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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6752266" data-attributes="member: 4937">Of course it is.  What it may not be is so depraved that we could assign to the person as a whole the title of evil.  Stealing some M&Ms is a very minor evil.  The harm you are causing is very small and mostly to yourself (because you are confusing your own sense of right and wrong).  We wouldn't expect a petty shoplifter to be so depraved in all their thinking that we could now call them evil, but we wouldn't be surprised if these petty acts of evil were the grease to worse and worse things.It's worth noting that there is a sliding scale of accountability here.   A Wisdom 30 Solar is so perceptive and self-aware that he immediately discerns the full depravity of stealing the MM's.  If the Wisdom 30 Solar decides to steal the MM's fully knowing how wrong it is, the Wisdom 30 Solar immediately plunges to Evil.  He has the wisdom to fully discern the meaning and consequences of his actions.   Where as the Wisdom 5 child doesn't really understand what they are doing and doesn't see the full wrongness of the action.  They can persist in shoplifting for quite a while, and their own ignorance and lack of understanding will protect them from the harm that they do.   And it's worth noting, that most legal systems take this idea into account.  Sure it is.  And it's the sort of evil that is almost certain to lead to even worse acts of evil.  Again, the person can be self-deluded here, but by the time we've graduated up to burglary and grand theft, the character has already demonstrated significant inability to distinguish between right and wrong and a definite disregard for the needs and feelings of others.  The next stage of this is you burgle a house, the little old lady turns out to be home and tries to stop you, and in a panic you throw here to the ground and fracture her hips and/or skull.   At this point, maybe - just maybe you think - "I've become a horrible person."   Whether that makes you change your ways or not is another matter.That's the sort of argument people make to justify their evil.  Again, the Dunning-Krugar effect is very instructive here.  The more evil the person gets, the more they will compare themselves to persons who are clearly depraved and act as if this makes them above average.  They don't compare themselves to the 90% of people who wouldn't burgle a home.   There like, "Ok, I'm a hit man.  But Tony deserved it.  He knew the score.  He should have never welched on Big Eddy.  It's not like I'm Stalin or anything, killing random people.  It's just business."</blockquote>

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