People Are Naturally Evil.. I Think So At Least…
I was conversing with a friend of mine earlier this week, and he asked me, "Do you think people are naturally evil?" Before even thinking, I told him "Yes." Now before you think I'm saying everyone is a product of Satan or something, or think I'm the largest pessimist there is, hear my logic first..
I start in that proverbial "sandbox" that we all allude to when talking about "blank" or "unbiased" children. Well, in that sandbox, you'll find raw human instinct and emotion, not driven by morals or values or anything else that must be taught.
If I take any 2 children in that sandbox and only have 1 toy between them, you'll see several different things. You'll see anger, possessiveness, might even see violence. By any morals and values that we've been taught, whether religious based or not, aren't those characteristics considered "evil" or not acceptable? If you were an adult in a work environment, and someone came up to you and took your keyboard off your desk, and you slapped the fire out of them, wouldn't you be thought of as "Hey, don't mess with him, that's the evil guy..." We're expected to "know better" right? Well the only reason we know better is because we're TAUGHT to know better, taught to coexist or ignore our natural "human" instincts. I placed quotes around human because there's no such thing in my mind as "human" instincts; that's an oxymoron. Instincts themselves are animalistic in nature. Instincts by definition are:
Instinct -An inborn pattern of behavior that is characteristic of a species and is often a response to specific environmental stimuli
So, by that definition, if we have to be TAUGHT to become good, then instinctually, or naturally, we're evil right? Can't be both.
The things that make us socially acceptible, able to coexist, and separate us as humans, are those morals and values. Or could it be simply fear of the reprecussions if we don't "play nice." If we aren't defined by our morals and values then we're just the same as animals. That's how we treat those social outcasts in our society, we throw them in cages just like animals in the zoo. We like to that we've effectively changed our chemical makeup or something or that we're "above" primative behavior. I personally think those same human emotions from the sandbox are still there, we're just taught to repress them and not act on our instincts. However, if you put any human in an environment where survival becomes the number one priority, impersonating or attuning ourselves to our animal instincts might be the only thing that can save our lives.
So, now that I've had a chance to think about the answer, "YES, I STILL think people are naturally "evil/animal", I just think we "play nice" so we're not socially repugnant."
What do you think?
