The Depths of Depravity

In the past I have written about good, evil and the ugly, more complicated combination in many, possibly most, people that is the apparent reality of our existence.

I explored how in Scientology people are at first portrayed as mostly good but as one progresses through the indoctrination a cruel reversal progresses and by the time one is in Scientology deep, they have found that almost everyone is portrayed as degraded, abberated and, well, evil.

I tried to contrast this against work from people outside Scientology that includes information on most people, probably three in five, seeking a fair or even deal with one in five putting other people first and one in five looking to give as little as possible while taking as much as they can, at least according to Adam Grant in his book Give and Take. I covered that in the blog post The Good, The Bad and The Ugly at Mockingbird's Nest blog on Scientology.

But if we are to be thorough we need to do more than point out that Scientology founder Ronald Hubbard was wrong about what percentage of people are evil, insane and lack compassion. He described the world and everyone in it in his terms and there is more than sufficient evidence to my mind to say he was inaccurate. He was totally wrong.

But that leaves the issue and it has other dimension besides what percent of people are mostly good, mostly bad or exceptionally bad or downright evil and what percent are more complicated and somewhere in the middle. And a lot of people in the middle never ever ever do many of the things the downright evil do. Or they are restrained by shame and compassion for others if they do cross a line. That matters. A lot. 

You don't have to be perfect or never violate any of six hundred rules ever to be in the middle. Some people as children get into trouble and learn they don't want to do evil acts because they are ashamed of themselves for hurting others emotionally and physically and not because of the threat of punishment. They stop because they don't want to be bullies or hurt people and their sincere contrition is relevant. Some dabble in evil, sometimes mistaking it for mischief or under the influence of drugs or alcohol and they regret the consequences of their actions when they see them fully or in a sober frame of mind.

I think at some point if we are to look at humanity and say the things Hubbard taught us in Scientology cannot be taken at face value or taken as a given based on his authority then we at some point may have to answer questions. Some of these questions are uncomfortable. Some are troubling, even as questions.

I have decided to take on the subject of evil. The evil in the absolute worst of the worst to be more specific. They exist, are real, and they are not a joke. They have done things we probably would not believe if it were not true. 

I ran into the work of doctor Michael Stone. Doctor Stone is a professor of clinical psychiatry and MD. He is the author of the books and over two hundred professional articles. He has read the biographies of over six hundred killers and spent decades interviewing serial killers, rapists and murderers and child molesters. He deals with the worst of the worst.

If any type of crime or criminal or victim is too offensive for you, I suggest you carefully consider whether you want to read the rest of this. I recall a story about a very realistic movie about the Vietnam War being released in theaters. The general public was not affected by the film, with rare exceptions. But Vietnam veterans who had been in traumatic combat WERE. The suicide rate reportedly surged across the country, but ONLY among this group of veterans, for everyone else it remained at its normal level.

So, only you can determine if any particular work in media may be upsetting for you and use your best judgment. 

Doctor Stone hosted a television series called Most Evil from 2006 to 2008. On this show he introduced his work and his twenty two point scale of evil. Every point in the scale describes a degree of evil starting with justifiable homicide at one and rapidly moving to much, much worse crimes. By the time you pass ten or so the crimes are well into the monstrous inhuman range. The range of seventeen or so to twenty two is so depraved I wish it was not even possible and both the injustice that the victims had to experience these horrors and the reality that people, human beings, are capable and even sometimes eager to commit such acts, that some love to commit these acts and have absolutely no remorse ever or compassion for their victims, well it is enough to make you feel life itself is profoundly unfair, a part of life, what these victims endure simply should not exist in any way and the perpetrators of these atrocities put a section of depravity onto humanity that is revolting. They are human but we feel like they are alien, like they are almost from a different origin and not what we are but despite their acts and psychology that is different from ours they remain a shameful part of us, like the blackest sheep of the human family, if we accept they are part of us it is begrudgingly and reluctantly. If they are part of us it puts many of our beliefs about ourselves in doubt. 

I am going to consult a book by doctor Michael Stone for this series and I think he has come up with a brilliant way to look at evil. Aside from his education and decades of experience he looked at how we in society use the term and synonyms for evil. He looked at newspapers and magazines and books and saw that some crimes get called evil and some don't. He saw that sometimes the victim or victims or number of victims determine the terms used. He saw that sometimes the same exact crime against a particular kind of victim is treated as more evil, sometimes based on race or gender or age. The book The Anatomy of Evil in my opinion is a superb dive into the subject and gives us much to consider.

Doctor Stone mainly dealt with people who operated alone or in pairs and he very rarely looked at larger groups. He has described cult leaders such as Charles Manson and his followers. He gave his assessment of how evil their crimes are on the television series Most Evil and in his book.

For Scientologists and ex Scientologists the question of how evil Ronald Hubbard and David Miscavige are is of course open to debate. Some people would place them at the furthest end of the scale because under both of them Scientology has caused tremendous harm to thousands of people. That is fair in my opinion, but some others would place them much lower on the scale and some, shockingly enough, contend that they  are not even on the scale, meaning their evil is not sufficient to be categorized because they are too innocent. That is not my position personally.

I wanted to write this first portion to introduce the ideas to be tackled and to make this warning so anyone who may be adversely affected can steer clear.