I’ve forgotten where I’d heard it exactly, the quote that says that there are no bad people, just good people who do bad things, I did ponder on it a lot. I tried to imagine a dozen scenarios to decide on the validity of that statement. At the end of my pondering, I concluded that the statement was true in a way but not completely.
I first sighted a serial paedophile, and said to myself, he/she has no way of convincing anyone that he’s a good person that just does bad things. Because I know these days that everyone ties the evil deeds of others to some childhood, psychological problem, and while that may be true for the most part, some people don’t have any background problems and just decide to be….bad.
And then I thought of a serial killer. Possibly put that way because he watched his parents butchered by some people and so grows up and goes on a revenge spree, killing everyone that was even remotely tied to the death of his parents. Then he sees a child, dying of hunger and takes care of that child and even finds a way to drop the child anonymously in a place where he’s sure the child will be taken care of. Granted, he’s a killer, but can we call him a bad person?
And then, finally, I narrow home to everyday situations. You and I. The man who beats his wife and children like animals at home, even targeting places he knows wouldn’t show once clothes are worn but then helps the old lady cross the road, stands up for the pregnant woman to sit in the bus, helps a child to pick up his groceries after spilling it on the floor. He’s still a bad person, given, but he does good things. So does that make him bad or good?
Or the president of the women's choir that donates to dozens of charities, the shoulder to lean or cry on for every emotional person within a fifty-mile radius, pecks the little children that come to visit her and kisses the boo-boos of the wailing child, but then has quick fingers. Swipes everything within range and sometimes goes to the gardener’s room when the husband leaves for work. A good person in most cases, but she does bad things, yeah.
I credit all of these to the imperfection of humans. For the most part, there are bad people, terrible people even. But then, unconsciously, they do some good deeds and there are the people we know as good people but they know the bad things they do. Little things. They might not even do it a lot, but it’s there.
No one would want to consider themselves a bad person no matter what. They might even say, “I’m not bad. I just do bad things.” and that could be valid in some sense and some situations. But we can all admit to having done something bad even though in the overall sense, we still see ourselves as good.
I’ve done things I’m not proud of. Things that people would very much say, “You’re good but this is a bad thing.” And I take responsibility for it because doing those bad things doesn’t make me a bad person. To be honest, I don’t think we can conveniently rule out someone as a bad person or a good person because we don’t know and we can never be sure of what actually goes on.
So, what makes a person either bad or good. Is it by the things the person does? Or what contradicts the values we uphold as a person. But no matter what the answer is, I do subscribe to the statement that bad people are capable of doing good things and good people, do bad things. But then, in that case, who would be considered a good person?
This is my response to this week’s weekend topic Good bad by @galenkp. I’d love to hear your opinions though on the concept of good and bad people. Feel free to speak your mind in the comments.
All images are mine.