Do you believe in Necessary Evils?

[Leprechaun_Sean]

To explain, A necessary evil is something that you do not like but which you know must exist or happen. This can the shape of many things. A prime example could be death. No one likes it, but we need it for the sake of the planet. Another example could be a character in literature who reluctantly plays the role of the villain so that an issue may be addressed and fixed.

I ask this because I believe that I recently had to play to the role of a necessary evil. In a recent dispute in the guild, I did what I had to do to push a ball that had been waiting to roll for a long time. What I did, was what many consider to cold and heartless, but I felt it was something that was a long time coming. Why watch a train wreck happen in slow motion when you can just click the button and get it over with?

But my problems that question my morality aside, do you believe in necessary evils?  

[cool4]

Evil is necessary to know what good is. If we got rid of necessary evil, then we would not be able to get rid of the evil such as murder, rape, ...I could go on.

But such is life we will have to make decisions that are tough, maybe they will lead to a greater good later on, maybe they will stray us down a path we aren't sure about. Either way one will have to make a decision they may not like at first.  

[wellwisher]

What Cool mentioned about evil being needed to know what good is, is right. the same about a few other social terms that don't have a set correct or incorrect. You can't get rid of evil, without losing the value of good.

You mean the Lesser of two evils principle? (the necessary evil you speak of would be the option picked that had less repercussions but still disliked) But, I think you have it a little wrong. The lesser of two evils is about choice. We choose to do the option that has the least repercussions, even when both are going to end up harmful. If we state the lesser of two evils choice as your necessary evil, then you made the choice knowing that the alternative options would be much worse regardless of if people like your decision or not.

As for the two other parts to this. I think the lesser of two evils principle happens all the time. Mostly it's used politically much to the dissent of the general populace that doesn't have all of the facts. But it's also used in day to day making one unsavory choice in favor of a less severe outcome. I don't however think that death would fit that role since it's not something we choose to do in favor over living forever. Your secondary example though is spot on. Good and bad things happen all the time, and often bad things are put into the light of being unnecessary. Which really isn't the case often.

What you did most recently could possibly be stretched to be considered a lesser of two evils principle example. From what little I know, it seemed as though you made a decision, and went with it. But, was that the best choice out there for you to do? If there were other options that could end up being good choices, then you did not take the lesser of the choices. But then again, I don't have all of the facts. Nor do I know how many options you thought of. That's something that you will have to think about yourself.  

[B1g_crunch]

I think even without a description of moral good vs evil, even animals can have a sense of right and wrong based on instinctive preservation.

Necessary evil depends I think on weighing the ends and the means against one another. If the means cause some serious conflict for a lot of people but are justified by the ends, then it may be considered a necessary evil. However if even with end goals that are meant for a great improvement or as a solution to a problem the means of attaining them are worse than can be afforded, it can't be considered a necessary evil.  

[EmbraceTheDemons]

Evil is always necessary to some extent. Light cannot exist without darkness and vice versa. The brightest light casts the longest shadows.

But what really is evil? If you believe in any religion, most of them say that humans as a whole are inherently evil. To an extant evil is a matter of perspective. Of course things like murder are universally considered to be evil.

But what about lying? Children lie all the time but does that make them evil? I don't think so. And telling the truth can sometimes be worse than lying as it can really hurt.

As far as death goes, I don't think that's evil at all. For a lot of people its a release from suffering a horrible disease they've been fighting. And since we have no real evidence as to what happens when we die for all we know it could be ten times better than life. We only fear death because we have a primitive fear of the unknown and death is unknown. No one alive has experienced it.

So to answer your question, I suppose I don't believe in necessary evils because I don't really believe in good and evil with the exception of things like murder and rape obviously being evil. Everything else is just human nature.