>Of course, we blinkered bigots under the sway of the medieval
>doctrines of psychoanalysis might say that people take pleasure in
>doing "evil."
>Doug
>
Taking pleasure in evil actions implies that you're conscious of the fact
that you're doing something cruel. This is not really evil at all. It's
just sadism. The essence of evil is its unconsciousness. Evil is
impersonal.
Take the example of Hitler. Is it a coincidence that he was subjected to mechanized killing for four years (and miraculously survived) and went on to subject Jews and Roma to mechanized killing? It's not that he took pleasure in killing people but that he unconsciously relieved himself of his mental anguish by physically imposing it onto others. All the while he thought he was saving Germany.
Ted