I’ve been following Rick Falkvinge, the creator of the Pirate Party, much more frequently. I’ve been fascinated about them for quite a while now, though I haven’t gone as far as to join them simply because politics still turns my stomach. I get that we have to get involved, but this just seems like leaping into the fire. Watching Rick’s talk at JSConf US 2012, he had a lot of really great things to say, and I feel for him since it’s easy to tell that he’s still trying to get comfortable with this role that fell into his lap. But this one point he made, really resounds:
“People aren’t evil. Your worst enemies are not evil. And painting them in that light doesn’t define them. But it defines you.” – Rick Falkvinge
Never have truer words been spoken. We make personal, business, political, and safety decisions based on our frame of what evil looks like to us. Some actions are easily identifiable as evil, but they still don’t necessarily define the actor of that action. We’d need to walk in their footsteps from the moment of their birth until the moment that evil action was committed to conclusively say that they are evil. In most cases, lawyers, psychologists, or any detective uncovers facts, sometimes much later on, that puts the actor in a new light. Sure, the evil action is evil, but the sweeping judgments that we all make can be equally evil because we didn’t use care before flipping the NO! switch.
It’s beyond time to start being more proactive than reactive, even if it’s cumbersome, time consuming, and not always personally rewarding. Changing our thinking about evil can actually change the way we teach about good and evil, and that will be exponentially rewarding for us all. We just might be able to reduce the times we reach towards stereotypes, which just might reduce conflicts, which just might reduce the number of power grabbers that are shackling our destinies. Those seem like pretty good rewards to reach for, don’t you think?
Read more about Rick and the Pirate Party at Falkvinge.net.
And to close off this little talk about evil, watch this really smart and sweet message by Mama Hope: African Men. Hollywood Stereotypes:
See…not evil! It really just might be all in our minds. Time to change that mentality. No, time to get rid of that mentality. Only then can we really fight against what is really evil. Because there’s still a lot of that going on in this world, and a lot of it is happening in the most respectable (?) of places.
