did. They tortured women personally. They deliberately targeted Jews. They broke into civilian's homes and rooms and shot them directly, individually. That's not "the rest of us." Ideology-addled, yes, I suppose so. Having rationalized horrendous crimes? Well, yes, in one sense, but they also _committed_ the horrendous crimes.
You've never been a boy or a young man, let alone an angry one. This behavior you find so shocking is characteristic of the type through history, and it takes a great deal of civilization to keep it in check.

And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Brad,
Search the archives. There are several long threads here discussing the atomic bombings.

On the sixtieth anniversary of the bombing of Dresden, the mayor of Dresden gave a speech in which he made the following statement:

We started the fire that came back and consumed us.

The Germans know who was to blame for the destruction of their cities. It's a pity some Americans don't.

So, are the links provided meant to sear my conscience and make me blood thirsty, or to convince me of how terrible it was to involve civilians in war?

Brad you were the one touting the moral lessons drawn from looking at graphic depictions of evil. You tell us.

We started the fire that came back and consumed us. The Germans know who was to blame for the destruction of their cities. It's a pity some Americans don't.

Those who refuse to acknowledge the distinction between women and children and armed combatants, are known as a lot of things, most commonly as terrorists. The fire comes back to consume all who use it.

With all that's been said above, I'm still not convinced, and I did not if fact call them good acts, but it's possible that those demonstrations of the devastation of neclear weaponry might in fact have saved more lives since those days.[not just immediately after WW2] Nagasaki ought never to have happened, that is on Hirihito and the Imperial family. The agressor in that conflict was Japan, the nation was proud of it's might, a ground war was to come as the Allies were planning to invade Japan to end their imperialistic, [may it be said, evil?] dream. One wouldn't have to stretch the imagination to see that [as war in those days were] huge numbers of civilians were to be at risk as a ground war was coming.

Yes, Brad, we should always do evil so that good might come out of it!

Better that 250,000 innocent civilian lives be snuffed out!

You are just about as evil as those bloody terrorists who claim that snuffing out the lives of thousands of American civilians in order to win their war against us is for the good!


It's a hard thing, having to be put in a position of doing harm for the sake of good.[God does it and has done it, and will yet do it, so dont criticize me for saying it].

Oh, so now you are claiming you are God and are, therefore, absolutely correct in having declared the destruction of innocent lives as you deem fit?

So, are the links provided meant to sear my conscience and make me blood thirsty, or to convince me of how terrible it was to involve civilians in war?

What conscience?

You just justified that it's alright to have thousands of innocent people killed!

Perhaps if it were your families and relatives that were killed in this manner, you would finally come to realize the horror of not only how they died but why did they have to in the first place?

After all, was it the 250,000 innocents who were culpable in the Pearl Harbor attack?

You're like the stupid terrorists who claim that American innocents are equally culpable for America's invasion of their countries and, therefore, deserve death!

I'm not sure I take your point, Cyrus, but if you are saying that all boys and young men are potential torturers of women and terrorist murderers a la the Bombay bombers, I beg to differ. Strongly. Unless one waters down the word "potential" so that it is meaningless. Plenty of boys and young men get angry and don't murder and torture people, nor even consider it. Perhaps they are civilized. But I'm certainly not going to let these evil (yes, evil) men off the hook on the grounds that somehow, poor fellows, they just missed out on getting civilized enough to avoid torturing and murdering individual innocents.

I have to say that the comments of Kevin and Cyrus in this thread have just confirmed all the more strongly my determination that it is often very important that we say, "They did it because they are evil." All of this "we are all alike under the skin" stuff and all of the excuse-making and subject-changing from Kevin just show me that I was right. We don't like saying that some people are plain evil.

Brad, I really appreciate your comments about the use of images and consider it an important topic, though I'm probably less inclined than you to consider it important for people whose heads are already on straight to see horrifying images. But I still have some hopes to break free of other things and put up a free-standing post on that topic.

Meanwhile, guys, I'd sort of appreciate our not redebating the bombing of Hiroshima per se in this thread.

Ari, please. Brad is in error, but not evil. Yikes.

Kevin,

Explain to me how Japan's imperialistic dream is considered evil and, yet, the murdering of 250,000 innocent people isn't.

The very arguments he puts forth are as twisted and insidious as those of the terrorists who justify their acts of killing countless innocents as being all but for the good.

Funny how he has justified the murdering of so many innocent lives as being necessary in order to end Japan's evil imperialism -- isn't that the very same argument espoused by those vile terrorists who say the same about us & their jihad that necessarily must also do the same and claim as many innocent civilians in order to achieve 'good' and thwart America's own evil imperialism?

Thus, I not only find this sort of argument erroneous but call it for what it is: EVIL.

Aristocles, you are pretty prolific at twisting things to make a point, but it doesn't seem to me to be very profitable. I cant even answer you because you characterize what I say to the point that I barely even recognize it, much less defend it.

I'm not sure I take your point, Cyrus, but if you are saying that all boys and young men are potential torturers of women and terrorist murderers a la the Bombay bombers, I beg to differ.
All? No. Just enough of them to fill the armies and mobs of the world from time immemorial. Just look at the behavior of any army prior to the 18th century, and quite a few since.
Plenty of boys and young men get angry and don't murder and torture people, nor even consider it. Perhaps they are civilized. But I'm certainly not going to let these evil (yes, evil) men off the hook on the grounds that somehow, poor fellows, they just missed out on getting civilized enough to avoid torturing and murdering individual innocents.
Who's saying that anyone gets let off the hook? They've made their choices, and now must pay the price. The thought of sympathy for them didn't cross my mind until you brought it up, though if God wishes that all should be saved, we might at least regret that they have given their souls to Satan. Digressions aside, I don't think they are somehow essentially different from "us," inhabiting some ontological category of evil. The truth is that the potential for unspeakable malignancy is there in all of us, and in drawing a bright line between them and us, we run a great risk of failing to interrogate our own actions and decisions and thereby losing our way. So yes, they are evil, but it is not enough to say that - some explanation is required, and a bit of "there but for the grace of God go I."

Ari, we're in agreement on the doctrine of total war and its warped justification for targeting civilian centers. I don't accept this kind of rhetoric though;"You are just about as evil..." You are better than that, sounds like your Greek temper got the better of you. I can relate.

We don't like saying that some people are plain evil.

Actually Lydia it is you who is remarkably reticent on this issue. Calling the perpetrators of the Bombay Massacre evil is easy and no one here has risen to their defense, or you would have provided the quote by now. However if the subject of this thread is the moral instruction of young people then we also better be able to embrace the moral wisdom of several millennia and pass on the practice of self-examination. There are other ways to hell, other than being a direct participant in a throat-slashing murder spree done in the name of ideology, religion or personal revenge. The fact that this seems controversial to you is mind-boggling.

Just enough of them to fill the armies and mobs of the world from time immemorial. Just look at the behavior of any army prior to the 18th century, and quite a few since.

See, this is the kind of statement that bothers me. A lot, actually. The Bombay murderers are on a par with the people filling any army from time immemorial? I mean, if I had a son or husband in the military, I'd be hitting the roof. Probably I should be hitting the roof anyway, but I'm human, and my emotions vary with my personal involvement. But this is the sort of thing that seems to me a deliberate kind of blinding of the self. I've seen quite a bit of it on this site recently, actually--comparing unlike things and calling them like. No, the members of armies are not just universally and generally classifiable with terrorists. Have soldiers committed rape, murder, and torture when they sack cities? Have some countries indeed deliberately encouraged or even demanded such behavior on the part of their soldiers? Sure, I'm not denying either of those things. But you speak of "enough to fill the armies," etc., which implies something more sweeping, and seriously wrong.

Actually, I _much_ prefer the "separate ontological category" approach. I think it is healthier than the "these guys are like the majority of the men who have filled most of the armies from time immemorial" approach. Actually, I think we need to recover a healthy respect for martial activities and for ideals of bravery, and chivalry that they used to embody. This "most soldiers are baby murderers and most baby murderers are like the armies of the world" stuff has gotta go. It's part of what's sapping the West; it messes up our minds. And it doesn't do the military much good, either.

Kevin, I'm talking about one important aspect of the education of the young. A very important one, and one that I'm afraid in our semi-existentialist, angst-ridden, self-hating culture is getting ignored or even deliberately cut out: Teaching the ability to distinguish good guys from bad guys. Yes, yes, we can take all the howling about being simplistic as read. Could you spare me actually listening to it? I'm deliberately saying that all of this "it's all so complicated" stuff is messing up our heads, big-time. You know, it _isn't_ always all so complicated. And deliberately erasing that childlike clarify of vision by talking about extenuating circumstances and root causes (which you _have_ done, say what you will), by continually changing the subject in the name of "seeing the big picture," by distracting attention from the love for evil acts found in people like the Bombay terrorists, is a form of mis-education. Conservatives, of all people, should fight it tooth and nail.

Are there _other_ important aspects of the education of the young? Yes, there are. I've already agreed that there are times when good people do evil things. At some point, perhaps when they are slightly older, kids need to be taught this difficult fact. They also need to be taught that good people sometimes countenance evil, which is slightly different but also important. Remember me? I'm the one who said it would have been _wrong_ to shoot down Flight 93. And that's all a very interesting thing in itself--Dick Cheney is basically a conscientious man. He's not a sadistic murderer like the Bombay killers. But he countenanced shooting down Flight 93. At some point kids do need to understand that human beings do that. The whole "breaking eggs to make omelettes" thing needs to be discussed. Moral absolutes need to be taught. You should have heard me blow a gasket when I discovered that one of my husband's former graduate students (a Christian, too, and a former home schooler) had been trying to corrupt my eldest by teaching her moral relativism using a cheap utilitarian example. ("So the chief of the village will kill one hundred men if you don't kill this one. Don't you see that it's better for just one man to die...") I'm glad to say Eldest more than held her own.

But all of that business of teaching them to resist the siren call of the hard cases is just a _different part_ of their moral education from telling them frankly and flatly, from the first questions asked, that men like the Bombay terrorists are acting evilly because they are evil, have chosen evil, and wished to do evil, and that there is no extenuation whatsoever. And I'm sorry, but all of this "they're really like most of the members of most of the armies in all of history," "They're really like the rest of us," stuff _is_ implicit extenuation and an encouragement of confusion. It's no good, and it's not the way to do that part of the moral education of a child.

Kevin and aristocles, isn't it true that the images you've decried [as being pivotal in driving men to becoming more blood thirsty] are in fact crucial to your position that war against civilian centers is wrong? How else would you know such things without having seen them either in person or the visual record?

Kevin, I see that your reference Hell, do you hold that the Bible is authoritative?

"They're really like the rest of us," stuff _is_ implicit extenuation and an encouragement of confusion. It's no good, and it's not the way to do that part of the moral education of a child.
OK, fair enough. For a child, this is true enough. Nuance will only confuse an 8 year old, for instance. I still don't agree that "because they're evil" is a particularly thorough explanation (it's true, but only half the truth), but it is probably the best answer for a young child.

As to armies, I'm unsure why you're contesting my point. No, modern western armies mostly comport themselves very well, depending of course on where in time and on the map one draws the lines for modern and western. The ground forces of the United States are quite likely the most punctiliously observant of the laws of war of any major power in history. But the way Americans fight now is not typical of the way men have fought for millennia, or even the way men still fight in most of the world. Just recall the Iliad, which starts with a dispute over human plunder in the form of the girl Briseis - in the midst of a war begun over another rape - and concludes with an episode of corpse mutilation. The Old Testament is full of massacres. Examples could be multiplied almost endlessly, right down to today's terrorists, pirates, and guerrillas, who fight for honor, revenge, plunder, and a celestial harem. To the extent that engaging in warfare has been a common occupation of young men throughout the ages, and to the extent that warfare has consisted largely of activities proscribed by the Geneva and Hague Conventions, it is fair to say that this sort of behavior is not far out of reach of the typical young man. It is to our great credit, and owed in the main to the Christian just war tradition, that our armies do not fight that way, but it is not historically typical. It is rather exceptional.

Post a comment


Bold Italic Underline Quote

Note: In order to limit duplicate comments, please submit a comment only once. A comment may take a few minutes to appear beneath the article.

Although this site does not actively hold comments for moderation, some comments are automatically held by the blog system. For best results, limit the number of links (including links in your signature line to your own website) to under 3 per comment as all comments with a large number of links will be automatically held. If your comment is held for any reason, please be patient and an author or administrator will approve it. Do not resubmit the same comment as subsequent submissions of the same comment will be held as well.