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| Yes | 62% | 1135 votes | Total: 1838 votes | |
| No | 38% | 703 votes |
Yes
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Add to FavoritesPeople are inherently good. Deep down. Sometimes really, really deep down. Sometimes it is so deep that you would have to turn them inside out to find the good. But, it's there. How can I be so sure? I guess you can't really be sure of anything. But, that's what I believe.
Looking at the world today, either through your television screen or your living room window, it seems like just the opposite. I think we've been trained to see the worst in everyone as some form of self-preservation tactic. We should always be on the lookout for the bad person who is going to do something horrible to us. We look for it all the time, and so we find it. On the news, all the stories are of murder, rape, atrocities of all kinds. Even the deaths sanctioned by our president are a representation of a battle against the evil that is taking over the world.
I'm sure it's always been this way. There have always been wars. There have always been murderers.
So, why do I believe that people are good? If the world is chocked full of killers and people doing various and sundry bad things? Because I look for the good. And, so I find it.
I chose not to make someone I don't understand into an enemy. I want to see the real individual underneath all the judgment, before any influence was forced upon them. I want to see the purity and innocence of each life, as they were as a child. Because when it comes down to it, we're all the same. At the core of every human being, we all want the same things from life: security, love, happiness. We want to take care of our families and live in a kind world. The light of spirit is inherent in all of us. But, through circumstances or adversities the light begins to dim. Some have dimmed to the point of being too dark to see. But, it's still there.
There is a quote by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow that sums up this sentiment beautifully:
"If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility."
Although there is plenty of evidence to suggest that we could justifiably categorize people as "good" or "bad", I don't believe it would be an accurate judgment. There are good people who do bad things. There are people who have wandered farther away from their true essence of spirit. But, there aren't innately bad people. There is good to be witnessed in everyone if we just look for it.
Learn more about this author, Leslie Conner.
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No
There is no such thing as "good" nor "evil," only nature.
What most people these days don't realize is that words "good" and "bad" came into existence with thedevelopmentof religion. With the evolution of religious belief, humanity was supplied with ever expanding rules with which one was expected to live by. It was "good" for a person to live by the laws provided and "bad if one were to rebel against them.
With that said, I feel quite comfortable arguing that people are neither born good nor bad, but rather natural. A perfect case study of this assertion would be to look at a third world country, or a post apocalyptic civilization. Whenever a large scale disaster takes its toll on a community of people, common courtesy and philanthropic desires are replaced by the need to survive.
In communist Russia, genocide was commonplace. With the radical Stalinist regime, people were dying of starvation every single day. How did some survive? Cannibalism; with nothing to eat, people's natural instincts kicked in and they ate whatever they could. No one shared food; it was all about survival. Obviously, in modern society cannibalism is strictly forbidden. If one person were to eat another in the US, they would be arrested and most likely be charged with manslaughter.
As you can see, the words "good" and "bad" are just fabricated in order to compare a person to a social standard. A popular argument for fundamentalist believers is that without God, there would be no "good" or "bad." I completely agree with this statement. Without God, there wouldn't be random rules that govern society, which seem to just stem fromintolerantindivi duals. Without God, humanity would be able to focus on creating a lifestyle that would help everyone collectively create a better community. Instead of worrying aboutsacrificesand repentance, people would be able to address issues directly effecting them.
That doesn't go to say that without religion killing or stealing would be permitted; this isn't the case at all. I firmly believe that if we were to evolve without religion, we would still frown down upon things such as murder. The reason humanity would most likely eventually outlaw it is because it slow down the progress of mankind. If one person were to kill another, jealousy and hatred would appear. Out of hatred, a person would most likely seek revenge on the person. Eventually, those agreeing with one side or another would team up against each other and a larger war would break out.
It is clear that killing would be a setback to the development of a civil society.
As I was saying before, people are natural. If we were to say that people were inherently good, we would have to address the standard we measure what defines good. Its time that people turn away from religious bigotry. What may be good for a religious agenda may be bad for a societal agenda. I'm quiteconfidentin saying that Elizabeth the first (Bloody Mary) didn't do good, as she though, by burning 300 protestants at the stake. Same goes for all the old crusader movements.
Learn more about this author, Kevin Olivier.
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