When we see images of U.S. soldiers dying in Iraq, or innocent children abused at the hands of their own parents, or even a bullied teenager who goes into a shooting rampage on a college campus, we wonder at the immeasurable cruelty and injustices caused by human beings upon one another. Such evilness is reminiscent of that vividly portrayed in William Golding's novel, "The Lord of the Flies". Further, we ask whether what Mr. Golding described is true: Without the institutions of law and order (the legal system and the police), would human beings in fact become savages and end up killing one another? Is evilness and selfishness the true nature of human beings?
Are we inately good or evil?
Despite the fact that we must recognize how truly vulnerable we are without the law, and without the establishment of entities that maintain and uphold peace and order, there is still a large part of me that believes the majority of people want to do what is good, what is right, and what is just.
Is it blind faith that compels me to believe thusly? Or simply the result of observations and experiences of the enormous compassion and cooperative efforts (minus the few who took advantage of the less fortunate during those tragedies) that often are demonstrated in times of great crises, as when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, or the tsunami in Thailand, or in the aftermath of 9-11?
I come to this optimistic conclusion about human nature because if we believe the alternative, that the majority of us are evil, then the world would be overrun with massive chaos and the human population would have rapidly dwindled into nothingness. If we are predominantly evil, people would be abusing, raping, murdering, stealing -- engaging in all sorts of unspeakable crimes against nature and life itself, and against one another.
However, since there remains an overpopulation of people, animals, and living things in the world, we can infer that there must be more good people in society than bad.
Q.E.D.
Undergoing MyBlogLog Verification
2 comments:
you know will smith got in trouble for saying similar things about hitler. i do believe that we are born good but throughout life things shape personalities. the mind is a fragile tool that does need to be nurtured
Fascinating blog. I too believe there are more good people than bad in this world. But I think we all make conscious choices. Doing the right thing is often much more difficult than doing the wrong thing.
For example, it is easy to walk by someone who has fallen on the sidewalk. We can pretend we didn't see them fall, that we didn't see them struggle to regain balance and get up again. We can even go about our day as if nothing ever happened.
However, it takes that special kind samaritan to actually stop and help pick the fallen victim up. To do good, we have to make extra deliberate efforts, and it is not easy, especially when we are all in such a hurry these days to go about our own business.
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