>There's a very good definition of evil, put forth by a political scientist
>named C. Fred Alford, that starts with this principle. What makes people
>evil is that, in order to contain their anguish, they're willing to expell
>it onto others. Evil is powered by dread, and what distinguishes it from
>mental illness (where the two categories don't overlap) is the absence of
>empathy.
Of course, we blinkered bigots under the sway of the medieval doctrines of psychoanalysis might say that people take pleasure in doing "evil." Normally, social sanction and internalized mechanisms of guilt inhibit us from running riot, but when normality is suspended - as during war - we can go wild. Thanks to TV, we can indulge this pleasure by watching images of bombing - someone else is doing it in the name of right and justice and morality, and that relieves us of feeling guilt over our pleasure in it.
Doug