A week ago I asked what you considered the definition of evil. I’m quite surprised at the number of people who offered their opinion. Thank you to all who commented. This post is to summarize what you said and to add a bit more.
Nearly all of the comments connected evil to harm. I gathered the ideas into several broad categories. I’m sure one could say the categories overlap. They are: Cruelty, physical harm, mental harm, social harm, spiritual harm, economic harm, institutional harm, and refusing to prevent harm.
I think we understand cruelty and physical harm.
Mental harm includes such things as lying; betraying trust; manipulation; declaring others, perhaps whole groups, as evil; projection; and turning love into suspicion, jealousy, and hate. I’ll add belittling comments.
Social harm includes diminishing the significance, worth, liberties, expression and contribution of others; stirring up hate; and causing the collapse of civil society.
Spiritual harm includes using religion to justify harm and using religion to declare the speaker is good and incapable of evil while others are evil and incapable of good. I’ll add one more: Declaring someone or a group is incapable of going to heaven.
Economic harm was mentioned but no examples given. I see it as including poverty wages, wage theft, redlining, and below standard or blocked education opportunities.
Institutional harm means many of these other harms are wrapped into institutional policies and law. We know what refusing to prevent harm means.
Other ideas of evil that were mentioned include enjoying the suffering of others and giving themselves the right and duty to punish others. One noted the desire to harm is insatiable.
I think evil is more than harm, though one could say these other categories might also fit under harm.
If one takes something from us we see it as evil, quite different from them asking and us offering. The examples of taking I can think of, such as wage theft, are all economic harms.
Another aspect of evil is control. The important versions of that in the news lately are banning abortion and banning transgender care. It also includes such things as banning protest and instituting political gerrymandering so that the minority writes the rules for the majority.
I think the biggest component of evil is killing. The killer is saying I have so much control over you I can kill you (and society is set up so I won’t face consequences). We declare genocide to be one of the worst evils.
I asked in the previous post: What are examples of evil people in life and fiction and what traits make you classify them as evil?