We know that life isn’t black or white. There’s a ton of gray space, where something isn’t entirely good but isn’t entirely bad. Every living being on Earth is gray, because the truth is that they each cause good things and bad things to other people. Probably the best example of this is Al Capone. We all know Al Capone was a mobster. What does a mobster do? Kill people. He killed a bunch people. Despite this, Al Capone managed to maintain a good reputation until the Saint Valentine’s Day massacre, and it is possible he may not have even committed that himself (he was in Florida at this time).
He accomplished this by convincing the public that he was actually a good guy. He donated to charities and even sponsored soup kitchens during the Great Depression. He was considered to be a Robin Hood type figure, and in his illegal business he was protesting against Prohibition.
Let me be clear here that Al Capone absolutely was not a good person. While he did support the poor in certain ways, there is almost no excuse to the amount of violence and death that his gang caused. Of course, he’s not the total reason for gang violence; it would have happened had he not been the leader. But his role in ordering so much of the chaos in Chicago is what makes him a bad person. He likely did not have good intentions for his good deeds but instead wanted to maintain his reputation.
The point is, morality is a very touchy subject. People have different moral values, so it’s hard to tell when something is bad or when something is good. However, there are a few questions I wish to explore more. For example, we have intent vs action.
Let’s treat this like a mendelian cross just for the sake of it. Let’s start with the easiest ones, which are bad intent & actions and good intent & actions. We know that people who do bad things with bad intentions are bad because they put more bad than good into the world. This is why we know Al Capone is a bad person, even though he did good things. The death and violence he caused severely outweigh his contributions, and he certainly did not have good intent. For good people, it’s almost as simple. However, don’t get up with thinking that good people always execute good actions perfectly. I’ve seen many people try to act like a moral pillar or standard, and the problem is that no one has any right to be a moral pillar. Every good person has, intentionally or not, done bad things in their past. Not only that, but in their own life they do hypocritical things every day without realizing it, undermining their integrity. This is the reason that introspection is so important, because good people without introspection really cannot become any better.
Now, let’s cover good intent and bad actions. There are a decent number of examples of this in fiction, but let’s take an example from real life: Lenin. I’m not going to make a political or conclusive statement here, but instead I’m going to point out how Lenin can be used as an example of a gray person. Most people agree that Lenin had a firm belief in socialism. The thing is, he did some good things for Russia. He was a feminist and promoted women’s rights technically before America gained women’s suffrage. He also allowed the Red Cross to offer aid during the 1920s famines. Essentially, some of the things he did had positive impacts, and we have a decent amount of evidence that he really believed Socialism was a good solution to change Russia for the better.
Now, let’s talk about all the atrocities committed. He was responsible for the Red Terror, which killed many political opponents. After a democratic election in Russia, he immediately declared the results false and took over the country by force. During the same famines that he allowed aid, he declared Prodrazvyorstka and took away food from peasants at a time when they were already starving. Basically, in order to enforce his communist “Utopia”, he had to kill a lot of people.
This is the question I want to ask– When does good intention outweigh bad action? For example, if you considered Lenin to be a bad person, is he redeemable? I personally don’t know. But it’s a very good question. At what point should a person be given the chance for redemption? At what point is giving chances immoral, and instead we should deliver justice?
The final option is bad intent, good action. This option confuses me, because I don’t really have an example of this to relate to. The only thing I could think of is maybe an instance where you are helping someone out only for the sake of getting something material. However, if someone does a good thing with bad intentions, is that worse than committing a bad thing with good intentions? There’s definitely a line that has to be crossed, but where does that lie?
And this is why it is important to think about these topics. If you don’t develop your moral values, you risk hypocrisy and making mistakes as a good person. If you are a bad person? Well, then maybe you don’t have to worry about it :).