ipanema
Member
- Aug 22, 2026
- 8
I used to view humans of the past with a sense of disconnect. They'd show seemimgly no regard for others. History is littered with war, genocide, slavery, and cruelty. I'd think wow, I'm sure glad I live in this modern world (or at least this modern country) where people don't do these things, and they're seen as unequivocally wrong.
But I've been thinking about it, and all those things I've listed where wrong even back then. It was always wrong to kill someone, steal from someone, etc. The reason people would do those things is because they'd develop some stupid excuse to permit them to do what their heart wants. Burning someone at the stake is barbaric, but she's a witch so it's different. It's wrong to enslave someone, but they're an inferior race so we can do it.
Such barbaric acts are less common today, but the thought process that causes them is ever present. People are very quick to deny you your humanity. I don't like your vibe and think you're weird? This gives me a licence to talk all this shit about you and treat you like your subhuman. You have this political stance, you literally deserve to die. I'm secretly jealous of you and don't really have a justifiable reason to hate you? All good, I'll just try my very best to find/make one, and then when I get it I'll double down. Like fabricating claims for a casus belli in Crusader Kings.
People are very willing to deny others of their humanity for the most arbitrary of reasons. Very few people are truly kind. Those that are willing to treat everyone with humanity, even those they dislike or those that wronged them, are expectionally rare. If people had remembered I'm human, I wouldn't want to kill myself right now. Well, they do know I'm human, they just don't care.
To me, most people are quite evil in many ways. Myself included. We have desires that are at odds with people's happiness, irrational hatred, and a want to hurt. A good person is someone who is aware of those things and fights against them. Most people would rather pretend they don't have them, or use mental gymnastics to justify their evil.
But I've been thinking about it, and all those things I've listed where wrong even back then. It was always wrong to kill someone, steal from someone, etc. The reason people would do those things is because they'd develop some stupid excuse to permit them to do what their heart wants. Burning someone at the stake is barbaric, but she's a witch so it's different. It's wrong to enslave someone, but they're an inferior race so we can do it.
Such barbaric acts are less common today, but the thought process that causes them is ever present. People are very quick to deny you your humanity. I don't like your vibe and think you're weird? This gives me a licence to talk all this shit about you and treat you like your subhuman. You have this political stance, you literally deserve to die. I'm secretly jealous of you and don't really have a justifiable reason to hate you? All good, I'll just try my very best to find/make one, and then when I get it I'll double down. Like fabricating claims for a casus belli in Crusader Kings.
People are very willing to deny others of their humanity for the most arbitrary of reasons. Very few people are truly kind. Those that are willing to treat everyone with humanity, even those they dislike or those that wronged them, are expectionally rare. If people had remembered I'm human, I wouldn't want to kill myself right now. Well, they do know I'm human, they just don't care.
To me, most people are quite evil in many ways. Myself included. We have desires that are at odds with people's happiness, irrational hatred, and a want to hurt. A good person is someone who is aware of those things and fights against them. Most people would rather pretend they don't have them, or use mental gymnastics to justify their evil.
