A Brief Treatise on Good and Evil

“You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.”

These words were uttered by Aaron Eckhart’s Harvey Dent in the 2008 film The Dark Knight. While poignant, I find them to not really answer a question I’ve had for a long time: do bad guys know they’re bad, or are they always just the good guy in their own story?

In terms of fiction, it seems only the outlandish, childish movies or TV shows do the villains actually call themselves villains. In the majority of more mature works, villains have motives for what they do beyond just being evil. They may want more money, or power, or immortality. They may just be trying to protect the people that they care about in the only way they know how. From their point of view, the good guys are evil, and trying to stop them from getting what they want.

What interests me most is that when it comes to villains, specifically the ones that are heroes to themselves, the majority never question the morality of their actions. They are prepared to do whatever they need to for their own greater good, and ignore the consequences to other people, or their own souls. They forget about right and wrong.

How do these characters relate to real-life villains though? Sure, they may be complex characters with fascinating backstories, but do real people who “join the dark side” question whether their actions are right or wrong? Did Charles Manson know that he was a bad person? Did Adolf Hitler? Did King Herod?

Those people, along with countless others, ordered unspeakable acts of horror against other human beings. Did they know that what they were doing was wrong?

I ask these questions because of my own morality. I know that I have done bad things in the past. I know that I still make bad choices. Does this make me a bad person? Does it make me worse, knowing that what I do is wrong? Does my questioning of myself and my motives prove that I ultimately have a good heart? Will I know that I’m the villain when I’ve hurt and driven away all the people I care about? Or will I live out all of my days and die as the hero of my story?

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Back to regular posts and challenges for next week! Give me four words. They don't have to form a sentence. They could be as random as "Nitwit. Blubber. Oddment. Tweak." They will be worked into next week's story.

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