How James Woods Helped Me Collect My Thoughts on Morality.

[David Sklansky]

Before he became my buddy, I read an interview of him where he was aked how he prepared himself for a villian's role. His reply was that he always tried to inject some righteousness into that villian no matter how dastardly he appeared. Because he realized that except possibly for the truly insane, everybody basically thinks they are a generally good person. Even career criminals, mobsters and scoundrels justify to themselves that there is a good reason for what they do. Almost no one simply says to themselves "I am bad period. So what? They make excuses in their mind which amount to a desire to conform to some sort of "moral" code, twisted as it may be. And he felt it was important to portray that aspect of their psyche.

Upon reading that I realized James was right. At least as far as the several dozen bad people I knew. And clearly he is right about suicide bombers. Else why would they give up their lives? Surely not just for the 72 virgins. They must have felt that what they were doing was morally right. And that includes the 911 hijackers. (I often think we would have a better chance in the mid east if we would acknowledge this fact rather than simply call them evil criminals. But that is for another thread.) Same goes for most, if not all, Nazis. They almost certainly convinced themselves they were not evil. Likewise slaveowners.

I think everyone agrees that a truly crazy person is not evil any more than an animal is. As for those not crazy, how can you call them evil (rather than stupid or deluded) if they take pains to explain to thmselves or others why what they are doing is "right". Now there may be a few sociopathic types that don't fit into this category but they are either non existent or rare enough to ignore. The fact is that most of those we call evil, upon closer examination really aren't. Probably including Hitler. Something that James Woods helped me see.

[chomsky53]

wow. you are really really dumb.

[Jman28]

I agree entirely that almost all people think they are good people. People also all think they have a good personality, but that's off topic.

[ QUOTE ]
As for those not crazy, how can you call them evil (rather than stupid or deluded) if they take pains to explain to thmselves or others why what they are doing is "right".

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's where I disagree a little. Maybe 'evil' is a strong word, but there are definitely people who are more good than others. As for the people who convince themselves what they are doing is right, I think that is an issue similar to will power. (Which I have read about it your book.)

We all know that we shouldn't take $50 from a kid even if we will never get caught. Those who can somehow convince themselves it is okay are resisting the will to do right. This is similar to someone convincing themselves it's okay to eat ice cream when dieting.

A better example than is one that is less clearly right/wrong:

A friend needs help moving.

A good friend will resist the urge to stay at home watching TV in order to help his friend.

A bad friend will convince himself that he isn't wrong to not help, and will stay home and watch 'That 70s House' on mtv.

The difference is that one resisted the urge to do 'evil' and I think that we can make a value judgement here and call him a better person.

[BluffTHIS!]

If those who:

a) intentionally inflict harm on others for self-gratification

b) kill, maim or injure others for personal benefit not absolutely necessary for survival

c) place no value on the lives of others

are not evil, then you have no concept of morality and are amoral, though not because the above conditions are true of yourself personally. And it is reprehensible to characterize someone as Hitler, albeit having sociopathic tendencies, as not evil, since to do so mitigates the seriousness of their harmful actions and denigrates the suffering of their victims.

[David Sklansky]

Poster: BluffTHIS!
Subject: Re: How James Woods Helped Me Collect My Thoughts on Morality.

"If those who:

a) intentionally inflict harm on others for self-gratification

b) kill, maim or injure others for personal benefit not absolutely necessary for survival

c) place no value on the lives of others

are not evil, then you have no concept of morality "

I agree with that. I, and James woods, claim that in real life, such a person (not including the retarded and deranged) is almost nonexistent.

Also by the way, I define evil as a lot worse than simply immoral.

[brick]

You see david, you've almost made it around the circle.
You've pointed out that everyone thinks they are good, but are actually not.
Including you. You are bad. So am I.

[BluffTHIS!]

[ QUOTE ]
I agree with that. I, and James woods, claim that in real life, such a person is almost nonexistent.

[/ QUOTE ]

Our american prisons are full of such murderers, rapists, and child-molesters. Many of them belonged to gangs or organized crime. My comments about not characterizing Hitler as evil applies to them as well.

[NotReady]

Tell Mr. Woods I think he's a great actor. Probably the best all time slimeball on screen (that's a compliment). The only better portrayal of pure evil I can think of is Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs, a role Woods could have done well, I think.

Your first two paragraphs are good. One thing all humans do well is rationalize. Even when we admit we did something wrong, we find an excuse. It started with Adam and Eve when they tried to blame God for their sin. The rest is history.

The third paragraph is dead wrong for reasons I've given many times.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
PTB --
<font color="white"> ,, </font>
The last person to get into heaven will be the last person who insists that someone must go to hell

[/ QUOTE ]

Someday you will be able to google that quote.

PairTheBoard

[David Sklansky]

"Our american prisons are full of such murderers, rapists, and child-molesters. Many of them belonged to gangs or organized crime. My comments about not characterizing Hitler as evil applies to them as well."

I already agreed that some people can be characterized as evil and that you have a good definition of it. We just disagree about how rare those people are. Do you agree with me that suicide bombers do not fit into that category? I can tell you for sure that most Mafioso don't. And I'm almost sure that many of the other ones you named don't either. In some cases because they are flat out crazy. Do you agree that exempts them from the evil label? As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure.

Meanwhile given your definition of an evil person I assume you disagree with Not Ready that you need God to have absolute moral standards.

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]
Because he realized that except possibly for the truly insane, everybody basically thinks they are a generally good person. Even career criminals, mobsters and scoundrels justify to themselves that there is a good reason for what they do.

[/ QUOTE ]

He's right - Steven Pinker said in one of his books that no matter what we do, we confabulate and reinterpret events and actions so that one statement is true at all times: "I am a good person, and I am in control."

Anybody who doesn't believe this may feel free to prove it experimentally by going up to some biker at a bar and saying "Hey buddy, you're an a**hole and you don't know what you're doing."

As far as institutionally-widespread evils like Nazism or slavery go, the responsibility for said evils diminishes with each new person to jump on board (given that the pressure for acquiescing to the 'norm' increases as well). So for example with slavery, some idiot on vacation in Africa gets the bright idea of bringing a black guy home with him in chains as a souvenir, and makes him a slave on his plantation. Now his company, Douchebag Cotton Co., can lower prices because they've got themselves some "free labor". From here it's quite clear how even something as horrible as slavery can be established as an institution - after Douchebag Cotton does it, then previously-respectable Acme Cotton joins in to compete, all the way on down the line until Mom and Pop Cotton feels they have to buy slaves or else they won't be able to feed their children (plus you get the ancillary idiocies like preachers searching for passages in the bible that they can make sound like a divine mandate to own slaves). So in this case, as in most cases in life, evil (to what extent that it exists) and the responsibility for it lie primarily with the Douchebags.

[BluffTHIS!]

[ QUOTE ]

I already agreed that some people can be characterized as evil and that you have a good definition of it. We just disagree about how rare those people are.

[/ QUOTE ]

How would you define rare? And why does it matter if it is rare, when even a small percentage proves that such evil individuals do exist. Furthermore, those people who are imprisoned for actually committing those acts are only the ones who are caught, and does not include those whom you labeled in one of your essays as the truly evil ones who live among us who would do those things but don't only for fear of being known and or punished. And people who do those things might be crazy, but the fact that they do those things is not in itself proof of same.

[ QUOTE ]
Do you agree with me that suicide bombers do not fit into that category?

[/ QUOTE ]

They can only not fit in that category if you believe that the end always justify the means.

[ QUOTE ]
I can tell you for sure that most Mafioso don't.

[/ QUOTE ]

All "made men" in the mafia do fit that label because they got "made" by committing murder. And as far as others who cooperate with them to lesser degrees, they are enabling and perpetuating the acts of the worst in their organization, so again it applies to them though just not to the same degree as the worst.

[ QUOTE ]
As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure.

[/ QUOTE ]

The fruit shows the nature of the tree, and statements such as above are mere sophistry.

[ QUOTE ]
Meanwhile given your definition of an evil person I assume you disagree with Not Ready that you need God to have absolute moral standards.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, although since you have made it clear that you disdain philosophy in general, and in order reference such possible non-religious moral standards a philosophy with an ethical system would have to be seen as necessary either for yourself or for society, then there is no purpose in further discussing the matter, which is why I have not posted in the other threads on this.

[craig r]

When Hannah Arendt wrote "Eichman In Jerusalem: The Banality of Evil" I think this was the point she was trying to make. That Eichmann (who was in charge of the "deportation" of he Jews) did not think what he was doing was wrong. He actually thought he was helping "everybIody", including the Jews. Another example regarding the holocaust would be the difference between Schindler's List and The Pianist. I thought the Pianist did a better job of showing how the Nazi's (and even some of the turn coat Jews) really were. They were not psychopaths. In fact, many Jews reproted, that survived the holocaust, that it was very rare for the Nazi's to act "psycopathic".

Another example I can think of is Robert McNamara in the Fog of War documentary. Did he seem like an uncaring guy. I mean I would have a cup of coffee with him. Yet, he was responsible for hundrends of thousands of deaths (if not millions). But, during the interviews you knew he was a real person. He cried when Kennedy was shot. He cried when he was discussing what he did in the past (though never apologized).

And I am not saying that McNamara and the Nazis were exactly the same, but they both claimed to be doing what they were doing in self defense. They did not do it to purposely inflict harm on others because they received some sort of pleasure out of it. It was under the guise of self defense (as almost all wars are).

Now, I realize I am using very extreme examples. But, I think it is necessary to use extreme examples when trying to prove that even people that committed horrible atrocities are not "evil", nor do they think they are "evil".

Sklansky brought up the 9/11 attacks. To use a reductionist argument and say that these people were "evil" we will never get to any of the root causes of why this happened.

Even in our current war, there is no doubt that civilians are getting killed by young men (U.S. troops). These young men know that they are doing this, yet they continue to do it anyways (okay, some have fled for Canada). Would we say that they are all sociopathic? Would we label them "evil". I mean, after all, it is a matter of "defense".

Would we label CEO's and corporations who knowingly poison people (whether intentional or not..they still know) with their pollution, chemicals, etc... "evil"? What about the Phillip Morris Company? Are they evil? They profit off of other's pain.

Okay, I am done with my 3:45 am rant. I just think that James Woods and Sklansky are right. All of the above examples go home at night, kiss their children, etc....Does this mean I agree with them? Of course not. Does it mean I am justifying what they do? Of course not.

Okay, rant not over. I am a vegan. This is by choice and not for health reasons. But, there is no doubt that these animals suffer so we can eat. They aren't just shot in the head, but have a horrible existence up until there death. Why would most people be willing to cause another sentient being pain? I don't know the answer. And I am not being self-righteous. But, we willingly cause harm. And I don't think that all of you meat eaters are "evil" or "heartless". I just think it is the "banality of evil".

End rant.

craig

p.s. What is your deal chomsky53? These are concepts that Chomsky discusses. They are not far from what Sklanksy has said. I figured you would get it. Unless it is just a troll account; i really don't know.

[Aytumious]

[ QUOTE ]
wow. you are really really dumb.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could someone ban this chimp, please? All of his post are complete pointless and are only made to insult whomever he is responding to.

[Piers]

[ QUOTE ]
The fact is that most of those we call evil, upon closer examination really aren't.

[/ QUOTE ]

Only if you insist on a weak form of morality: A person is not evil if there is a valid observer who would not consider them evil.

One could define a strong form of morality: A person is not evil if every valid observer would not consider them evil.

I do not believe either of these definitions has much use in the real world.

However my own personal moral instincts tend towards the weak definition above.

[craig r]

Sorry, it was too late for me to edit my post. But, I wanted to add, that I beleive that given the right circumstances, that anybody is pretty much capable of anything. As some of you have read other posts of mine in the other various forums, I am fairly far left (wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy past liberal). If there was a draft tomorrow I would do whatever it took to get out of it. Not just because I don't want to die, but because I would fine it morally objectionable (as I am sure others would as well). But, lets just say there was nothing I could do and I had to go. And I had to fight and kill other people. Now, doing this and knowing that i am morally oppossed to killing someone, does that make me even more of an "evil" person, than lets say a hitler or kissinger? I would actually being saying fck my conscious. Where neither of these two guys thought they were doing anything wrong. So, who would actually be more evil? Hitler and Kissinger or me?

craig

Edit for: Sorry both the posts were discussing poliitics in a sense. It just seems that the greatest atrocities are usually pulled off my governments.

[txag007]

"Before he became my buddy, I read an interview of him where he was aked how he prepared himself for a villian's role. His reply was that he always tried to inject some righteousness into that villian no matter how dastardly he appeared. Because he realized that except possibly for the truly insane, everybody basically thinks they are a generally good person. Even career criminals, mobsters and scoundrels justify to themselves that there is a good reason for what they do. Almost no one simply says to themselves "I am bad period. So what? They make excuses in their mind which amount to a desire to conform to some sort of "moral" code, twisted as it may be."

Sklanksy's original post is a great argument IN FAVOR of absolute morality. From where does this "moral code" originate? Twisted as it may be, even the criminals mention have some idea of what they ought to be doing.

[Georgia Avenue]

Nice Quote! It seems like the David's point could be taken to be: the only true crime is self-righteousness...or, more plausibly: self-righteousness is the root of all evil. Have you ever met a person without doubts and self-scrutiny who WASN’T a wacko/jerkwad? I can’t say that I have. The unexamined life is usually pretty destructive.

I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean this, but, that’s my personal deliberate misinterpretation of the Word from On High!

[andyfox]

"As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure."

I think this is where your argument falls apart. Let's suppose Hitler had, in his own mind, a good reason for doing what he did. Let's say he honestly felt that Jews were reponsible for most of the world's problems and he felt he was making the world a better place by trying to exterminate them.

Feeling you're doing the right thing is not enough. The fact of the matter is that he was wrong. And six million people, many of them children who could not possibly, by any stretch of the imagination, be considered responsible for the world's problems. He should have been sure of his facts before embarking on a course of action that resulted in millions of deaths. He was wrong about the influence of the Jews and wrong about how to solve the alledged problem.

My sense is that there's good and bad in everyone. I know when I'm doing something bad and while I might occasionally rationalize it with the cloak of goodness, I know the real truth. I've known a few Mafia types myself and my sense is the opposite of yours: they knew when they were being bad.

[hmkpoker]

I agree with most if not all of what you wrote. I also don't believe in good or evil as useful concepts.

Let's take a fellow who's had a rotten upbringing, riddled himself mad with psychedelic drugs, and is now a crazed serial killer lurking in the shadows. He inflicts harm for his own pleasure. However, he views life in a very feral, LaVeyan sort of way, that human beings are all, at their core, feral, competitive animals, and by indulging in vicious acts, he lives out his existence in the highest and best way a human being can, and thereby, considers it "good."

What's the verdict?

I'm curious to hear what you think makes an evil person.


-hmk

[andyfox]

In Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America, Woods plays a small-time hood. He reinvents himself in a grand scheme that screws Robert De Niro's character.

At the end of the movie, he feels the need to confess to De Niro. He tells him what he did and asks De Niro, who is a hit man, to kill him (since he feels his life is ruined and he might be hit by others anyway). He feels this will be justice for De Niro and a fate that he himself (Woods) deserves.

DeNiro refuses. He refuses to hold the evil part of Woods against him, preferring instead to see the good part of him as the important part. One senses that De Niro understands that he, De Niro, is no better than Woods and thus he cannot accept that Woods is deserving of the fate Woods himself feels that he is.

[A great movie, BTW. Not the shortened American release version which, because of the studio cuts, is virtually incomprehensible. I'm pretty sure the original "director's cut" is now available on DVD. One of Woods' finest performances.]

This theme of good and evil as a part of everyone is manifest in most of Sergio Leone's movies (most pointedly in The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly). Certainly most gangster movies try to make this point too. When Clemenza, after murdering somebody in the Godfather, says "leave the gun, take the cannoli," he is showing us that he's just a person. Yes, he brutally killed somebody, but he's still thinking about his wife who had asked him to bring home the cannoli.

We're all part good, part evil. That we take pains to explain what we are doing "right" does not make it right or lessen the evil if evil results from what we do.

[ QUOTE ]
"As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure."

I think this is where your argument falls apart. Let's suppose Hitler had, in his own mind, a good reason for doing what he did. Let's say he honestly felt that Jews were reponsible for most of the world's problems and he felt he was making the world a better place by trying to exterminate them.

Feeling you're doing the right thing is not enough. The fact of the matter is that he was wrong. And six million people, many of them children who could not possibly, by any stretch of the imagination, be considered responsible for the world's problems. He should have been sure of his facts before embarking on a course of action that resulted in millions of deaths. He was wrong about the influence of the Jews and wrong about how to solve the alledged problem.

My sense is that there's good and bad in everyone. I know when I'm doing something bad and while I might occasionally rationalize it with the cloak of goodness, I know the real truth. I've known a few Mafia types myself and my sense is the opposite of yours: they knew when they were being bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

I have read a biography of Hitler and he never killed anybody. So I don't think you can call him evil so much as you can the idiots who carry out evil acts espoused by someone else. It isn't Hitler who was evil it was commanders and generals who wouldn't "Just Say No", Hitler it ain't happening. Blind obedience is evil.

Many

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]

I'm curious to hear what you think makes an evil person.

[/ QUOTE ]

I suppose a rough sketch would be simply someone who willfully causes a greater-than-average amount of harm. But if we want to be honest, I think almost all of us define evil in the same way that the Supreme Court justice (I think it might have been Scalia*, but don't quote me on that) defined pornography: "I don't know what it is exactly, but I know it when I see it."

Discussion of the fact that there is no such thing as pure, unadulterated, twitching-your-mustache-in-your-secret-lair evil does not in any way absolve Hitler or slaveowners or Idi Amin or what have you (off-topic slightly, for an excellent view of the life of a malicious dictator - a "behind-the-psychopathy" if you will - check out Barbet Schroeder's movie "General Idi Amin Dada". The scenes showing him doing mundane, completely innocuous things are incredibly frightening simply because of who he is.)

I don't want to overuse Steven Pinker as a source, but he also said something pithy apropos your comment - basically, he said it really doesn't matter whether we do everything for good reasons or we do everything because we are at heart nothing more than selfish sex-gremlins - Mother Theresa is good and Gordon Gekko is bad, and that's all there is to it.

The main problem in this thread that many people can easily get hung up on is differentiating between "evil" and the concept of "Pure Evil", or "Evil with a capital 'E'", the latter meaning the mustache-twitching insanity bit. The former (people who do significantly more harm than can be expected from an average human) is certainly present on this planet, and anyone who tries to argue otherwise would do best to prove his position by bunking with a convicted felon, because otherwise I don't believe him for a second.

*edit: I was way off - it was Potter Stewart. Oh well - Scalia seemed like the kind of guy who knows his way around pornography /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

[Peter666]

"I already agreed that some people can be characterized as evil and that you have a good definition of it."

Great, now both of you are causing confusion. The fact is, no human being is capable of doing a subjectively evil action. Any wilful action done by a human being is always subjectively good in that person's eyes. Even if the person intentionally wants to commit "evil" to himself or others, he is still seeking "happiness" or self satisfaction thru his excercise of free will, no matter how deluded.

When we want to call someone or something "evil" it is always in relation to that person's existence in a society (ethics) or before his ultimate Maker (morality). Because we are not self sufficient of self sustaining creatures, all the rightness or wrongness of our actions are determined by our ultimate end (death in a society [ethics] or the beatific vision [morality]).

In a society, we can do anything we like so long as it does not attack what is the common good of society. As a creature sustained by God, we can do anything we like so long as it does not go against His will. So when we judge the actions of people, it is always in relation to their capacity of knowledge of the common good (natural law)[Ethics] or supernatural good [Morality]. Murderers, rapists, and Hitler are evil not because they are cyborgs from Hell, but because they did things that were not for the common good, and they should have known better.

Also remember that there is no created thing named evil. Evil is merely the absence of good where the good ought to be.

[David Sklansky]

As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure."

I think this is where your argument falls apart. Let's suppose Hitler had, in his own mind, a good reason for doing what he did. Let's say he honestly felt that Jews were reponsible for most of the world's problems and he felt he was making the world a better place by trying to exterminate them.

Feeling you're doing the right thing is not enough.

It is just enough not to be called EVIL. I may be defining that word different than a lot of you. I take it to mean a lot worse than merely bad. Put another way a person who does evil acts is not necessarily evil by the definition I am using.

[hmkpoker]

With reference to "Mother Theresa is good and Gordon Gekko is bad, and that's all there is to it."...

Madagascar is located in the Indian ocean, and Brazil along the edge of the Atlantic. No debate there. But when we look at the tip of South Africa, it becomes a little harder to tell.

Despite not knowing either of them, I'd be willing to bet that Mother Teresa is a good person, by any definition, and Gordon Gekko, (not sure who he is, but I'll assume Charles Manson will work as well) is a bad person. We kind of use these people as archetypes though. They are epitomes, and pure, idealistic exemplaries of these concepts of good and evil, much like every Disney hero and villian.

While these archetypes do speak to us on a fundamental level, real people don't work that way. And often, when someone does something that most people would consider evil, when you get to know the reasoning behind the act and understand the context on an intimate level, you usually relate to it, and wouldn't consider it to be "evil."

For example, I know someone who is doing a very poor job of raising her kid. Her daughter is overly stressed, and when the mother found out she was cutting herself, she slapped her and threatened her. On the surface, this seems like black and white evil, but when I got to understand how the mother was raised and how resultantly the gears in her head work, I understand why she did what she did.

...this does NOT excuse such behavior, by any means, obviously, and she SHOULD take steps to rectify it. But I think her actions stem more from ignorance than "evil," and when you get down to it, most "evil" actions do too.

-hmk

[andyfox]

My understanding is that Charles Manson was not involved in the Tate-LaBianca murders in that he didn't go to the houses, he just ordered the murders. Should he not be in jail for the crimes?

Blind obedeience is not evil unless the act being committed is evil. The person who ordered the act is responsible.

[andyfox]

Gordon Gecko was the Michael Douglas character in the movie Wall Street. He was an immoral investment banker (or Wall Street analyst or something like that) and his most famous line was "Greed is Good."

[ QUOTE ]
My understanding is that Charles Manson was not involved in the Tate-LaBianca murders in that he didn't go to the houses, he just ordered the murders. Should he not be in jail for the crimes?

Blind obedeience is not evil unless the act being committed is evil. " The person who ordered the act is responsible."

[/ QUOTE ]

" The person who ordered the act is responsible."

Why? And no, Manson should not be in prison

Many

[hmkpoker]

Thanks ^_^

I was sure he was a serial killer or terrorist or something like that.

[Cyrus]

[ QUOTE ]
Except possibly for the truly insane, everybody basically thinks they are a generally good person. Even career criminals, mobsters and scoundrels justify to themselves that there is a good reason for what they do. They make excuses in their mind which amount to a desire to conform to some sort of "moral" code, twisted as it may be.
<font color="white"> . </font>
[This also] is right about suicide bombers. Else why would they give up their lives? Surely not just for the 72 virgins. They must have felt that what they were doing was morally right. And that includes the 911 hijackers. Same goes for most, if not all, Nazis. They almost certainly convinced themselves they were not evil. Likewise slaveowners.
<font color="white"> .</font>
I think everyone agrees that a truly crazy person is not evil any more than an animal is. Those not crazy [are]rather stupid or deluded. Now there may be a few sociopathic types that don't fit into this category but they are either non existent or rare enough to ignore. The fact is that most of those we call evil, upon closer examination really aren't. Probably including Hitler.

[/ QUOTE ]

David Sklansky has embarked on a campaign to illuminate minds here. I take this to be his own roundabout way of educating (and fast) a new breed of 2+2ers into advantage thinking (&amp; play). The poker champs of tomorrow are the ones who grasp the analytical methodoloy sampled freely around this li'l Science page by Sklansky.

I'm up more than $300 per hour in EV just by reading the stuff.

[fnord_too]

I don't hold the same interpretation of the OUATIA as you. Great movie, but:

De Niro is NOT a hit man, he is a bootlegger/mobster. IIRC he only kills one person in the film, the guy who killed the young member of his gang. (I could be mistaken here).

Woods was not asking De Niro to kill him because he felt he deserved it, he was asking because he knew he was going to be killed and, given that, decided that De Niro was really the only one with a right to kill him due to the way he screwed his friend over.

I think there are many reasons De Niro did not kill Woods, but I don't think the fact that he felt he was no better than Woods really played a part in the decision. De Niro at the end who has come to peace with himself after a life of tragedy and mistakes. I think he was really glad to see that his erstwhile best friend was in fact still alive, and had accomplished things he wanted to do with his life. As he said, some jobs they took and some they didn't; the jobs Woods was offering was not one they would touch. When he said he hoped the problems were really nothing, I believe he meant it sincerely.

I have now seen so many versions of this movie over the past two decades, I don't remeber which version all the scenes were in. Is the directors cut the first one where his childhood love tells him not to go through the door because he will see a ghost (Woods son)? That was a great scene.

You should start a "Sergio Leone is the greatest epic director of all time" thread in OOT, I would but you carry a lot more weight than I do.

To OP - sorry for the tangent, but that discussion, like so many, just dwindles to deffinitions. Discussing Leone's work is much more interesting.

[andyfox]

I had thought that when De Niro comes to see Woods at the end, he has been making his living as a hit man. Early on, he and Woods were indeed bootleggers/mobsters/partners. Woods has given De Niro a suitcase full of money, in his (Woods') mind, to give him back the money he stole from him when they were young, but as a down payment for a hit. On himself.

Your post is very thoughtful and a great take on the film. I too have seen many different versions of the film. There's a Leone exhibit currently at the Gene Autry museum here in Los Angeles. I hadn't realize Leone staged the great chariot scene in Ben Hur, he was an assistant director on the film.

I brought the film into this thread because of James Woods' performance in it, and its possible relationship to what he described to David and David's take on good and evil.

[meep_42]

Congratulations on learning cognitive dissonance. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

-d

[SomethingClever]

This really depends on your definition of evil.

If an evil person is the opposite of an altruist, then I imagine you're right... there are probably very few of those people roaming the Earth. Thankfully. (Of course, the opposite is probably true. True altruists [if that's a word] are quite rare as well).

But I don't think you can excuse the truly selfish, who will pursue their own goals at the expense of others. Maybe they're not purposefully trying to hurt anyone, but through their selfishness and denial they can really be devastating.

For example, a chemical tycoon who saves money by disposing of waste in an unsafe fashion.

He certainly wouldn't murder anyone, but he allows himself to be blinded by increasing profits while innocents surely suffer and die through his actions.

Evil? Yeah, I think it's close.

[fnord_too]

[ QUOTE ]
There's a Leone exhibit currently at the Gene Autry museum here in Los Angeles. I hadn't realize Leone staged the great chariot scene in Ben Hur, he was an assistant director on the film.



[/ QUOTE ]

Wow, I didn't know that either.

I did not gather that De Niro had been a hit man in the interem (though certainly I gathered that was what the money was for). I think I have the director's cut on DVD, I'll have to carve out some time to watch it again. I just wish they would release Duck You Sucker on DVD, that is probably my fovorite film of his, but his least popular.

[Jim T]

[ QUOTE ]
So for example with slavery, some idiot on vacation in Africa gets the bright idea of bringing a black guy home with him in chains as a souvenir, and makes him a slave on his plantation. Now his company, Douchebag Cotton Co., can lower prices because they've got themselves some "free labor". From here it's quite clear how even something as horrible as slavery can be established as an institution - after Douchebag Cotton does it, then previously-respectable Acme Cotton joins in to compete, all the way on down the line until Mom and Pop Cotton feels they have to buy slaves or else they won't be able to feed their children (plus you get the ancillary idiocies like preachers searching for passages in the bible that they can make sound like a divine mandate to own slaves).

[/ QUOTE ]

Funny how you seem to be blaming white people for the institution of slavery ("...some idiot on vacation in Africa gets the bright idea..."). You seem to be sorely lacking in historical knowledge. You are aware that the very word "slave" is derived from the Slavs, a white people, right?

You mentioned the Bible, didn't you notice that the Ancient Egyptians (ie. Africans) owned massive numbers of slaves? This was a just a little bit prior to the Southern plantation owners.

Speaking of the Bible, I'd say that with quotes like:

[ QUOTE ]
When a slave owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner's property. (Exod. 21:20-21)

[/ QUOTE ]

it's not exactly difficult to make it "seem" like the Bible (ie. God's word) gives a mandate to own slaves. It does.

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]

Funny how you seem to be blaming white people for the institution of slavery ("...some idiot on vacation in Africa gets the bright idea..."). You seem to be sorely lacking in historical knowledge. You are aware that the very word "slave" is derived from the Slavs, a white people, right?

You mentioned the Bible, didn't you notice that the Ancient Egyptians (ie. Africans) owned massive numbers of slaves? This was a just a little bit prior to the Southern plantation owners.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think it was pretty obvious that I was referring specifically to slavery in America.

[Timer]

[ QUOTE ]
I hadn't realize Leone staged the great chariot scene in Ben Hur, he was an assistant director on the film.

[/ QUOTE ]

A stuntman died filming the chariot race scenes and that death is in the movie.

[siegfriedandroy]

I think I can still call them evil if they fly planes into 3 buildings and kill 3000 people. Likewise war atrocities where innocents are abused, killed, etc. I dont give a *uck how they justify it to themselves or what they believe, in reality, they are still truly 'evil', in my view. Come on, Mr. David. Dont you know it's evil to swindle sweet old grandmas at the 2/4 table who think their bottom pair is good and proceed to cap every street! jk Anyway, I do believe there is true 'evil' in the world, and that most who commit truly wicked crimes know that what they are doing is really wrong, despite whatever alibis/bs they can come up with. Perhaps some are so deluded to the point where they truly do not understand the immorality of their actions, but I'd say most probably do. I think Mr. Woods would also agree that their is truly 'evil' in the world. He's a good republican, isnt he!? jk- i am not a republican, fwiw anyway, if you dont know that flying an airplane into a building or killing 6 million jews or killing 60 million people w/o any semblance of a legitimate reason probably knows that they're not a saint. perhaps they have deluded themselves through false religion or through materialistic philosophy into believing that their acts are justified- but any 5 year old knows it's truly wrong to take human life. counterarg- 5 year old is conditioned; siegfried's first response after playing 12 hrs at the bike- let's do a lord of the rings and put a 5 year old on an island alone (somehow we will provide food/shelter, etc. w/ absoulely 0 human contact, and then transport him to the continent (whichever one you please) and somehow attempt to ascertain whether he believes that murder is wrong) again, ive been up all night at the f'n bike, where i saw some stripper who gave me a lap dance, told me we had a psychic connection, and some other stuff i can't repeat- 3 years ago, and then came home to prove this to my unbelieving friend by showing him her website. good run on sentence. man she looks faded now. anyway, i am married now, and truly believe that if i did anything w/ her now, or even thought inappropriately about her, that i would be sinning against God and my wife. and i 'know' that to be true, for whatever it's worth. sklansky, please dont take offense- you said you are turned off by Christians/religious folk who 'know' everything. honestly, in all truthfulness, i believe i know extremely little of what there is 'out there' to know, and i believe all of us are in that boat, and greatly overestimate our own intelligence/knowledge (from the most mentally deficient (well perhaps not them so much) to the greatest philosophers of all time)- so i guess im semi-agnostic in that respect.

anyway, sklank (i left out the y intentionally), im sorry if i incorrectly assumed that you were an atheist, if you really are not. Perhaps i made a false assumption, based on the general nature and character of your posts. But perhaps i should not apologize, since everything is probably an assumption to some degree. So what are you Mr. Sklank? And what is Mr. Woods? What are any of us? Why am i still awake and writing, when i could be sitting and engaging in stimulating conversation w/ some degenerate at the bike?

(sorry for the lack of paragraphs- i am too lazy. if you are still reading, you are surely not 'evil'. jk - you still are

[Cyrus]

[ QUOTE ]
As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil.

[/ QUOTE ]

Then how about this guy here:

Gruesome details revealed at 'BTK' sentencing hearing (http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-08-16-BTK-sentencing_x.htm?POE=NEWISVA)

[FredJones888]

so james woods helped you to believe that Hitler wasn't evil.....

Now I have a better context to understand all of your non-poker related posts.

[FredJones888]

"As for Hitler I only said he MIGHT not be evil. I would have to know his real motives to be sure."

you are pretending you don't know the motivies of hitler ? And because you don't know his motives, you can't be SURE that hitler was evil ?

That is moral relativism at its absolute worst. Somebody cold bloodedly murders over 6 million people ( not including the people that died in combat ) and you aren't SURE that he's evil ?

That is almost unbelievable.

[benkahuna]

It's cool that a James Woods interview spurred some thinking. He's obviously very bright and very talented. And Salvador, what a performance that was.

I see your thesis here as tautological.

It sounds like you're saying no one can truly act in an evil manner unless they're insane, so therefore there are no truly evil people as insane people cannot be evil. That makes for a semantically annoying situation. You've basically defined evil in a such a way that you cannot be wrong if we use your definition.

So, you've proven nothing and you haven't made an argument, but you have expressed a thought.

Another problem with this whole discussion is that good/evil is a binary concept that, like I believe David said before, requires some omnipotent force to define it for you. The idea has been so culturally filtered through Western religion that it's hard to have a solid discussion about it and avoid the assumptions everyone has about what good/evil means.

I disagree with your assumptions here. I think someone can certainly be evil without being insane. And I don't think all of these people rationalize what they are doing as in some way being morally good. Some people just seek out various goals such as money, power, sex, love, or fame. They may not care how they get it. I feel that people willing to violate their own sense of ethics to achieve these goals can be evil. That doesn't mean I don't sympathize with their humanity.

My sense of evil obviously involves my ethics so I guess I'm not actually disagreeing on anything except the definion of evil. I'm against destruction and causing pain, misery, or death without strong side benefits. Is that vague? You bet.

I would characterize people that have engaged in a pattern of violating their sense of ethics for some other goal as evil. There is a major issue here drawing the line between evil and just really, really bad.

Was Pete Wilson evil for promoting prop 187 (the California proposition which in part sought to deny illegal immigrants emergency medical care--for me it's ironic that this amendment had the same number as the police code for murder) when he almost certainly knew that illegal immigrants in California keep the farming industry going and (according to a professor of mine) pay more in taxes than they receive in services? He did so, in part because the economy was doing poorly and, as in Nazi Germany, a convenient scapegoat was illegal immigrants. He was a fairly big name governor at the time and considered a possible candidate for president in the next election. Maybe he knew the California Supreme Court would strike down that provision of the proposition. Never mind, bad example. Had this amendment passed in its complete form into law, it would have certainly killed a number of people (some of whom were scared to go to emergency rooms and died just due to the very existence of the proposition, even before it passed) had it passed as well as being incredibly irresponsible from a public health perspective (contagious diseases). His indirect influence probably caused the deaths of a few people. Occupational hazard.

I would say Stalin, Hitler, Eichmann, and Polpot were almost certainly evil. Eichmann almost certainly knew he was planning a broad scale extermination and according to the writer mentioned earlier in the thread (if you trust wikipedia's entry) he was neither anti-Semitic nor insane. So, he just acted a bureaucrat in the killing of millions of Jews, gypsys, gays, communists, criminals and political dissidents. Sounds like a strong case for evil in my book.

I tend to feel that people that are evil in the absense of coercive circumstances are insane, but that some people will engage in evil given the right motivation. They know it's wrong and would say they believe what they did was wrong if you asked them. Some are often guilty people who probably "don't sleep well at night." W.E.B. Du Bois feels such people deserve sympathy and have their own psychological scars with which to deal. I think for such people there is redemption, but feeling guilty is not enough. I think you can be evil in the sense I've defined it, but can change so that you are no longer evil.


As for movie roles, I think unless you inject some more complex humanity into a character, you're just a caricature. Caricatures and good films generally don't mix.

[Hoi Polloi]

[ QUOTE ]
Gordon Gecko was the Michael Douglas character in the movie Wall Street. He was an immoral investment banker (or Wall Street analyst or something like that) and his most famous line was "Greed is Good."

[/ QUOTE ]

Clearly qualifying him as non-evil in the Woods/Sklansky definition. He believed that by acting in his own self interest he made the markets more efficient thus benefiting all of us. You can disagree with him, but he was not acting in the interest of causing harm.

[andyfox]

But he didn't really believe greed is good; he only believed it was good for him. He knew many of the things he did was wrong; he asked his protege for inside information on an airline, since his protege's father worked for that airline.

My sense is that many people who say they think they're doing thing for good really know that they're doing bad things and are just trying to put the best public face they can on their deeds. Since Adam Smith formulated the principle, we've seen that the supposed common public good that comes from self-interested entrepreneurs is not always evident.

[imported_adhoc]

[ QUOTE ]

so james woods helped you to believe that Hitler wasn't evil.....

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, it's a stunning post. Literally. I am totally speechless, just sitting here at my computer, stupefied. It's quite a feeling.

As of right now, I am going to stop reading this forum forever to try and keep my respect for David intact.

[fimbulwinter]

[ QUOTE ]
i took time out of my day to name drop a b list has been celeb and state the obvious

[/ QUOTE ]

almost as bad as my taking the time to reply to it.

fim

[lehighguy]

There are also many people that match BluffThis definition of evil and construct moral believe systems to justify thier actions. Perhaps they even trick themselves after awhile. Consider, maybe Osama Bin Laden may not actually believe anything he says. Maybe he is just suffering from existential angst and his Jihad gives him a sense of meaning. The way doing charity work might bring purpose to someones life Jihad may do the same for him. I don't know. However, killing thousands so that you feel good about yourself and have a sense of purpose could be just as "evil" via BluffThis explanation.

Morals, good, and evil are human creations. Each individual can therefore decide for himself what he considers "evil". In my own framework, I don't think the fact that Hitler had good intentions matters in terms of wether or not he was evil. What matters is what he was trying to do and how he did it. Those things will, now and forever, remain evil. Just as Osama will forever be evil even if we consider his intentions pure (disregarding the idea posited in paragraph one).