That which exists in any of us, exists within all of us.
We all bleed, we all suffer, we all hope, we all dream
To me, evil represents the disregard for human life, the complete absence of compassion. It is not some external force which we must “fight”. It is an internal battle won by turning towards humanity in the face of pain and anger.
When we choose love over hate, we fight evil.
When we choose forgiveness over vengeance, we fight evil.
When we protect the weak and the innocent regardless of who benefits, we fight evil.
But I acknowledge this is based on my values, namely the value for human life which I hold sacred. I am only a man, merely human with all the failings and faults. I acknowledge that I value the life of my loved ones above others. I can only try to remember that every other person is the loved one of someone else, that they hold esteemed positions in the hearts of their family just as mine do to me.
I desperately hope that I will never have to confront the pain, anger, suffering, and anguish from losing one of my loved ones at the hands of malice from another human. I write this missive in the hope that if I do, I may revisit this higher ideal from a more benevolent time in my life. May this version of myself, with clear mind and hopeful heart steer me on a course of compassion and forgiveness.
And to you reader, so many confronted with violence and anger, desperation and terror, seeking answers to questions that have none. I cannot possibly offer to cure your anguish but perhaps I can label what I suspect many of us are realizing subconsciously, what we are observing in the world is not love, it is not compassion, it is not benevolence.
What manifests before us are the desperate acts of hopeless people driven to anger and hatred. To me, this violence is the manifestation of evil, the victory of our worst nature as humans. We must not ignore the reality that humans perpetrate these acts, and that we too are humans with these same capacities. We must cry out in objection, we must pursue our better nature, to find peace we must set aside our pain for it is this suffering that fuels the horror we witness.
And as we continue to inflict pain on each other outwardly, we will not resurrect our fallen, we will spread anger and hatred wider and deeper. The generational trauma which fueled this conflict will be renewed and passed down to our children to carry. Is this the legacy we wish to pass to them? As we inflict pain on our “enemies” so it returns to those we love. Why can we not stop this cycle of violence, of hatred, of evil?
It is because we choose not to, because evil is a choice within each of us.
I have a fickle relationship with the notion of “justice” finding it often appears to poorly disguise what is actually revenge. The only path forward in my mind is simply to allow people to live, to give them the respect due to them as humans. With time and compassion, we might forget the pain we suffered and have opportunity to once again cultivate love and prosperity. It will not be pleasant, we will suffer and some will retaliate. We must accept that not all will be able to manage their pain and anger but that cannot lead us down the same path as a society.
We must choose to appeal to our higher values, our higher ideals.
We should not cower behind claims of defense or the innocent lives of others. Defending ourselves stops when the harm stops. Disproportionate retaliation is never defensive, it is hateful, spiteful even. And use of innocent lives for defense is unfortunately effective because if we have compassion, then the harm of those innocent lives should be unthinkable.
The only response we have now is grief. We must mourn and suffer our losses.
Even if all violence ceased right now, if all parties simply agreed to endow each other with mutual respect and returned to a normal life, there would be years and generations of pain and trauma to metabolize. Is that not enough suffering? There has already been lifetimes of suffering imparted in the last few weeks, not to mention the decades preceding it. Is that not enough? What will it take to realize we have created these circumstances and we feed them further every passing day?
I watch in terror as the worst of our nature wins every day. I plea for relief, that those in pain will stop spreading it. I plea to you reader that you will not let it seize you too. Choose life, choose peace, tell the world your choice, plea to them to choose the same.
