Previously, we identified “evil” as being an action taken in an effort to realize irrational greed. An “evil person” is one who is motivated primarily, if not entirely, by irrational greed – that is, greed that requires the harming of another’s person or property to satisfy the evil person’s desire.
“Good,” however cannot simply be the absence of evil. To engage solely in actions that aren’t motivated by irrational greed doesn’t define a human as being “good,” but merely “decent.” Not raping, robbing, assaulting, extorting or murdering people are examples of a human decency. Eschewing evil actions is the bare minimum civilization requires of its participants. A society that tolerates rape, assault, theft and murder isn’t civilized and won’t be a society for long as it will rip itself apart. “Goodness,” however requires something more – mindfulness and empathy.
A “decent” employer, for example, doesn’t mistreat their employees and pays them a reasonable wage. A “good” person who employs people treats them well and pays them as much a he or she can reasonably afford without jeopardizing the company or their own well-being. This is where mindfulness and empathy come in. It takes effort for a person to put themselves, mentally, into the position of another – particularly if they’re a subordinate of any sort – and try to empathize with their life.
An employer looking at the labor laws and the wage similar companies pay for similar work doesn’t have to pay an employee more than that average; but an empathetic one who realizes that extra dollar per hour will mean a lot to the employee is one who is going beyond mere human decency and is being a good person. Typically, “goodness” always requires more effort than “decency.” This is not to say that this formula can be pushed even farther into “super good,” by paying the employee far and away more than the value of the labor he or she performs is worth. Such an unsustainable practice would bring ruin to the entire company and end up harming a lot more people than the one person temporarily “helped” by being overpaid before being laid-off when the company went bust.
Humankind has been struggling to bring about a fair, just and “good” society for ages. It has consistently failed because we have sought to use evil actions to bring it about. Yet, undeterred, we keep electing politicians and we keep voting and playing along with the system in hopes someone is going to eventually enact just the right set of laws and regulations that will create utopia.
It’s a fool’s errand.
We can have an at least decent society if each of us looks inside and identifies our sources of irrational greed and works to disabuse ourselves of those notions while pledging to never act upon them. This would mean people realizing that the desire to dictate what a woman does with the fetus she carries is irrationally greedy. This would mean people admitting that being provided a living that is greater than the value of the labor they perform – if any – is irrationally greedy. This would mean people admitting that using the government to lock people up so as to protect their pill profits is irrationally greedy. This would mean recognizing that government agencies constantly looking for more things to control and regulate are being irrationally greedy. This would mean big multinational corporations acknowledging the irrational greed of having the military interfere in other countries on their behalf; and several other admittedly unlikely epiphanies.
We can only have a good society if we each take the above step, and then several more – if we pledge to work to be forever mindful and empathetic toward our fellow man and to give as much of ourselves as we can reasonably afford to help those around us who may be struggling. This is most certainly not a call for more taxes and a swelling of the welfare state – government “entitlement programs” are the least efficient way imaginable of “helping” anyone and they always fail as they are based entirely upon objectively evil actions – theft. No, this is a call for each and every individual person, be they a rank-and-file entry-level employee or the founder and CEO, to look inside and without and be mindful and empathetic of their fellow human’s needs.
That’s it and that’s all. There is no “magic bullet,” no “quick fix” no “turnkey solution” to the intractable problems facing humanity. We each have to instead work to treat others only as we’d like to be treated ourselves – there’s some more of than ancient wisdom we ignore.
We can have a society that is as decent or as good – or as evil – as the individual humans within it. As long as people continue to mistake their irrational greed for a human right, we will remain mired in this awful place American humans find themselves in during this 2018th year of the Common Era.
Leave a Reply