“Thoughts On Evil And Human Nature”
by W. Christopher Epler
“Carl Sagan, author and astrophysicist
from Cornell, used to wonder if atomic weaponry would be the nemesis of
most “advanced species”. A flight of fancy of sorts since whales and
elephants are certainly advanced species but don’t feel the need for
technology (and should we patronize them for this since they aren’t
rapidly destroying the planet?). Is it possible that much of science and
technology are actually synonyms of self destructive stupidity? A kind
of short sighted greed, perhaps.
In any event, what has now TOTALLY blocked the evolution of the human
species is pure evil. The fringe of astronomically rich sociopaths is
the absolute outer limit of evil. Similarly, so do all mentally ill
religious fanatics poison the march of human civilization. And, probably
most of all, the Earth’s Paris Hiltons and astronomically rich
parasites (and vampires – remember, it’s all really OUR wealth),
necessitate convoluted social/financial structures and processes which
are the “crown of thorns” or highway to hell (or your metaphor of
choice) for Homo sapiens.
Maybe the wrong species got killed off during the demise of the Neanderthals.
Remember, “human” is a generic word that evolution has experimented
with in actually a great many forms – we’re just the form that is still
standing. But what’s the problem? Not a candy ass “religious” problem or
a candy ass “political” problem but THE problem? Why is our species
well on its way to going extinct? Indeed, why is it a near certainly
that Home sapiens are going bye bye in the relatively near future (and
taking countless “innocent by-stander” species with us in the process)?
However, alas, they are just a sample of evil, since evil is as
omnipresent as our breath. But what IS evil? Well, we don’t have to get
particularly metaphysical about this. Evil is a function of human
society. It has to do with the interactions of quantities of us (or
probably any advanced life form). So there’s a decidedly “quantitative” variable here. As our numbers
increase, so does the complexity of our social infrastructure. And that
seems to be the rub, since invisibly and insidiously the “social game
rules” are conditioned into our vulnerable, biological brains.
And
just here is the door to hell. This dimension can be called “consensus
reality” and it’s an admixture of language (always language!), the past,
memory (not always our friend), and the miscellaneous conditionings of
our time, place, and families (often profoundly dysfunctional). More
openly, here are the programmed religions, laws, constitutions, and
“theories” we so love to worship. In short, here is the stopping point
of our species. Not atomic weapons, but the accumulated programming of
years of social/psychological conditioning. The “operational definition”
of all of the above is thought, because consensus realty IS thought;
hence the thing the human race does best is think itself to death.
On
a positive note, words like liberation, transcendence, and
Enlightenment are “mystical” (the shoe fits) alternatives to this
“swallowed whole” existence. The intelligence limitations of our species
are still sublimely unknown, but whatever pragmatic value consensus
reality may offer, our lives don’t even BEGIN until we get straight that
this fire storm of conditioning that has become the “mind set” of the
entire human race (indeed, the very “God” of the human race), is
fundamentally, radically, and biologically arbitrary and random. In the
context of this piece, what this means is that the social game rules
that perpetuate the “Have’s”, that justify their astronomical wealth and
power, and that (worst of all!) give an obscene “righteousness” to
deranged lunatics who so love to commit genocide for the glory of God,
aren’t worth the toilet paper they are printed on.
And
exactly here is where our species is probably doomed since many are
called but few are chosen when it comes to being true to your birthright
self and finding a reality/creativity/intelligence center that
trivializes millennia of evil-perpetuating conditioning. Remember
phrases like, “Might makes right”, “Manifest Destiny”, “survival of the
fittest” (translation, survival of the wealthiest), and the loathsomely
hypocritical “Divine Right”.
Of
course these sayings (and even laws) are merely the tip of the iceberg.
The dungeon is elsewhere. It is deep within the infrastructure of the
collective human mind. Do we know that it is infinitely unjust that the
elites spend more money on their wardrobes than most of us spend on our
families in an entire lifetime? Do we know it is evil when religious
fanatics try to steal an entire country and turn the lives of the people
who have been living there for centuries into a WW2 concentration camp?
One
response to these questions could be that we’re not sure if these
things are evil, but almost certainly the world does know these things
are filthy, evil, and infinitely unjust. However, you can know things on
the “surface” of your mind that you play games with in the depths of
your mind. The tragedy is that the world basically turns the other way
from these evils and injustices because in the depths of our
conditioning we are historically programmed to accept them. Hence, it is
the deep, collective mind set that permits and justifies evil. We know
better, but our “unconscious” (to use that word) “accepts” evil because
we have been programmed to adapt to it for millennia.
The
literally unimaginable suffering that NECESSARILY goes with the
existence of Greek God-like elites would make Jesus weep, but we accept
The Haves (the evil) – indeed, most of us probably envy them. This is
the paradox of evil. If we didn’t “accept” evil, it couldn’t exist! But
since literally billions of us DO accept evil, that makes us an evil
species.
This is not
intellectualizing or empty theory. If the human race said no to “The
Beast”, to the “Have’s”, to genocidal religious fanatics, to the
Rockefeller’s, to the Rothschild’s, to the Bush’s, to murder in the name
of God subhuman filth, to Saudi Princes, etc., etc., we could destroy
them in a week. And I mean “non theoretically” destroy them in a week.
Remove them from the planet as in cease to exist – now you see them, now
you don’t! There are times in life you must be limitlessly aggressive.
We can either watch The Beast destroy Mother Nature and our children’s
future, or WE can destroy the beast. Remember, we know exactly who they
are and we know exactly where they are. So what in the name of truth,
beauty, and goodness are we waiting for? Certainly not for the paper
bullets of religion and politics. ULTIMATE hardball is the name of this
game.
Hence, looked at
one way, there is great hope. Looked at another way, it is hopeless. It
all comes down to how each of us deals with a lifetime of conditioning.
Liberation is transcending the box. The world IS the box. So consensus
reality (the home of evil) can be left. This is called being true to
ourselves, or perhaps even Enlightenment. However, as a species, the
probability that we will leave the box in sufficient percentages to
“eliminate” evil is probably very, very small. Fortunately, even though
our paralyzed and conditioned species continues to equate life with a
moronically defective consensus mind set, each of us is still able to
stretch our intelligence/spiritual eagle wings and leave this evil box
forever. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: we’re
the dogs – never the tails.”