What is the Nature of Evil?

[ctg]

Is it evil for you to kill someone, or is it evil when you feel good from doing it? Is it evil for you to destroy someone's lifehood, or is it evil for you to get kicks from it? Is it a evil for you to take away someone's most favourite thing, or is it evil when you feel nothing?

There are so many things that are evil, and we so often take them as granted, and never ever really study them. But even if we would give them a proper study, we would find out that there are at least two kind of evils: moral evils and real evils.

Moral evils are those that we take as granted, and we never even give them a second thought. Real evils are absolutely another matter, that - without naming them - are really ... evil, and should never be done. Then again, as life is such a great teacher, we know that a good man can be put in such a situation where he has to do the evil. In that crucial point when he is executing it, the question becomes: Is he becoming evil or does remain good? What if there really was no other choice?

The trouble with the evil character is that when a evil character does a evil deed. It would just be a natural feeling for them. But if one would feel something from it, then we would be talking about some sort of a mental sicknesses, like for example on how to be a psychopath.

I have couple of questions for you writers and storytellers:

• How far you are willing go to show the terminal line between the good and the evil?

• How much you are willing to put writing on it, or can you trust that a reader can make their own judgements from the act?

• Does it make the stories more interesting if you leave these out judgements?

The trouble for me is, that when I read actual factual historical documents (try to say that fast three times in row), I can see the thin red line the writer has taken. I can imagine the kind of trauma they've taken and sometimes I can see a guilty prayer for a redemption.

However, fictional writers can take quite another path on their descriptions (me included), and we can write the deeds without ever really giving them a second thought. We might even make them look good and acceptable. Therefore this is my ultimate question for you, and it nullifies the above questions. Should a fictional writer write the characters like the character are experiencing the settings, or should he or she keep hiding behind the safety lines?