Is there evil in the world?

My son just mentioned in conversation that there are no villains in the world. Everyone is reacting to some kind of motivation as opposed to having an internal well of malevolent motivation. I suppose that's true but there have been times when the evil perpetrated by someone was so obvious that I've wondered how it could go unchecked. I am terrified of the hate mongering spurred by Trump. My experience with unbridled power matched with paranoia and a total lack of conscience was on a much smaller, personal scale but the skeletal structure is the same. It has to be recognized for what it is and it has to be stopped.

I had a principal once who was so insecure that she purposely destroyed the administrators she inherited from the previous administration. The longer she was able to get away with the abusive behavior, the worse it became. Normally when we do bad things to other people there are strictures in place that stop it from going too far. If no barriers appear, the behavior snowballs until it is completely out of control.

I wrote a grant for an after-school program. I didn't think anyone else would devote the time and effort it would take to run this program for the amount budgeted for a director's salary so I gave up my part-time job teaching graduate classes at a nearby college, which I had done for the past seven years and took a $2000 cut to manage the program. I'd managed a much smaller after-school program and knew how hard it would be. Also one of the conditions of getting the grant was naming a director that had previous experience. I was the only one in the district that qualified. Naming an unqualified director could have lost us the grant. Even though I would have lost $2000, and worked a heck of a lot harder running the program, the job was taken away from me with the accusation that I had written the grant to "line my own pockets."  I wasn't hurt that the job was taken away from me because it was way too hard, paid too little and I could make more money doing a lot less staying with my part-time teaching job. What hurt was knowing that pure malevolence had spurred the action and the accusation that went with it. She had told people that the only reason I had written the grant was to provide a part-time job for myself when she was the one who had asked me to write it. What causes people to be so evil? I spent hours of my own time, totally uncompensated writing a $300,000 grant for an after-school program. I did not want to give up my IU job to run it. There was so much jealousy over the fact that I had actually been awarded the grant that the administration did all it could to make the program fail. It was just such a clear-cut example of good and evil I could feel an Aesop tale coming on. 

The negativity and terror that filled my last 2 years at that school were totally illegal and if I had had half a backbone, I could have sued for harassment or bullying in the workplace. That just wasn't done back then. Getting away with the behavior she inflicted on one of the assistant principals the year before, what she did to me and what she did to the other assistant principal she went after once I was gone, reminded me of the Niemoller poem that went around when Trump wanted to ban Muslims.

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—

Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—

Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—

Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Niemoller

Perhaps it seems a bit dramatic to compare this to my little situation but I found little comfort in the fact that a man I had counted a friend, turned on me and then was next in line to be destroyed.  I understand because all my "friends" could have lost their jobs if anyone had said anything. Because no one did object, it was the same as giving tacit approval, which caused the abuse to grow everyday. I wondered how German soldiers could become so brainwashed that they could rationalize treating people like animals but it is not all that complicated. It happens easily, quickly, and with majority approval.

My little vignette is but a tiny example of what can happen to a country when hatred and paranoia lead us to rationalize behavior we know is not right. I am terrified at the number of people who back Trump and how easily he can manipulate thousands of people to forget the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. What happens in a fishbowl can happen in an ocean. In small instances and in large, people of conscience have to stand up to ignorance, paranoia, hatred, prejudice, vindictiveness and yes, evil.