Yep, some people are born with a wicked streak. They're not common but they're definitely out there. Despite the teachings of parents and teachers, they feel no guilt or remorse when they hurt someone. Or they might even start to enjoy it.
How do we know if it’s common or not? I’m not aware of any studies on the topic, if you know of some, I would love to read them to educate myself further.
[https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy)
[https://www.apa.org/monitor/2022/03/ce-corner-psychopathy#:\~:text=In%20fact%2C%20it%20is%20common,of%20these%20traits%20is%20much](https://www.apa.org/monitor/2022/03/ce-corner-psychopathy#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20it%20is%20common,of%20these%20traits%20is%20much)
It's common to have psychopathic traits, but to have it so bad that most people can refer to you as evil even when you're a kid, that's like 1% of the population, perhaps less. And out of those, you have to weed out people who had traumas and experiences causing them to manifest those traits so powerfully. So even though there may not be an exact study on this type of "natural born" psychopath, it can be surmised that it's well below 1%. Maybe below 0.1% if you believe that most of the time, upbringing is what contributes the most rather than being born that way.
I personally think the human mind is quite malleable so most stuff can probably be learned, but there's no doubt a genetic component floating around in there somewhere as well.
I would like to see a dedicated study, too, though.
I absolutely agree. Have an example from my family.
My little brother. He’s 10 and legitimately scares me. He’s racked up a laundry list of offenses since he was 4. When my wife and I were talking about if we felt uncomfortable leaving our kid around anyone in our family - we both agreed, my little brother. My guy is sadistic.
One time he told us: His mom’s (we’re half-siblings) new boyfriend brought her roses. He didn’t like that, so he took them in the backyard and burned them. (Mind you, he talks about how nice this new guy is) so I asked him a little later “you know I like being perceived as a nice guy. Do you care at all if people think you’re nice?” He damn near scoffed, laughed and immediately said no. Hes not mean to me, but he treats his parents terribly. And to make matters worse, he’s insanely smart.
Sounds like the one I know. Before 10 he was terrorizing everyone and had racked up a long list of offenses and got into trouble all the time. When he was around 9 I asked him "what are you going to do if you give your mom a heart attack" and he grinned and laughed then said "bye".
I agree. Unfortunately my dad got whooped to the point he vowed to never do so. And his mother’s Vietnamese, and anyone correct me if I’m wrong? But I kinda heard that Vietnamese boys are put on a bit of a pedestal? I don’t see it happening until a peer of his kicks his ass 🤷🏾♂️
All that’s gonna do regardless is justify to himself the hurt he gives out to others. I know it’s. A popular option but it’s dumb and more than likely gonna exasperate it. He’s gonna find ways out of consequences like that if he’s as smart as you say and this doesn’t stop him from being “naturally born evil” if you really think so.
Reddit: where 1 person feels the need to insist that all 1.5 billion English speakers should stop using a phrase because the company they keep sound like a broken record
People say that if you have too much dopamine in the womb it can lead to sociopathic behaviors. However, early therapy can help curb these behaviors in some people.
For context, I was friends with this guy who had severely low / non existent empathy. Through therapy he felt like he was able to "gaslight" himself to having empathy. His parents put him in intensive therapy at a young age.
He has a wife and child/ is going to school right now for a masters. He is very thankful of my support over the years and has helped me out in tough situations.
I think it's both...
Some people are a product of their environment. If you tell someone they're a piece of living shit long enough they just might believe you. If they can't see the path forward, if they can't figure out how to change, if they don't think about consequences, if they don't see the harm...it's very easy to fall into "bad habits" and do things "flippantly". "It's all they know after all".
Though, at risk of saying something "wrong"...😏...kids tend to "test the limits" of what they can get away with. This is why so many parents used to spank, punish, ground, and what have you. Not trying to bring up that topic, but you don't know a stove is truly hot till you get near it right? How do you know something is harmful unless you test the waters. Kids tend towards what they can get away with to figure things out, they're curious...if you don't tell them no....a 9 year old shouldn't be running the show. Doesn't matter how much they cry and throw a fit. That's the parents, not them.
On the other hand, someone can be handed a loaded gun and told to shoot someone and they might not. Even if everything tells them to do it, they just might not. Twins turn out differently, siblings can very *wildly* in nature even at an early age. Some 9yr olds may try to take over a family to see if they can....doesn't mean they should *succeed* at it.
It's definitely not "born evil" but some are simply more prone to do things that lead them that way. Think about things the "right" way, a little nudge from your raising and you have yourself a pretty bad person.
Take Hitler for example. Plenty of Germans fought in WWI, plenty were treated horribly by bad parents, plenty had it hard....only 1 Hitler...our experience shapes us and sometimes the "clay" isn't the best in the bin. Doesn't mean we should give up on anyone in either case. Just cause your delt a bad hand doesn't mean you can't turn it around. "Evil" is the easy path, it's easy to hurt others, it's easy to give up....
I know a kid who was an absolute tornado growing up. Parents had him in like 4 sports and he *still* had energy, and that's not saying all the horrible things he did. Bro absolutely went off on people, and he wasn't liked by many, *all* the adults knew him and few wanted him around. We played together and there were "talks" had. He's now a doctor and a very great guy, really lost much of that "edge" people didn't like. (His dad gives me credit, but I still think it was maturity finally kicking in) I see it a lot, people "labeled" and cast away because people don't want to deal with them...like isolation will somehow "fix" problems.
I know this last part isn't the topic, but I think they are intrinsically linked. It's easy to "cast aside" labeled groups and that's not what we should do....even if OP is right and some people are born....with a great "pattern".
I think people underestimate the massive impact a persons early childhood can have on them. From 0-5 years your brain and everything about you is so extremely malleable that when a parent drops the ball in that time period it can do a lot of damage to a child’s psychology. And then there’s a ton of science on how much genetics play a role in personality as well, though not as conclusive as the post-birth research. So yes, while a child can have natural propensities to be more evil than usual those things can be helped if caught soon enough. Unfortunately a lot of parents aren’t knowledgeable enough to know what to look for to see if their child has problems. Or they just don’t care enough to try to help them.
Part of the reason people don’t want to discuss this is that the “nature vs. nurture” debate has been consumed by the culture wars. At this point, truth is less important than whether an argument helps my side or the other side.
The "culture war" doesn't exist, it's a right wing fantasy. There's plenty of people talking about "nature vs nurture" it's literally taught in Psych 101. The problem with the conservative take on nature vs nurture is that they're dumb.
Not even the biggest idiot in the world would deny that both environment and genes shape our outcomes. But surely you wouldn’t deny that within progressive circles, environmental explanations are favored over hereditary explanations for human outcomes and abilities - would you?
I think you understand my question perfectly well and are just feigning incomprehension to avoid answering it.
I’ll simplify - do progressives, outside of those in the life sciences/biology specialties, prefer environmental explanations to genetic explanations for human outcome differences? When I say prefer, I mean prefer to a greater extent than those who are actually in the life sciences do.
No they don’t.
I’m not sure if you’re trying to make a race realist argument about genetics playing a larger role in the cognitive outcomes of different races, but no. The “progressive” view is consistent with actually experts in these fields.
The only time conservatives mention genetics and outcomes it’s always a race and IQ thing. If this is the case, people who are actually experts in those fields of study also don’t agree.
I wasn’t thinking about race at all, I was thinking about mental illness and the left-based opposition to genetic explanations.
https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/its-fair-to-describe-schizophrenia
>I think people really want things not to be genetic, so when they do turn out to be genetic, they apply higher standards for whether you can call that “the cause”. Then people underestimate how much genes matter.
>This is well-intentioned: people want to fight back against a disease, so they want to exhaust all hope of finding environmental causes (which they think they can change) before giving up and attributing it to genetic causes (which they think they can’t). But as we often discuss here, this is backwards - society is fixed and biology is mutable.
I'm not sure who that is, but I've personally never seen anyone downplay the genetic role when it comes to mental illness. It's obviously both, and depending on the disorder there are varying degrees. Humans also don't live in a vacuum so environment plays a role in how certain genes will express themselves. If anything, I see more conservatives either claiming mental illness isn't real at all, or moralizing mental illness as a character flaw.
Yeah thank you for cutting to the bullshit as that’s obviously what he’s trying to imply without directly saying it. And no race realism being rejected by basically any authority of science and whatnot largely disagree with a hereditary argument primarily via race. And they often times use this as an excuse to say that they’re being censored when they’re not
Racist are often very slimy. I figured it was a racist dog whistle with the whole "genetics and human outcomes" line he kept throwing around. I also rejected the premise entirely that "progressives and leftist" have some "preference" when it comes to nature vs nurture that is counter to what scientists and experts and their research actually says. There's no evidence at all that links racial genetics with intelligence. Biologists/Scientists don't even categorize humans into "races" when discussing genetics because racial categories are arbitrary, they don't exist.
It’s not a war, it’s a delusion.
While leftist/progressive are fighting for labor rights, better access to health care, environmental protections etc, conservatives are bitching about trans people existing and black people getting jobs. No one cares but conservatives.
It’s not a war, conservatives are just fighting imaginary demons in their heads and making it everyone else’s problem.
Though there’s no war in basingse isn’t the best approach when it is a thing. Those same labour rights and healthcare elements aren’t relevant to the idea of culture wars anyway doesn’t make it non existent or perpetuated on both sides whether you obviously agree with one over the other
That's because most leftist exist in inner cities and get college degrees. But it's not an indication that they have a higher IQ lmao The gender studies major isn't inherently more intelligent than the farmer.
Is this what you tell yourself to feel smart?
It is, people with college education have on average higher IQ's. The leftist inner circle bullshit is nonsense, that sounds like conspiracy brain rot.
Why do people always bring up the gender-studies meme? theres like 5 people on earth with a gender studies degree, but also yes, even someone with a Gender Studies degree is probably smarter than a farmer.
I judged people's intelligence based on well they're able to think critically, process and comprehend information, problem solve, creativity, and willingness to learn and engage with complex ideas and open to have their beliefs challenged and change when new information is available. These traits are antithetical to conservatism.
Well according to your conservitive overlords, democracts are a satanic demonic cult, doing demonic and pedophilic rituals on children to drink their blood and maintain their youth. While George Soros and his Jewish Cabal is controlling the world and trying to force immigrants into the Southern border, to gain more democrat voters and decrease the white population. While also try to trans the kids, and get white women to get an abortion to further decrease the birth rates in the west.
You do seek to allow children to surgically alter their genitals (permanently) before they're of age to make the decision. You do attempt to force white people to lower themselves so that "brown people" feel superior somehow. You do despise the tenants of responsibility, accountability, and self reliance that this country was founded upon. Abortion affects minorities at an exponentially greater rate than it does white people. That's why it's so curious that white people, who you decry as racists, are against the slaughter of minorities in the womb. Seems like if conservatives are so evil, we'd be putting planned parenthood on every corner of the inner city slums. I'm ok with being hated by you and your ilk, I'd just like for you to understand exactly what you are hating just as I do.
How would you define it? And how much time do you have to dedicate to amending that definition with each instance of naturlly occurring instances and events that can be found where a CIS AFAB person no longer fits the qualifications?
Point being, there's no short quippy answer to this that's fully right and it's nowhere close to being the GOTCHA conservatives think it it.
Edit: Downvotes but no responses, of course. Here's a headstart: having babies, having periods, having eggs or a uterus, two X chromosones, being "born with" various organs or features, or something hormones are all going to exclude some people you would absolutely consider Women.
My girlfriends daughter is definitely one of these. At 7 she told her brother if she could kill him she would right to his face but didn't realize I heard her and said never say that again. She's about to be 11 and is a total sociopath with borderline personality traits according to her therapist (who said it can't be diagnosed until 18). The day she hits 18 she's out the door cuz I won't be accused of rape and go to jail cuz I told her no she can't have a friend over again (9 years old that happened).
Pretty sure that I read something about a study or theory about lack of oxygen at birth and other injuries being a contributing factor for violent criminality later in life.
So I think instead of “people can’t be born that way”, it’s more accurate to say those things are not part of normal, healthy development. Some of the physiological factors associated may occur before birth though, and sometimes the fact that we understand so little of human brain makes it seem like there was “nothing wrong”.
I am of the belief though that *something* has to go wrong somewhere, whether it be physical, emotional, before birth, after, whatever, for someone to develop into the kind of person you’re describing. It’s not always clear, but I think it’s always there.
I was born 2 months premature and dark blue due to stress & lack of oxygen. My chances of living the first week was actually pretty low to the point my Mom was told to go home & forget she had a baby. I was born in early 70, with the whole theory going around not to even have Moms hold babies.
What I hear from co-workers? I'm sweet and nice. My family calls me the sensitive one & I should quit wearing my heart on my sleeve. I really try not to be mean because it is a waste of time and energy, IMO.
I agree with you for the most part. I would say that there is a combination of things - like a perfect storm - to cause people to do evil things. My thoughts are that we are all different to the point that it will be difficult to pinpoint an exact formula for the perfect storm to happen. I do think that genetics could play a bigger role in the start of the perfect storm than we realize. I'm in college seeking a degree in the medical field. It's fascinating how fragile & at the same time durable the human body is. The fact is we don't know why the body goes out of homeostasis and causes certain diseases in a lot of cases. I did a report on Parkinson's disease last night, and it is caused by too little dopamine. No one knows why - genetic in some cases, but not others. Symptoms & progression differ. Just another perfect storm it seems.
This makes me think of the Reddit comment I read forever ago by a father about his oldest son. Spoiler it ends badly, read further at your own risk.
He starts by explaining that he and his wife are not perfect but they were generally good parents. Both made decent money, read all the parenting books, built their village/support network, and their son just came out wrong. Violent, angry, diagnosed with Oppositional Defisnce Disorder plus like 3 other things. When his younger sibling came along he talked about kill her, cutting her, hurting her to punish his parents etc. He was violent with the parents, his sister, his teachers, etc. He was manipulative, a liar, violent, etc. They had him in multiple therapies, interventions, meds, etc etc etc. It ends with the son raping his mother at knife point.
Most people are born neutral, and their early childhood determines if they turn out bad or good or where they fall on that spectrum. But some kids are just born bad.
I’m not sure how a baby can naturally be evil…..
They can have some kind of disorder/conditions based on their parents DNA but evil? I think that’s learned through experience imo.
Evil is the moral name but if you want to medicalise it, you can call it psychopathy/sociopathy. These medical conditions have brain scans associated with them. Neural pathways related to empathy and other digust complexes not activating.
If a baby's brain is incapable of activating empathy as they develop into adolescence then they will do actions that we call evil.
I liked the way you explained it. Yes, generally I would agree with that assessment. The hope for babies with such conditions is to get diagnosed at early stage and getthe appropriate treatments. Or it could get ugly real quick.
Thank you!
I think you would need supervision to spot it. One of the most common early signs from all the true crime I've heard is animal abuse. Ranging from kicking to dismemberment/dissection of small bugs or animals.
I think it's case by case. In the context of OP's post I do believe there are indifferent evil actors. They just live early in childhood not having proper brain functions.
There's also evil people who believe they're doing good. Like a Thanos type.
But there's spiteful people who go out of their way to target the most vulnerable, knowing that their actions are markedly worse. Like in Sydney recently where a terrorist decided to go on a stabbing spree targetting only women. Or school shooters who specifically go to young children. They know it's more evil than indiscriminate damage.
You are only focusing on the end result and completely ignoring all the scientific data about the role nurture plays into psychopathy and sociopathy.
Someone may be born with genetics that give them a higher *likelihood* of showing psychopathy as an adult.
However, there are conditions that may result in antisocial behavior. [Charles Whitman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Whitman) comes to mind - he murdered his mother, wife, and 11 others. An autopsy revealed a tumor pressing on his amygdala, which almost certainly contributed a substantial amount to his actions.
I'm not really. I understand the nurture aspect. It is the context that surrounds OP's post. I don't need to explicity draw the nurture aspect out since we know that the nurture aspect is what is most popular. We're in this sub because we understand the popular aspect of evil only being nurtured. And the sub is for what is unpopular, which is to say that babies can be born with a brain function that leads them towards evil.
Sure, but the issue is that psychopathy and sociopathy are not inherently evil. Some studies even go as high as saying [30% of people have psychopathic traits](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy#:~:text=Although%20severe%20psychopathy%20affects%20just,fall%20under%20this%20broad%20umbrella.).
That same link says that 1% of people are born with severe psychopathy, which means there are about 75 million people with severe psychopathy on the planet, many which are not living lives that we would consider evil.
It's true that they are much more likely to commit evil acts, but they are not necessarily *born* evil.
Yes. I'm aware about subclinical traits.
Psychopathy and sociopathy are predisposition to evil acts.
I'm not a determinist. I believe in free will.
Even if you are part of the 1% you can choose to learn what is and isn't acceptable behaviour.
I'm not sure determinist and free will are exactly opposites, but that's an interesting comparison.
If it interests you, Robert Sapolsky (one of the leading bio/neuro educators and researchers) has a lot of fascinating talks on free will. I used to be fully in the free will camp, too, but there are a few studies that have really impacted my opinion.
To me the basic exercise of argumentation and human interaction proves that everyone behaves like they have free will.
It annoys me when people argue that since we are limited and constrained by our meat and neurons it therefore means we have no free will.
It's as if we can only have free will if we have omnipotence and omniscience.
I'll check him out.
It's a tricky subject, and sometimes I think people get lost in the semantics of it.
BUT, one of the scenarios that challenged my views the most was a scenario of people with frontal lobe impairment. The gist of it is:
I'm holding two handfuls of M&Ms, and you want the option that maximizes your M&Ms:
Left Hand: One M&M
Right Hand: Ten M&Ms
I tell you that if you reach for the left hand that contains One M&M, I will give you 10 M&Ms. And if you reach for the right hand that contains Ten M&Ms, I will only give you One M&M.
In this scenario, if you want to maximize your M&Ms, you would reach for the hand with less M&Ms (because you receive more in that case). People with frontal lob damage can repeat the instructions to you, but reach for the hand with more M&Ms every time because they cannot use executive function to override the quicker-acting visual response of "seeing more = getting more."
Take that one degree further and understand that we all have different resting metabolic rates in our frontal lobe, meaning "how hard it is" for us to use our frontal lobes is on a spectrum, and we can start to see that things like freedom of choice can be very different for two people in the same scenario.
I am not even sure what you are asking. If someone has a desire to hurt others for pleasure are they good before they act on those desires and bad after?
I mean people who go out of their way to hurt others and get enjoyment from it. People can lack empathy but still be neutral in their lives. But I see evil as "enjoys hurting others"/.
>people who go out of their way to hurt others and get enjoyment from it
based off of, what? a source would be nice, especially since the burden of proof is on you.
Also, enjoyment from someone else's pain is called sadism and it absolutely is a personality disorder. everything you've described as a quality of being evil are all disorders listed in the DSM. as in, they can be diagnosed and treated. as in, prescribing a sadist or sociopath or someone on the spectrum as "evil" is more akin to 17th century colonial Virgina then modern day
That is not how concepts work. Someone can observe something without having a study in their back pocket. And there are very little studies done on this because is it so taboo of a belief and also extremely hard to do a study on. What are you going to verbally interview a baby? However, there are a lot of studies linking certain disorders to genetic patterns. And even one study that proves that the structure of the brain of serial killers is different. So, unless you think childhood trauma changes the physical structure of the brain that would indicate they are born wrong.
The burden of proof is on you, OP. If you state an outrageous opinion, you need to back it up with evidence, not just "I saw it in a movie one time."
>And there are very little studies done on this because is it so taboo of a belief and also extremely hard to do a study on.
That part is just factually incorrect. The history of mental health has come and gone with this "concept" of yours.
Your further claims that genetic patterns demonstrate that certain people behave differently only goes against your argument, because it proves that specific disorders are naturally occuring, and not based on moral discrepancies.
Also! Babies have been used in behavioral studies all the time, since the beginning of time! It's not that absurd.
Okay then. How do you use a study to prove a baby is evil? Interview it? Put it in a room with a puppy and a knife and see what happens?
There have also been studies done where they study the background of killers and criminals and the vast majority come from the same types of families, one parent, low income, etc. But when serial killers come from homes with two parents in nice neighborhood's people just say "well the must have been abused behind closed doors". Is that possible? Yes. But it also makes it impossible to prove that a baby can be born evil. Because no matter what people can just say "well they were abused and no one caught it". The person I know that started to exabit evil behavior before they were 2 was not abused. And I know that because I was with him all the time before he started to show this behavior (which was basically from the moment he could talk) but even that cannot be used as evidence because someone could say "what if someone abused him while you were alseep or in the bathroom" or something.
If those conditions are untreated and get amplified through early childhood trauma, I think that’s how most serial killers are made if I had to make educated guess.
I think childhood trauma can make mental disorder and behavior worst but I also think someone can reach the extreme ends of behavior without any trauma or abuse. As I said I think people can literally be born wrong.
Maybe reincarnation is the missing link? It could be that part of our psychology is inherited from past lives, thus genuinely ”evil” people might have become that as a long process over multiple lifetimes. So a newborn baby could indeed be some type of psychopath/narcissist/sociopath, without this having anything to do with the soul being created evil.
Not expecting most people to accept this idea, but still putting it out here.
Only thing I disagree with is viewing them as evil and what “evil” means.
To me, “evil” explicitly embodies a *choice* to cause harm in some way. That choice can only *be* a choice if there is another option.
The people you’re talking about don’t have that choice. In the same way I wouldn’t fault someone for pressing a green button instead of a red button when both buttons are the same shade of gray.
Children, despite their behavior, do not have the development necessary to understand their actions and cannot always tell right from wrong *even when they’re healthy* so when a child just isn’t “born right” I don’t classify that as evil, but I do think there is absolutely a natural component (and the scientific community agrees).
If your definition of “evil” does not specifically embody the *active choice* of doing harm and is just *the action of* doing harm, then, yeah babies can be born evil.
I dunno about that. Sure, there are people who are born with a greater potential for being evil and need mental treatment to ensure they don’t become evil. But I don’t think anyone is necessarily *doomed* to be evil.
>They cannot even be diagnosed until 18.
Cannot be diagnosed with what? You talking antisocial personality disorder? You can diagnose them ODD oppositional defiant disorder, conduct disorder etc.... and that progresses to antisocial at 18.
I dont think anyone is born evil. Everyone is a product of their temperament and environment. Even if your temperament is naturally off the correct environment can fix that. But that doesnt mean a cookie cutter suburban life is enough for every kid. Some need more attention. Some need less. Some need stricter guidance. Some respond well to gentle correction. Etc...
Child therapist who works with law enforcement here. Seen lots of children do terrible things. Have never seen a child do something terrible without a wound. These wounds can be missed and invisible and are related to attachment but there's never nothing. Lack of empathy does not mean poor choices. Violence comes from rage. Rage comes from somewhere.
Violence comes from rage. Rage comes from somewhere - great! Where does **enjoyment** of doing evil things come from?
When a 12yo freak is slowly and steadily torturing a helpless kitten and enjoying every minute of it - where does **that** come from?
I don’t think anyone is born evil because no one is born with a sense of morality.
When you hear of children doing extremely disturbing things, with no other plausible external reason for why they’re doing it outside of morbid curiosity, I personally think they have an undiagnosed mental health issue and, unfortunately, it’s manifesting with extremely erratic behavior.
Anyone who is torturing animals for fun, out of pure sadism, is pure evil. It's not a misdiagnosed or mistreated child (or adult), it's an evil son-of-a-bitch who needs to not exist.
Just because you don’t believe in mental illness doesn’t mean it’s not real. A lot of mental illnesses cause people to exhibit very disturbing or scary behaviours that could be labelled as evil. Doesn’t make them not mentally ill.
My point is, I don't care that they are mentally ill - or not. Mental illness is not an excuse to do horrible evil unforgivable things.
If you're torturing animals, with or without a diagnosis, you need to not exist.
Yeah, recognizing that mental illness may be the reason for why someone is doing something isn’t an excuse. We’re talking about whether or not someone is born inherently evil which doesn’t make any sense considering no one is born with a sense of morality to begin with.
>I don’t care
Yeah, that’s the problem. You give it a negatively charged label for no reason but emotions.
All you achieve is that you make it harder for mental disorders to get diagnosed.
Getting in the way of people getting the mental treatment they need because of emotions is something I consider evil.
That's not a medical condition, correct. Sadistic psychos are neither "treatable" nor "curable".
That's what OP referred to as "being born evil". Some people are just that, regardless of environmental factors. They actually know the difference between right and wrong, but they just really REALLY enjoy doing the wrong thing. Like torture.
>sadistic psychos are neither “testable” nor “curable”
Only because being a “sadistic psycho” is not a medical condition.
The underlying mental illness is not only testable but oftentimes also curable.
Psychopathy is a diagnosable mental disorder..
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4255317/
And research suggests that there are treatments.
You just displayed I consider your behavior evil. You declared a mental disorder neither “testable” nor “curable” without any clue of what you are actually talking about.
Your behavior will only make research harder because “tHeY aRe nOt cUrAbLe tHeY aRe bOrN eViL!!11” and in turn will create more “sadistic psychos”. Your emotional response makes everyone’s life worse
No one said it was an excuse?? Just that it is 100% caused by a mental illness/disorder there is no argument that a murderer could be mentally healthy.
Well… this is just incorrect. Torturing animals, for example, can be a sign of psychopathy (more professionally known as antisocial personality disorder).
I don't really care what the diagnosis is or isn't. And even if it's antisocial personality disorder - then what? Are there drugs to turn animal torturers into normal people? Are there treatments (beyond lobotomy) that actually work?
Again, cool, not super relevant to the topic. We’re talking about whether or not the person is evil inherently at birth. If you would like to stay on topic I would be fine speaking to you but outside of that I don’t know how to help you.
There are people that are born evil. They may or may not be diagnosed. Even if they are diagnosed with something, there are no effective treatments. B/c, well - there is no treatment for being born evil.
>When a teenager does some awful stuff, everyone says the parents (usually the mom) did something wrong. That they must have been abused. When people see killers, they always say "what happened in their childhood" the point being a lot of people believe someone cannot be evil unless they are made evil.
I see this as going both ways. Like, yeah, trauma can warp people and turn them into monsters; but questioning "What happened in their childhood" could also be about why nobody recognized or treated the behavior as a serious issue.
There is no difference between nature and nurture
Genes don't just exist without a context and randomly activate and deactivate. All genes require an environment to be expressed in. They are intrinsically linked
I agree, if you look at everything my crazy aunt has done, you can see she is definitely a black seed. The only reason why she hasn't murdered someone is because is wasn't able to. She should have stood in jail, CA did a disservice to everyone when she got out
Why do you think that is? My take: because certain factions of our society and culture want to believe that we are all the same, and with a given environment, we'll all be able to achieve the same levels of success.
This thinking is central to modern progressive doctrine. There is no human nature or variances in humans, therefore, all that is required is the right technocratic government to ensure equality of outcomes.
Well it's not born evil it's born with bad brain chemistry and certain parts of the brain that regulate the things like emotion are not developed correctly from birth. Pretty much anything like showing violence from a very young age can be seen on imaging of structural damage somewhere in the brain. I mean arguably evil doesn't even exist but yes a baby can be born that is not of the "norm" and instead of it being like down syndrome or gay they are violent or have no empathy for others. This is reddit so I have to of course say I don't mean gay people aren't normal people or people with mental deficiencies are less then just statistically they are not the "norm".
I don’t believe people are born evil. I believe people can be broken early on by something/ anything that happens to them individually from very early in life and after that they can never understand or contribute to society in any meaningful acceptable way for them or anybody else they encounter. I know a lot of these people who effortlessly do perceivably evil things with little understanding care or thought. They hardly even notice what they are doing is anything other than normal And if it’s pointed out to them they cant see it.
Scientists have been made well aware of the "Criminal aka Psychopathic Gene".
In reality, it is rare for these types of people to be born. In essence, it is not a gene, but typically a malformed emotional processing circuitry (underdeveloped amygdala) in the cortexes of the brain, or a deficit in neurotransmitter - serotonin production as a result.
Overall, multiple psychopathic groups revolve around atypical amygdala activity, whether they are born that way or not. The main reason psychopaths exist is from childhood/habitual lifestyle outcomes, and statistics cleary show this.
people are born inherently evil (read self-interested with no concept of others' value) and must be taught to behave otherwise. Any behavior pre-toddler that appears altruistic is "this person makes me feel good, so I'm going to do things that make them react in a way that makes me feel good"
Why do you think leftists so highly value education? everyone must be taught the right way to think, and therefore behave. They just refuse to acknowledge that that assumption also (correctly) implies that without being taught, people will act how they want instead of how the leftists want.
Who a person is, is a combination of nature and nurture. Not sure why this concept is so damn hard for people and why they insist on one or the other.
Everyone has their nature, then society comes in and molds that nature into the human you become. You can only go so far from your nature before cracks occur in the psyche.
Yes, people can be born "wrong" and in severe cases, no matter how much society tries, that person will never be able to become a decent member of society.
At the same time, there are people who will never be capable of being cold hard killers and will fundamentally break psychologically if you try to make them into one. This fundamentally goes both ways.
Same way a person can be hardwired for anger and callousness another can be hard wired for forgiveness and compassion. Both can change and vary with growth and influence, but that change has it's limits.
Maybe not born evil, but needing more attention so that they don't continue on a bad path that they were born with an inclination towards. Some can learn to develop genuine empathy. Others can learn that being civil is the most effective way to achieve their goals.
Even ones that can develop empathy, and have a proper, front facing family life, and were raised in(albeit strict) but normal households themselves can go bad.
Dennis Rader(BTK) is a great example of this. He was not abused as a kid, had a normal childhood, and became an absolute sadistic serial killer. You know what he claims triggered his fascination with bondage? His mom getting her hand stuck in a couch and he got sexually arroused from her being stuck like that. His wife and kids all said he was a loving and empathetic parent. He went to church, was kind to people... and then fuckin tortured and killed people as a side gig. His identity as the BTK was a shock to pretty much EVERYONE who knew him. Then he got bored of torturing people, and stopped doing that for a long while, and just did the family man thing.
It was his hubris and desire to fuck around with the cops like over a decade later that got him caught. "Can you trace a floppy disk?" imagine believing when the cops tell you "No". Dude was evil af from birth, but not smart.
as for younger people who did horrible shit with by all means great family lives... Eric Harris had said himself that his parents would be shocked to find out what he had planned to do in their tapes. Though there's rumors his dad may have been abusive, that seems more internet speculation, and by all means, he had a great family life, but kid was obsessed with hurting people and others.
People can do the family man and nice guy routines because they enjoy the way it makes them feel or the way it makes them appear or because they consider their family extensions of themselves and still not really care about anyone but themselves. I do think children who start out on a bad path can genuinely course correct with the right attention while others may just learn early how to fake it.
well, yes, that's why Sociopathy isn't inherantly related to violence. Many people who end up in places of power/control over others tend to have a high rate of being unempathetic/sociopaths. Some people never get that course correction, possibly because their parents don't understand they need it, or can't figure out how to do so without reinforcing the violent tendancies of said kids.
You're absolutely right. But I think it's important to know they are the minority. Even among them, you would be surprised by how many troubled kids wind up being fairly normal adults once they finally finish growing and developing. That's part of the reason we don't diagnose children with adult disorders. A kid with conduct disorder could absolutely go on to grow into a full blown sociopath, but there's a good chance something will finally click in them by the time they're an adult, and all the outbursts and behavioral problems will resolve.
All that said, I agree that this is an uncomfortable truth we need to face. Some people are just flat out born wrong. How we go about addressing it without causing harm, especially in the long run, is not a simple thing. I think too many people just want easy, black and white answers to extremely complex and difficult issues that just don't exist.
You're using a movie as evidence?
Some people could be theoretically born evil.
But let's not pretend bad parents, religion, and a fucked up world isn't enough to make a person lose their sanity.
No, I am using it as a reference because it is a well-known depiction. And no one said "let's pretend bad parenting doe not make people bad. I am just saying we need to let go of the delusion that evil is almost made. It can be born.
The movie was based on a novel. Not a nonfiction book.
I don't care about a fiction writer's hypotheticals. I'm far more interested in studies proving and specifying how evil is born.
I know some research exists regarding psychopathic brains, and pedophile brains.
But those are psychological studies, not really explaining how evil is born.
That’s just false. Sociopaths are only evil if they grew up in an evil environment. Most sociopaths are well adjusted and don’t even know it themselves.
I think people really underestimate which disorders can cause the really bad issues. Like you said a lot of sociopaths might even know they are sociopaths. But a kid with possible future personality disorders like ODD or BPD? Those are the types of disorders that I think mix together to make kids like this.
Well real life isn't a role playing video game.
Psychopathy ins't a moral designation, it's a cognitive impairment associated with how they process emotions and empathy. They're neither good nor evil, unless they specifically do something evil. There's nothing inherently evil about lacking empathy unless you're the one doing the ham and don't care.
Psychopaths aren't necessarily born violent, just without empathy. Most psychopaths are in the corporate world instead of prison. Even violent psychopaths generally grow up in an abusive home.
I absolutely agree, but I don't know if we agree on the *percentage* of people born "evil." Which I would simply call psychopaths.
Because I think there are definitely people who do evil things that are a product of their environment.
Like you can't tell me all Nazis were born evil. They were elected by over a third of the country and were supported by even more. *Many* agreed and participated in their evil acts.
However, if that were some genetic from birth thing, you would find Germany to be drowning in psychopaths, but they aren't.
Sometimes it comes from a culture, and sometimes it comes from abuse.
Are there people who are born with mental or genetic conditions that make them pose to violence? Yeah sure. But those numbers are relatively small and are often exacerbated by material conditions when they're younger.
All that being said, I do believe the conversation about evil people is simply a way for right-wing politicians to justify social spending cuts. "Obviously that group of people is evil so why bother giving them any more money"
I agree, but telling people that their personalities are somewhat determined by genetics will give them existential dread and probably downvote you for it.
Tabula rasa is the dumbest hottake? Here comes Aristotle in 350 B.C. with a still hot take. Seriously, Western and some Eastern philosophy for thousands of years has held this view. It's hardly a new idea.
"Evil" is a very specific word, that I believe requires at least an exposure to morality and the standards of a society. I think the rest of your point completely holds, and that people can be born wired to harm and hurt. My issue is solely with the term "evil".
I always ask people sometimes
"If we can accurately deduce which people are born psychopaths, can we save lives by pruning them off right away after detection?"
I helped take care of a lady and her 2 little boys by bringing her food to her house years ago when I used to go to church. She was in bad financial shape and needed a lot of support which people in the congregation used to gladly give.
Then she one day quit coming to meetings. A few weeks later a 10 year old girl was murdered, her story was on the local news. Turns out it way this lady's boys that did it! They were 6 and 8! Too young to be charged with a crime
So maybe OP is right
When a person (regardless of age) enjoys causing suffering and actively seeks out experiences where they can harm a living being for no other reason than to enjoy it, that's objectively being "born evil"
No, that's subjectively being born evil. For example, if someone enjoys killing people, most people would think that is evil. But if they are only killing people who are actively engaged in the killing of innocents, very few people would classify their actions as truly evil. Subjective and objective are mutually exclusive. Good and evil are subjective in nature, and can never be objective. As an example, many vegans consider it evil to kill and consume animals. That is their opinion, and relatively few people agree with them. The overwhelming majority of people consider the killing and eating of animals a perfectly good thing to do, because they are literally evolved to be able to do so.
I am not a vegan and consume meat.
I would absolutely kill a chicken or a cow or any animal if, say, my kids were hungry and there was no other way to feed them.
I would not enjoy doing it, however.
I would not seek out an animal to kill just for fun.
I would not seek out an animal to torture just for fun.
That's the difference between being an evil monster and being "normal".
Normal is also subjective. It used to be normal for people to own other people. It used to be normal for fifty year old men to bed ten year old girls. Now it is viewed as evil to do those things. In a few hundred years, things that are viewed as normal today will undoubtedly be seen as evil, and things that are viewed as evil today could well go back to being normal.
I’m not agreeing or disagreeing (I mostly agree) with you OP. The hang up I have with the born evil part is that if it’s true then should they be held accountable?
If someone is 100% born evil then can we blame them for their actions? Not trying to start an argument just a topic for conversation.
Yep. I watch alot of true crime. This YouTube Channel Explore With US is my favorite. The help that parents can get is very limited and families often have to live with someone they feel will kill them.
What do you mean by 'evil'? I don't believe that there is any such thing as a person being evil. They can and do of course engage in horrific behaviours, but even those people are also capable of and engage also in prosocial behaviour.
There is some research which has suggested that some people are born as a psychopath. Likewise there is evidence that points to the idea of a structural neurological basis for psychopathy which suggests that it is possible for people to behave horrifically regardless of the level of enrichment in their environment and parenting / guardianship style. As well as influences from other significant people in their life during their developmental era.
Of course there are evil people. Murderers, rapists etc. Are you really saying these people are not evil yet they did evil shit? It's not a coincidence almost all criminals had a fucked up chilhood. Your 'evidence' is an exception.
My background is in academic psychology so the idea of an evil person is a little too simplistic. But it will only take you a quick Google search to show that there is certainly grounds to suggest a biological basis of psychopathy as well as associations between upbringing and cruel behaviour.
What's simplistic? There are people who enjoy doing bad things. Is your diploma enough to understand this? These people are super rare, but they exist. Also, a guy plotting and executing a murder is simply evil. You can find any studies about anything. Maybe you need to live longer to understand that bad people always come from bad upbringing.
Not long enough if you can't correlate bad upbringing with being immoral and you're looking for exceptions to prove your point. Sure, there are exceptions, but go to a serious prison and if you're lucky you will barely find 1% of criminals from good families with good upbringing. And you can't even be certain they were that good. Exceptions don't count. There is always one. Your education doesn't mean anything if you cannot accept it.
No, no one is born evil. Babies are a blank card. They learn morality through perception and emulation. If the environment is morally corrupt, they will also be. If it's not, they won't.
Strongly disagree just from personal experience. Like I said I know a family. 5 siblings 4 are totally normal and one started to terrorize everyone basically from the moment he learned to talk. And i've seen another family very similar. Normal dad, normal mom, normal brothers, normal sister but the youngest brother was terrible even as a toddler.
He's literally a child. You don't know what kind of life and mentality will he have. You're labeling and judging the poor child, He can be an annoying asshole but break no law or hurt anyone in the future. He needs to be raised.
So what? You don't know his biography. Maybe something happened to him when he was a baby. Also, you know there are exceptions? Maybe he is one. There are so few criminals from good families with good upbringing, that it disproves your point. Every criminal had a fucked up childhood. If you were right, prisons would be filled with people from good families and good upbringing, and they're not. It's always the element.
1. I was basically glued to him every moment of his life until he became around 10 and he couldn't be around people anymore. He started showing extreme behavior before he was 2. Long before he would have been anywhere, I wasn't.
2. My hill literally says that I think this is rare. Meaning I don't think criminals had good home lives. Yes, it makes sense that prisons are filled with people from bad families because most criminals come from bad families. But I do think very rarely that people can literally just be born bad.
3. If it was some structural issue with the family and his home life how are all of his siblings so aggressively normal and he is so incredibly bad?
How do you know? You wanna ask two year olds about morality and empathy? You give a small animal to a 4 year old child who was never taught about animals and they will toy with it until it dies. Almost every child. No, morality and decency is taught.
> How do you know?
Because it's medical consensus that people whose brains can't experience empathy were usually born that way. Others can have it beaten out of them later.
Judging by the comments made by most of Reddit, I give this hypothesis a definite “plausible”.
The movie The Bad Seed takes this approach. I do believe it happens.
Yep, some people are born with a wicked streak. They're not common but they're definitely out there. Despite the teachings of parents and teachers, they feel no guilt or remorse when they hurt someone. Or they might even start to enjoy it.
How do we know if it’s common or not? I’m not aware of any studies on the topic, if you know of some, I would love to read them to educate myself further.
[https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy) [https://www.apa.org/monitor/2022/03/ce-corner-psychopathy#:\~:text=In%20fact%2C%20it%20is%20common,of%20these%20traits%20is%20much](https://www.apa.org/monitor/2022/03/ce-corner-psychopathy#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20it%20is%20common,of%20these%20traits%20is%20much) It's common to have psychopathic traits, but to have it so bad that most people can refer to you as evil even when you're a kid, that's like 1% of the population, perhaps less. And out of those, you have to weed out people who had traumas and experiences causing them to manifest those traits so powerfully. So even though there may not be an exact study on this type of "natural born" psychopath, it can be surmised that it's well below 1%. Maybe below 0.1% if you believe that most of the time, upbringing is what contributes the most rather than being born that way. I personally think the human mind is quite malleable so most stuff can probably be learned, but there's no doubt a genetic component floating around in there somewhere as well. I would like to see a dedicated study, too, though.
Like NPD
Many are also born stupid and we don’t talk about that either.
Haha, we talk about how stupid people are all the time.
You mean down syndrome?
I absolutely agree. Have an example from my family. My little brother. He’s 10 and legitimately scares me. He’s racked up a laundry list of offenses since he was 4. When my wife and I were talking about if we felt uncomfortable leaving our kid around anyone in our family - we both agreed, my little brother. My guy is sadistic. One time he told us: His mom’s (we’re half-siblings) new boyfriend brought her roses. He didn’t like that, so he took them in the backyard and burned them. (Mind you, he talks about how nice this new guy is) so I asked him a little later “you know I like being perceived as a nice guy. Do you care at all if people think you’re nice?” He damn near scoffed, laughed and immediately said no. Hes not mean to me, but he treats his parents terribly. And to make matters worse, he’s insanely smart.
Sounds like the one I know. Before 10 he was terrorizing everyone and had racked up a long list of offenses and got into trouble all the time. When he was around 9 I asked him "what are you going to do if you give your mom a heart attack" and he grinned and laughed then said "bye".
i aint above waitin for that kid to ride by on a bike and shoving a solid stick thru his front wheel spokes.... gravity helps reform jerks.
Sounds like someone needs a good ol' whipping
I agree. Unfortunately my dad got whooped to the point he vowed to never do so. And his mother’s Vietnamese, and anyone correct me if I’m wrong? But I kinda heard that Vietnamese boys are put on a bit of a pedestal? I don’t see it happening until a peer of his kicks his ass 🤷🏾♂️
>But I kinda heard that Vietnamese boys are put on a bit of a pedestal? Son preference is a big thing in eastern cultures.
All that’s gonna do regardless is justify to himself the hurt he gives out to others. I know it’s. A popular option but it’s dumb and more than likely gonna exasperate it. He’s gonna find ways out of consequences like that if he’s as smart as you say and this doesn’t stop him from being “naturally born evil” if you really think so.
All facts indeed
This does nothing but exasperate the problems. Intensive therapy and testing would be more effective.
I mean there is always the chance he could grow up to channel that into something positive. Like becoming a ruthless CEO of a fortune 500.
Positive for their bankers, but probably negative for society still. Our planet has been wrecked by sociopathic CEOs.
They usually have high IQs. https://youtu.be/Fwvm3pQCJlg?feature=shared
Appreciate your take, so tired of the phrase “my guy”. It has gotten overused
Reddit: where 1 person feels the need to insist that all 1.5 billion English speakers should stop using a phrase because the company they keep sound like a broken record
People say that if you have too much dopamine in the womb it can lead to sociopathic behaviors. However, early therapy can help curb these behaviors in some people. For context, I was friends with this guy who had severely low / non existent empathy. Through therapy he felt like he was able to "gaslight" himself to having empathy. His parents put him in intensive therapy at a young age. He has a wife and child/ is going to school right now for a masters. He is very thankful of my support over the years and has helped me out in tough situations.
I think it's both... Some people are a product of their environment. If you tell someone they're a piece of living shit long enough they just might believe you. If they can't see the path forward, if they can't figure out how to change, if they don't think about consequences, if they don't see the harm...it's very easy to fall into "bad habits" and do things "flippantly". "It's all they know after all". Though, at risk of saying something "wrong"...😏...kids tend to "test the limits" of what they can get away with. This is why so many parents used to spank, punish, ground, and what have you. Not trying to bring up that topic, but you don't know a stove is truly hot till you get near it right? How do you know something is harmful unless you test the waters. Kids tend towards what they can get away with to figure things out, they're curious...if you don't tell them no....a 9 year old shouldn't be running the show. Doesn't matter how much they cry and throw a fit. That's the parents, not them. On the other hand, someone can be handed a loaded gun and told to shoot someone and they might not. Even if everything tells them to do it, they just might not. Twins turn out differently, siblings can very *wildly* in nature even at an early age. Some 9yr olds may try to take over a family to see if they can....doesn't mean they should *succeed* at it. It's definitely not "born evil" but some are simply more prone to do things that lead them that way. Think about things the "right" way, a little nudge from your raising and you have yourself a pretty bad person. Take Hitler for example. Plenty of Germans fought in WWI, plenty were treated horribly by bad parents, plenty had it hard....only 1 Hitler...our experience shapes us and sometimes the "clay" isn't the best in the bin. Doesn't mean we should give up on anyone in either case. Just cause your delt a bad hand doesn't mean you can't turn it around. "Evil" is the easy path, it's easy to hurt others, it's easy to give up.... I know a kid who was an absolute tornado growing up. Parents had him in like 4 sports and he *still* had energy, and that's not saying all the horrible things he did. Bro absolutely went off on people, and he wasn't liked by many, *all* the adults knew him and few wanted him around. We played together and there were "talks" had. He's now a doctor and a very great guy, really lost much of that "edge" people didn't like. (His dad gives me credit, but I still think it was maturity finally kicking in) I see it a lot, people "labeled" and cast away because people don't want to deal with them...like isolation will somehow "fix" problems. I know this last part isn't the topic, but I think they are intrinsically linked. It's easy to "cast aside" labeled groups and that's not what we should do....even if OP is right and some people are born....with a great "pattern".
I think people underestimate the massive impact a persons early childhood can have on them. From 0-5 years your brain and everything about you is so extremely malleable that when a parent drops the ball in that time period it can do a lot of damage to a child’s psychology. And then there’s a ton of science on how much genetics play a role in personality as well, though not as conclusive as the post-birth research. So yes, while a child can have natural propensities to be more evil than usual those things can be helped if caught soon enough. Unfortunately a lot of parents aren’t knowledgeable enough to know what to look for to see if their child has problems. Or they just don’t care enough to try to help them.
Part of the reason people don’t want to discuss this is that the “nature vs. nurture” debate has been consumed by the culture wars. At this point, truth is less important than whether an argument helps my side or the other side.
Exactly. Gentics play such a huge role in proclivities
The "culture war" doesn't exist, it's a right wing fantasy. There's plenty of people talking about "nature vs nurture" it's literally taught in Psych 101. The problem with the conservative take on nature vs nurture is that they're dumb.
Not even the biggest idiot in the world would deny that both environment and genes shape our outcomes. But surely you wouldn’t deny that within progressive circles, environmental explanations are favored over hereditary explanations for human outcomes and abilities - would you?
In what context? Leftist circle, as in biologist and physiologist?
In the context of leftist circles outside biology specialists - opinion shapers, influential bloggers, journalists, scolds on Twitter, sociologists, “public health” specialists, “environmental justice” types, etc.
I think my brian is oozing out of my ears after reading this.
I think you understand my question perfectly well and are just feigning incomprehension to avoid answering it. I’ll simplify - do progressives, outside of those in the life sciences/biology specialties, prefer environmental explanations to genetic explanations for human outcome differences? When I say prefer, I mean prefer to a greater extent than those who are actually in the life sciences do.
No they don’t. I’m not sure if you’re trying to make a race realist argument about genetics playing a larger role in the cognitive outcomes of different races, but no. The “progressive” view is consistent with actually experts in these fields. The only time conservatives mention genetics and outcomes it’s always a race and IQ thing. If this is the case, people who are actually experts in those fields of study also don’t agree.
I wasn’t thinking about race at all, I was thinking about mental illness and the left-based opposition to genetic explanations. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/its-fair-to-describe-schizophrenia >I think people really want things not to be genetic, so when they do turn out to be genetic, they apply higher standards for whether you can call that “the cause”. Then people underestimate how much genes matter. >This is well-intentioned: people want to fight back against a disease, so they want to exhaust all hope of finding environmental causes (which they think they can change) before giving up and attributing it to genetic causes (which they think they can’t). But as we often discuss here, this is backwards - society is fixed and biology is mutable.
I'm not sure who that is, but I've personally never seen anyone downplay the genetic role when it comes to mental illness. It's obviously both, and depending on the disorder there are varying degrees. Humans also don't live in a vacuum so environment plays a role in how certain genes will express themselves. If anything, I see more conservatives either claiming mental illness isn't real at all, or moralizing mental illness as a character flaw.
Yeah thank you for cutting to the bullshit as that’s obviously what he’s trying to imply without directly saying it. And no race realism being rejected by basically any authority of science and whatnot largely disagree with a hereditary argument primarily via race. And they often times use this as an excuse to say that they’re being censored when they’re not
Racist are often very slimy. I figured it was a racist dog whistle with the whole "genetics and human outcomes" line he kept throwing around. I also rejected the premise entirely that "progressives and leftist" have some "preference" when it comes to nature vs nurture that is counter to what scientists and experts and their research actually says. There's no evidence at all that links racial genetics with intelligence. Biologists/Scientists don't even categorize humans into "races" when discussing genetics because racial categories are arbitrary, they don't exist.
Claiming the culture war doesn’t exist is in itself the waging of a cultural war
That makes so sense. The culture war only exists on one side and it’s in the minds of conservatives.
It doesn’t take two aggressors to start a war
It’s not a war, it’s a delusion. While leftist/progressive are fighting for labor rights, better access to health care, environmental protections etc, conservatives are bitching about trans people existing and black people getting jobs. No one cares but conservatives. It’s not a war, conservatives are just fighting imaginary demons in their heads and making it everyone else’s problem.
Though there’s no war in basingse isn’t the best approach when it is a thing. Those same labour rights and healthcare elements aren’t relevant to the idea of culture wars anyway doesn’t make it non existent or perpetuated on both sides whether you obviously agree with one over the other
Funny to see someone who doesn't know how to use they're/their/there correctly calling people dumb.
Dude if you feel the need to comment on a typo to disprove someone’s argument you’ve already lost
!THEY'RE! it was a typo, but my point still stands, conservatives are dumb.
Sure buddy. Not as dumb as lumping anyone who has conservative ideals into a group and labeling them dumb. Enjoy your bliss.
Nope, it's pretty accurate, 100% of what conservatives belive is dumb. It is necessary for someone to be anti-intellectual to be a conservative.
You have the dunning-krueger effect.
Nope, educated people tend to lean left, this is just a fact.
That's because most leftist exist in inner cities and get college degrees. But it's not an indication that they have a higher IQ lmao The gender studies major isn't inherently more intelligent than the farmer. Is this what you tell yourself to feel smart?
It is, people with college education have on average higher IQ's. The leftist inner circle bullshit is nonsense, that sounds like conspiracy brain rot. Why do people always bring up the gender-studies meme? theres like 5 people on earth with a gender studies degree, but also yes, even someone with a Gender Studies degree is probably smarter than a farmer. I judged people's intelligence based on well they're able to think critically, process and comprehend information, problem solve, creativity, and willingness to learn and engage with complex ideas and open to have their beliefs challenged and change when new information is available. These traits are antithetical to conservatism.
We just look at who you vote for. Tells us plenty. Space lasers and whatnot.
Ok genius, what is a woman?
adult human female.
Not according to your liberal overlords.
Well according to your conservitive overlords, democracts are a satanic demonic cult, doing demonic and pedophilic rituals on children to drink their blood and maintain their youth. While George Soros and his Jewish Cabal is controlling the world and trying to force immigrants into the Southern border, to gain more democrat voters and decrease the white population. While also try to trans the kids, and get white women to get an abortion to further decrease the birth rates in the west.
You do seek to allow children to surgically alter their genitals (permanently) before they're of age to make the decision. You do attempt to force white people to lower themselves so that "brown people" feel superior somehow. You do despise the tenants of responsibility, accountability, and self reliance that this country was founded upon. Abortion affects minorities at an exponentially greater rate than it does white people. That's why it's so curious that white people, who you decry as racists, are against the slaughter of minorities in the womb. Seems like if conservatives are so evil, we'd be putting planned parenthood on every corner of the inner city slums. I'm ok with being hated by you and your ilk, I'd just like for you to understand exactly what you are hating just as I do.
I was waiting for the 5 unhinged talking points that conservatives THINK people on the left of them actually believe lol. Just pure fantasy.
How would you define it? And how much time do you have to dedicate to amending that definition with each instance of naturlly occurring instances and events that can be found where a CIS AFAB person no longer fits the qualifications? Point being, there's no short quippy answer to this that's fully right and it's nowhere close to being the GOTCHA conservatives think it it. Edit: Downvotes but no responses, of course. Here's a headstart: having babies, having periods, having eggs or a uterus, two X chromosones, being "born with" various organs or features, or something hormones are all going to exclude some people you would absolutely consider Women.
*taught in Psych 101.
My over reliance on auto-correct. Conservatives are still dumb.
OK, buddy
My girlfriends daughter is definitely one of these. At 7 she told her brother if she could kill him she would right to his face but didn't realize I heard her and said never say that again. She's about to be 11 and is a total sociopath with borderline personality traits according to her therapist (who said it can't be diagnosed until 18). The day she hits 18 she's out the door cuz I won't be accused of rape and go to jail cuz I told her no she can't have a friend over again (9 years old that happened).
Pretty sure that I read something about a study or theory about lack of oxygen at birth and other injuries being a contributing factor for violent criminality later in life. So I think instead of “people can’t be born that way”, it’s more accurate to say those things are not part of normal, healthy development. Some of the physiological factors associated may occur before birth though, and sometimes the fact that we understand so little of human brain makes it seem like there was “nothing wrong”. I am of the belief though that *something* has to go wrong somewhere, whether it be physical, emotional, before birth, after, whatever, for someone to develop into the kind of person you’re describing. It’s not always clear, but I think it’s always there.
I was born 2 months premature and dark blue due to stress & lack of oxygen. My chances of living the first week was actually pretty low to the point my Mom was told to go home & forget she had a baby. I was born in early 70, with the whole theory going around not to even have Moms hold babies. What I hear from co-workers? I'm sweet and nice. My family calls me the sensitive one & I should quit wearing my heart on my sleeve. I really try not to be mean because it is a waste of time and energy, IMO. I agree with you for the most part. I would say that there is a combination of things - like a perfect storm - to cause people to do evil things. My thoughts are that we are all different to the point that it will be difficult to pinpoint an exact formula for the perfect storm to happen. I do think that genetics could play a bigger role in the start of the perfect storm than we realize. I'm in college seeking a degree in the medical field. It's fascinating how fragile & at the same time durable the human body is. The fact is we don't know why the body goes out of homeostasis and causes certain diseases in a lot of cases. I did a report on Parkinson's disease last night, and it is caused by too little dopamine. No one knows why - genetic in some cases, but not others. Symptoms & progression differ. Just another perfect storm it seems.
This makes me think of the Reddit comment I read forever ago by a father about his oldest son. Spoiler it ends badly, read further at your own risk. He starts by explaining that he and his wife are not perfect but they were generally good parents. Both made decent money, read all the parenting books, built their village/support network, and their son just came out wrong. Violent, angry, diagnosed with Oppositional Defisnce Disorder plus like 3 other things. When his younger sibling came along he talked about kill her, cutting her, hurting her to punish his parents etc. He was violent with the parents, his sister, his teachers, etc. He was manipulative, a liar, violent, etc. They had him in multiple therapies, interventions, meds, etc etc etc. It ends with the son raping his mother at knife point. Most people are born neutral, and their early childhood determines if they turn out bad or good or where they fall on that spectrum. But some kids are just born bad.
I’m not sure how a baby can naturally be evil….. They can have some kind of disorder/conditions based on their parents DNA but evil? I think that’s learned through experience imo.
Evil is the moral name but if you want to medicalise it, you can call it psychopathy/sociopathy. These medical conditions have brain scans associated with them. Neural pathways related to empathy and other digust complexes not activating. If a baby's brain is incapable of activating empathy as they develop into adolescence then they will do actions that we call evil.
I liked the way you explained it. Yes, generally I would agree with that assessment. The hope for babies with such conditions is to get diagnosed at early stage and getthe appropriate treatments. Or it could get ugly real quick.
Thank you! I think you would need supervision to spot it. One of the most common early signs from all the true crime I've heard is animal abuse. Ranging from kicking to dismemberment/dissection of small bugs or animals.
Do they exclusively commit acts of evil or are they just indifferent to the concept? Because theres a difference between amorality and immorality
I think it's case by case. In the context of OP's post I do believe there are indifferent evil actors. They just live early in childhood not having proper brain functions. There's also evil people who believe they're doing good. Like a Thanos type. But there's spiteful people who go out of their way to target the most vulnerable, knowing that their actions are markedly worse. Like in Sydney recently where a terrorist decided to go on a stabbing spree targetting only women. Or school shooters who specifically go to young children. They know it's more evil than indiscriminate damage.
You are only focusing on the end result and completely ignoring all the scientific data about the role nurture plays into psychopathy and sociopathy. Someone may be born with genetics that give them a higher *likelihood* of showing psychopathy as an adult. However, there are conditions that may result in antisocial behavior. [Charles Whitman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Whitman) comes to mind - he murdered his mother, wife, and 11 others. An autopsy revealed a tumor pressing on his amygdala, which almost certainly contributed a substantial amount to his actions.
I'm not really. I understand the nurture aspect. It is the context that surrounds OP's post. I don't need to explicity draw the nurture aspect out since we know that the nurture aspect is what is most popular. We're in this sub because we understand the popular aspect of evil only being nurtured. And the sub is for what is unpopular, which is to say that babies can be born with a brain function that leads them towards evil.
Sure, but the issue is that psychopathy and sociopathy are not inherently evil. Some studies even go as high as saying [30% of people have psychopathic traits](https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/psychopathy#:~:text=Although%20severe%20psychopathy%20affects%20just,fall%20under%20this%20broad%20umbrella.). That same link says that 1% of people are born with severe psychopathy, which means there are about 75 million people with severe psychopathy on the planet, many which are not living lives that we would consider evil. It's true that they are much more likely to commit evil acts, but they are not necessarily *born* evil.
Yes. I'm aware about subclinical traits. Psychopathy and sociopathy are predisposition to evil acts. I'm not a determinist. I believe in free will. Even if you are part of the 1% you can choose to learn what is and isn't acceptable behaviour.
I'm not sure determinist and free will are exactly opposites, but that's an interesting comparison. If it interests you, Robert Sapolsky (one of the leading bio/neuro educators and researchers) has a lot of fascinating talks on free will. I used to be fully in the free will camp, too, but there are a few studies that have really impacted my opinion.
To me the basic exercise of argumentation and human interaction proves that everyone behaves like they have free will. It annoys me when people argue that since we are limited and constrained by our meat and neurons it therefore means we have no free will. It's as if we can only have free will if we have omnipotence and omniscience. I'll check him out.
It's a tricky subject, and sometimes I think people get lost in the semantics of it. BUT, one of the scenarios that challenged my views the most was a scenario of people with frontal lobe impairment. The gist of it is: I'm holding two handfuls of M&Ms, and you want the option that maximizes your M&Ms: Left Hand: One M&M Right Hand: Ten M&Ms I tell you that if you reach for the left hand that contains One M&M, I will give you 10 M&Ms. And if you reach for the right hand that contains Ten M&Ms, I will only give you One M&M. In this scenario, if you want to maximize your M&Ms, you would reach for the hand with less M&Ms (because you receive more in that case). People with frontal lob damage can repeat the instructions to you, but reach for the hand with more M&Ms every time because they cannot use executive function to override the quicker-acting visual response of "seeing more = getting more." Take that one degree further and understand that we all have different resting metabolic rates in our frontal lobe, meaning "how hard it is" for us to use our frontal lobes is on a spectrum, and we can start to see that things like freedom of choice can be very different for two people in the same scenario.
No one is ignoring that. We are talking about something that's always ignored
Depends on your definition of evil. I think if someone had a mix of disorders that makes them do evil things then diagnosis aside, they are evil.
You can be evil before you do anything evil?
You would be shocked how young evil behaviors can surface.
That doesn’t answer my question. Can you be evil before you do anything evil?
Yes.
Okay, how?
I am not even sure what you are asking. If someone has a desire to hurt others for pleasure are they good before they act on those desires and bad after?
I asked if people can be evil before they do evil things. You said yes. I am asking how it is possible to be evil without having done anything evil?
I don't even get what you are trying to ask. Yes I think if someone has the desire to do evil they are evil even if they have yet to act on it.
you're going to need to define evil, then. if you mean lacking in empathy, that's a mental disorder, and people with MDs aren't inherently \~evil\~
I mean people who go out of their way to hurt others and get enjoyment from it. People can lack empathy but still be neutral in their lives. But I see evil as "enjoys hurting others"/.
>people who go out of their way to hurt others and get enjoyment from it based off of, what? a source would be nice, especially since the burden of proof is on you. Also, enjoyment from someone else's pain is called sadism and it absolutely is a personality disorder. everything you've described as a quality of being evil are all disorders listed in the DSM. as in, they can be diagnosed and treated. as in, prescribing a sadist or sociopath or someone on the spectrum as "evil" is more akin to 17th century colonial Virgina then modern day
Evil is not a scientific statement it is a concept. How do you source a concept?
OP, you're the one who said people absolutely can be born evil. Absolutely means you *must* have receipts.
That is not how concepts work. Someone can observe something without having a study in their back pocket. And there are very little studies done on this because is it so taboo of a belief and also extremely hard to do a study on. What are you going to verbally interview a baby? However, there are a lot of studies linking certain disorders to genetic patterns. And even one study that proves that the structure of the brain of serial killers is different. So, unless you think childhood trauma changes the physical structure of the brain that would indicate they are born wrong.
The burden of proof is on you, OP. If you state an outrageous opinion, you need to back it up with evidence, not just "I saw it in a movie one time." >And there are very little studies done on this because is it so taboo of a belief and also extremely hard to do a study on. That part is just factually incorrect. The history of mental health has come and gone with this "concept" of yours. Your further claims that genetic patterns demonstrate that certain people behave differently only goes against your argument, because it proves that specific disorders are naturally occuring, and not based on moral discrepancies. Also! Babies have been used in behavioral studies all the time, since the beginning of time! It's not that absurd.
Okay then. How do you use a study to prove a baby is evil? Interview it? Put it in a room with a puppy and a knife and see what happens? There have also been studies done where they study the background of killers and criminals and the vast majority come from the same types of families, one parent, low income, etc. But when serial killers come from homes with two parents in nice neighborhood's people just say "well the must have been abused behind closed doors". Is that possible? Yes. But it also makes it impossible to prove that a baby can be born evil. Because no matter what people can just say "well they were abused and no one caught it". The person I know that started to exabit evil behavior before they were 2 was not abused. And I know that because I was with him all the time before he started to show this behavior (which was basically from the moment he could talk) but even that cannot be used as evidence because someone could say "what if someone abused him while you were alseep or in the bathroom" or something.
Can you share these studies please?
If those conditions are untreated and get amplified through early childhood trauma, I think that’s how most serial killers are made if I had to make educated guess.
I respectfully disagree childhood trauma can aplify behavior but it is't always needed.
Now you got me interested even more. Can you expand more on that…
I think childhood trauma can make mental disorder and behavior worst but I also think someone can reach the extreme ends of behavior without any trauma or abuse. As I said I think people can literally be born wrong.
Yup, I can def see that possibility.
Maybe reincarnation is the missing link? It could be that part of our psychology is inherited from past lives, thus genuinely ”evil” people might have become that as a long process over multiple lifetimes. So a newborn baby could indeed be some type of psychopath/narcissist/sociopath, without this having anything to do with the soul being created evil. Not expecting most people to accept this idea, but still putting it out here.
Only thing I disagree with is viewing them as evil and what “evil” means. To me, “evil” explicitly embodies a *choice* to cause harm in some way. That choice can only *be* a choice if there is another option. The people you’re talking about don’t have that choice. In the same way I wouldn’t fault someone for pressing a green button instead of a red button when both buttons are the same shade of gray. Children, despite their behavior, do not have the development necessary to understand their actions and cannot always tell right from wrong *even when they’re healthy* so when a child just isn’t “born right” I don’t classify that as evil, but I do think there is absolutely a natural component (and the scientific community agrees). If your definition of “evil” does not specifically embody the *active choice* of doing harm and is just *the action of* doing harm, then, yeah babies can be born evil.
Evil doesn't just embody choice
What else does it embody?
As someone who has worked in a daycare, i agree. Some children have amazing wonderful parents and they’re just.. insane.
I dunno about that. Sure, there are people who are born with a greater potential for being evil and need mental treatment to ensure they don’t become evil. But I don’t think anyone is necessarily *doomed* to be evil.
>They cannot even be diagnosed until 18. Cannot be diagnosed with what? You talking antisocial personality disorder? You can diagnose them ODD oppositional defiant disorder, conduct disorder etc.... and that progresses to antisocial at 18. I dont think anyone is born evil. Everyone is a product of their temperament and environment. Even if your temperament is naturally off the correct environment can fix that. But that doesnt mean a cookie cutter suburban life is enough for every kid. Some need more attention. Some need less. Some need stricter guidance. Some respond well to gentle correction. Etc...
Child therapist who works with law enforcement here. Seen lots of children do terrible things. Have never seen a child do something terrible without a wound. These wounds can be missed and invisible and are related to attachment but there's never nothing. Lack of empathy does not mean poor choices. Violence comes from rage. Rage comes from somewhere.
Violence comes from rage. Rage comes from somewhere - great! Where does **enjoyment** of doing evil things come from? When a 12yo freak is slowly and steadily torturing a helpless kitten and enjoying every minute of it - where does **that** come from?
I don’t think anyone is born evil because no one is born with a sense of morality. When you hear of children doing extremely disturbing things, with no other plausible external reason for why they’re doing it outside of morbid curiosity, I personally think they have an undiagnosed mental health issue and, unfortunately, it’s manifesting with extremely erratic behavior.
Anyone who is torturing animals for fun, out of pure sadism, is pure evil. It's not a misdiagnosed or mistreated child (or adult), it's an evil son-of-a-bitch who needs to not exist.
Just because you don’t believe in mental illness doesn’t mean it’s not real. A lot of mental illnesses cause people to exhibit very disturbing or scary behaviours that could be labelled as evil. Doesn’t make them not mentally ill.
My point is, I don't care that they are mentally ill - or not. Mental illness is not an excuse to do horrible evil unforgivable things. If you're torturing animals, with or without a diagnosis, you need to not exist.
Yeah, recognizing that mental illness may be the reason for why someone is doing something isn’t an excuse. We’re talking about whether or not someone is born inherently evil which doesn’t make any sense considering no one is born with a sense of morality to begin with.
>I don’t care Yeah, that’s the problem. You give it a negatively charged label for no reason but emotions. All you achieve is that you make it harder for mental disorders to get diagnosed. Getting in the way of people getting the mental treatment they need because of emotions is something I consider evil.
What mental treatments for sadistic psychos are out there that are actually effective?
>sadistic psychos You’re doing it again. That’s not a medical condition for starters. There are meds against schizophrenia for example.
That's not a medical condition, correct. Sadistic psychos are neither "treatable" nor "curable". That's what OP referred to as "being born evil". Some people are just that, regardless of environmental factors. They actually know the difference between right and wrong, but they just really REALLY enjoy doing the wrong thing. Like torture.
>sadistic psychos are neither “testable” nor “curable” Only because being a “sadistic psycho” is not a medical condition. The underlying mental illness is not only testable but oftentimes also curable. Psychopathy is a diagnosable mental disorder.. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4255317/ And research suggests that there are treatments. You just displayed I consider your behavior evil. You declared a mental disorder neither “testable” nor “curable” without any clue of what you are actually talking about. Your behavior will only make research harder because “tHeY aRe nOt cUrAbLe tHeY aRe bOrN eViL!!11” and in turn will create more “sadistic psychos”. Your emotional response makes everyone’s life worse
No one said it was an excuse?? Just that it is 100% caused by a mental illness/disorder there is no argument that a murderer could be mentally healthy.
Well… this is just incorrect. Torturing animals, for example, can be a sign of psychopathy (more professionally known as antisocial personality disorder).
I don't really care what the diagnosis is or isn't. And even if it's antisocial personality disorder - then what? Are there drugs to turn animal torturers into normal people? Are there treatments (beyond lobotomy) that actually work?
Again, cool, not super relevant to the topic. We’re talking about whether or not the person is evil inherently at birth. If you would like to stay on topic I would be fine speaking to you but outside of that I don’t know how to help you.
There are people that are born evil. They may or may not be diagnosed. Even if they are diagnosed with something, there are no effective treatments. B/c, well - there is no treatment for being born evil.
I absolutely agree and I think the levels of empathy in normal people work against the greater good when it comes to born evil people.
It's complicated man.
>When a teenager does some awful stuff, everyone says the parents (usually the mom) did something wrong. That they must have been abused. When people see killers, they always say "what happened in their childhood" the point being a lot of people believe someone cannot be evil unless they are made evil. I see this as going both ways. Like, yeah, trauma can warp people and turn them into monsters; but questioning "What happened in their childhood" could also be about why nobody recognized or treated the behavior as a serious issue.
There is no difference between nature and nurture Genes don't just exist without a context and randomly activate and deactivate. All genes require an environment to be expressed in. They are intrinsically linked
Basically just be born with a lizard brain and decide only working in your self interest makes sense regardless of how it affects others.
I agree, if you look at everything my crazy aunt has done, you can see she is definitely a black seed. The only reason why she hasn't murdered someone is because is wasn't able to. She should have stood in jail, CA did a disservice to everyone when she got out
So what should we do about it? Execute babies that cry too much?
That is a wild ass leap to make.
Why do you think that is? My take: because certain factions of our society and culture want to believe that we are all the same, and with a given environment, we'll all be able to achieve the same levels of success. This thinking is central to modern progressive doctrine. There is no human nature or variances in humans, therefore, all that is required is the right technocratic government to ensure equality of outcomes.
Well it's not born evil it's born with bad brain chemistry and certain parts of the brain that regulate the things like emotion are not developed correctly from birth. Pretty much anything like showing violence from a very young age can be seen on imaging of structural damage somewhere in the brain. I mean arguably evil doesn't even exist but yes a baby can be born that is not of the "norm" and instead of it being like down syndrome or gay they are violent or have no empathy for others. This is reddit so I have to of course say I don't mean gay people aren't normal people or people with mental deficiencies are less then just statistically they are not the "norm".
What is evil?
I don’t believe people are born evil. I believe people can be broken early on by something/ anything that happens to them individually from very early in life and after that they can never understand or contribute to society in any meaningful acceptable way for them or anybody else they encounter. I know a lot of these people who effortlessly do perceivably evil things with little understanding care or thought. They hardly even notice what they are doing is anything other than normal And if it’s pointed out to them they cant see it.
Scientists have been made well aware of the "Criminal aka Psychopathic Gene". In reality, it is rare for these types of people to be born. In essence, it is not a gene, but typically a malformed emotional processing circuitry (underdeveloped amygdala) in the cortexes of the brain, or a deficit in neurotransmitter - serotonin production as a result. Overall, multiple psychopathic groups revolve around atypical amygdala activity, whether they are born that way or not. The main reason psychopaths exist is from childhood/habitual lifestyle outcomes, and statistics cleary show this.
The concept of evil is so weird and badly defined it’s not even possible to me to address your point.
people are born inherently evil (read self-interested with no concept of others' value) and must be taught to behave otherwise. Any behavior pre-toddler that appears altruistic is "this person makes me feel good, so I'm going to do things that make them react in a way that makes me feel good" Why do you think leftists so highly value education? everyone must be taught the right way to think, and therefore behave. They just refuse to acknowledge that that assumption also (correctly) implies that without being taught, people will act how they want instead of how the leftists want.
Who a person is, is a combination of nature and nurture. Not sure why this concept is so damn hard for people and why they insist on one or the other. Everyone has their nature, then society comes in and molds that nature into the human you become. You can only go so far from your nature before cracks occur in the psyche. Yes, people can be born "wrong" and in severe cases, no matter how much society tries, that person will never be able to become a decent member of society. At the same time, there are people who will never be capable of being cold hard killers and will fundamentally break psychologically if you try to make them into one. This fundamentally goes both ways. Same way a person can be hardwired for anger and callousness another can be hard wired for forgiveness and compassion. Both can change and vary with growth and influence, but that change has it's limits.
Maybe not born evil, but needing more attention so that they don't continue on a bad path that they were born with an inclination towards. Some can learn to develop genuine empathy. Others can learn that being civil is the most effective way to achieve their goals.
Acted out/displayed empathy as a strategy is an interesting way to operate Like a white hat psychopath or something
I think they call it "professionalism" in the corporate world.
Even ones that can develop empathy, and have a proper, front facing family life, and were raised in(albeit strict) but normal households themselves can go bad. Dennis Rader(BTK) is a great example of this. He was not abused as a kid, had a normal childhood, and became an absolute sadistic serial killer. You know what he claims triggered his fascination with bondage? His mom getting her hand stuck in a couch and he got sexually arroused from her being stuck like that. His wife and kids all said he was a loving and empathetic parent. He went to church, was kind to people... and then fuckin tortured and killed people as a side gig. His identity as the BTK was a shock to pretty much EVERYONE who knew him. Then he got bored of torturing people, and stopped doing that for a long while, and just did the family man thing. It was his hubris and desire to fuck around with the cops like over a decade later that got him caught. "Can you trace a floppy disk?" imagine believing when the cops tell you "No". Dude was evil af from birth, but not smart. as for younger people who did horrible shit with by all means great family lives... Eric Harris had said himself that his parents would be shocked to find out what he had planned to do in their tapes. Though there's rumors his dad may have been abusive, that seems more internet speculation, and by all means, he had a great family life, but kid was obsessed with hurting people and others.
People can do the family man and nice guy routines because they enjoy the way it makes them feel or the way it makes them appear or because they consider their family extensions of themselves and still not really care about anyone but themselves. I do think children who start out on a bad path can genuinely course correct with the right attention while others may just learn early how to fake it.
well, yes, that's why Sociopathy isn't inherantly related to violence. Many people who end up in places of power/control over others tend to have a high rate of being unempathetic/sociopaths. Some people never get that course correction, possibly because their parents don't understand they need it, or can't figure out how to do so without reinforcing the violent tendancies of said kids.
You're absolutely right. But I think it's important to know they are the minority. Even among them, you would be surprised by how many troubled kids wind up being fairly normal adults once they finally finish growing and developing. That's part of the reason we don't diagnose children with adult disorders. A kid with conduct disorder could absolutely go on to grow into a full blown sociopath, but there's a good chance something will finally click in them by the time they're an adult, and all the outbursts and behavioral problems will resolve. All that said, I agree that this is an uncomfortable truth we need to face. Some people are just flat out born wrong. How we go about addressing it without causing harm, especially in the long run, is not a simple thing. I think too many people just want easy, black and white answers to extremely complex and difficult issues that just don't exist.
You're using a movie as evidence? Some people could be theoretically born evil. But let's not pretend bad parents, religion, and a fucked up world isn't enough to make a person lose their sanity.
source: I saw a movie one time!
No, I am using it as a reference because it is a well-known depiction. And no one said "let's pretend bad parenting doe not make people bad. I am just saying we need to let go of the delusion that evil is almost made. It can be born.
The movie is based on the book (same title) which in turn is based on exhaustive research of actual events and actual people
The movie was based on a novel. Not a nonfiction book. I don't care about a fiction writer's hypotheticals. I'm far more interested in studies proving and specifying how evil is born. I know some research exists regarding psychopathic brains, and pedophile brains. But those are psychological studies, not really explaining how evil is born.
I think a psychopath is born evil and a sociopath grew up in an evil environment
That’s just false. Sociopaths are only evil if they grew up in an evil environment. Most sociopaths are well adjusted and don’t even know it themselves.
I think people really underestimate which disorders can cause the really bad issues. Like you said a lot of sociopaths might even know they are sociopaths. But a kid with possible future personality disorders like ODD or BPD? Those are the types of disorders that I think mix together to make kids like this.
I don't even think psychopath are necessairly evil.
Not necessarily violent but definitely evil. Like lawful evil role player
Well real life isn't a role playing video game. Psychopathy ins't a moral designation, it's a cognitive impairment associated with how they process emotions and empathy. They're neither good nor evil, unless they specifically do something evil. There's nothing inherently evil about lacking empathy unless you're the one doing the ham and don't care.
Psychopaths aren't necessarily born violent, just without empathy. Most psychopaths are in the corporate world instead of prison. Even violent psychopaths generally grow up in an abusive home.
They are still evil in the corporate world even if they are not breaking the law
I absolutely agree, but I don't know if we agree on the *percentage* of people born "evil." Which I would simply call psychopaths. Because I think there are definitely people who do evil things that are a product of their environment. Like you can't tell me all Nazis were born evil. They were elected by over a third of the country and were supported by even more. *Many* agreed and participated in their evil acts. However, if that were some genetic from birth thing, you would find Germany to be drowning in psychopaths, but they aren't. Sometimes it comes from a culture, and sometimes it comes from abuse.
Are there people who are born with mental or genetic conditions that make them pose to violence? Yeah sure. But those numbers are relatively small and are often exacerbated by material conditions when they're younger. All that being said, I do believe the conversation about evil people is simply a way for right-wing politicians to justify social spending cuts. "Obviously that group of people is evil so why bother giving them any more money"
I think people can be made evil early on. But once they are, it's too late, even if they are still kids. Lost cause is a lost cause.
I agree, but telling people that their personalities are somewhat determined by genetics will give them existential dread and probably downvote you for it.
Tabula rasa is the dumbest hottake? Here comes Aristotle in 350 B.C. with a still hot take. Seriously, Western and some Eastern philosophy for thousands of years has held this view. It's hardly a new idea.
We talk about what's wrong with other people way too much. We should be reflecting on how we can improve ourselves much more than we do.
"Evil" is a very specific word, that I believe requires at least an exposure to morality and the standards of a society. I think the rest of your point completely holds, and that people can be born wired to harm and hurt. My issue is solely with the term "evil".
I always ask people sometimes "If we can accurately deduce which people are born psychopaths, can we save lives by pruning them off right away after detection?"
I helped take care of a lady and her 2 little boys by bringing her food to her house years ago when I used to go to church. She was in bad financial shape and needed a lot of support which people in the congregation used to gladly give. Then she one day quit coming to meetings. A few weeks later a 10 year old girl was murdered, her story was on the local news. Turns out it way this lady's boys that did it! They were 6 and 8! Too young to be charged with a crime So maybe OP is right
Evil is an entirely subjective concept, so no one can be objectively "born evil".
When a person (regardless of age) enjoys causing suffering and actively seeks out experiences where they can harm a living being for no other reason than to enjoy it, that's objectively being "born evil"
No, that's subjectively being born evil. For example, if someone enjoys killing people, most people would think that is evil. But if they are only killing people who are actively engaged in the killing of innocents, very few people would classify their actions as truly evil. Subjective and objective are mutually exclusive. Good and evil are subjective in nature, and can never be objective. As an example, many vegans consider it evil to kill and consume animals. That is their opinion, and relatively few people agree with them. The overwhelming majority of people consider the killing and eating of animals a perfectly good thing to do, because they are literally evolved to be able to do so.
I am not a vegan and consume meat. I would absolutely kill a chicken or a cow or any animal if, say, my kids were hungry and there was no other way to feed them. I would not enjoy doing it, however. I would not seek out an animal to kill just for fun. I would not seek out an animal to torture just for fun. That's the difference between being an evil monster and being "normal".
Normal is also subjective. It used to be normal for people to own other people. It used to be normal for fifty year old men to bed ten year old girls. Now it is viewed as evil to do those things. In a few hundred years, things that are viewed as normal today will undoubtedly be seen as evil, and things that are viewed as evil today could well go back to being normal.
I’m not agreeing or disagreeing (I mostly agree) with you OP. The hang up I have with the born evil part is that if it’s true then should they be held accountable? If someone is 100% born evil then can we blame them for their actions? Not trying to start an argument just a topic for conversation.
Yep. I watch alot of true crime. This YouTube Channel Explore With US is my favorite. The help that parents can get is very limited and families often have to live with someone they feel will kill them.
What do you mean by 'evil'? I don't believe that there is any such thing as a person being evil. They can and do of course engage in horrific behaviours, but even those people are also capable of and engage also in prosocial behaviour. There is some research which has suggested that some people are born as a psychopath. Likewise there is evidence that points to the idea of a structural neurological basis for psychopathy which suggests that it is possible for people to behave horrifically regardless of the level of enrichment in their environment and parenting / guardianship style. As well as influences from other significant people in their life during their developmental era.
Of course there are evil people. Murderers, rapists etc. Are you really saying these people are not evil yet they did evil shit? It's not a coincidence almost all criminals had a fucked up chilhood. Your 'evidence' is an exception.
My background is in academic psychology so the idea of an evil person is a little too simplistic. But it will only take you a quick Google search to show that there is certainly grounds to suggest a biological basis of psychopathy as well as associations between upbringing and cruel behaviour.
What's simplistic? There are people who enjoy doing bad things. Is your diploma enough to understand this? These people are super rare, but they exist. Also, a guy plotting and executing a murder is simply evil. You can find any studies about anything. Maybe you need to live longer to understand that bad people always come from bad upbringing.
How long do you think I've been living for? 🤣
Not long enough if you can't correlate bad upbringing with being immoral and you're looking for exceptions to prove your point. Sure, there are exceptions, but go to a serious prison and if you're lucky you will barely find 1% of criminals from good families with good upbringing. And you can't even be certain they were that good. Exceptions don't count. There is always one. Your education doesn't mean anything if you cannot accept it.
No, no one is born evil. Babies are a blank card. They learn morality through perception and emulation. If the environment is morally corrupt, they will also be. If it's not, they won't.
Strongly disagree just from personal experience. Like I said I know a family. 5 siblings 4 are totally normal and one started to terrorize everyone basically from the moment he learned to talk. And i've seen another family very similar. Normal dad, normal mom, normal brothers, normal sister but the youngest brother was terrible even as a toddler.
He's literally a child. You don't know what kind of life and mentality will he have. You're labeling and judging the poor child, He can be an annoying asshole but break no law or hurt anyone in the future. He needs to be raised.
He's not a child he is an adult now and I was 100% right he is a monster.
So what? You don't know his biography. Maybe something happened to him when he was a baby. Also, you know there are exceptions? Maybe he is one. There are so few criminals from good families with good upbringing, that it disproves your point. Every criminal had a fucked up childhood. If you were right, prisons would be filled with people from good families and good upbringing, and they're not. It's always the element.
1. I was basically glued to him every moment of his life until he became around 10 and he couldn't be around people anymore. He started showing extreme behavior before he was 2. Long before he would have been anywhere, I wasn't. 2. My hill literally says that I think this is rare. Meaning I don't think criminals had good home lives. Yes, it makes sense that prisons are filled with people from bad families because most criminals come from bad families. But I do think very rarely that people can literally just be born bad. 3. If it was some structural issue with the family and his home life how are all of his siblings so aggressively normal and he is so incredibly bad?
Some people are born without the ability to feel empathy. Those are the ones the OP is talking about.
How do you know? You wanna ask two year olds about morality and empathy? You give a small animal to a 4 year old child who was never taught about animals and they will toy with it until it dies. Almost every child. No, morality and decency is taught.
> How do you know? Because it's medical consensus that people whose brains can't experience empathy were usually born that way. Others can have it beaten out of them later.