While rummaging around my closet the other day, I came across a page from a Jack Chick comic that, if I remember correctly, I obtained and decided to hang onto back in 1984.  It’s every bit as funny today as it was then.

It got me to thinking: is this really what the Jack Chicks of the world think evil is?  People running around yelling “whee! I’m evil!” and reveling in their horrible deeds?  My experience from reading about the great villains of history is that they have an overriding purpose (themselves), and that they do what they believe is necessary to achieve and maintain that purpose, always justifying their actions in their own heads in good proper Machiavellian style.  Far from celebrating their “badness,” they believe they are perfectly entitled to the spoils of power and should achieve them by any means necessary.

 No, this whole “hooray I’m evil” idea is straight out of the comic books. It’s for Supervillains of the sort you find battling Superman and Captain America in bright primary colors.  Real evil is cold, recognizing no authority other than itself. It has often asserted itself as a divinely chosen, unassailable authority.

 I swear sometimes these religious fundamentalists are all living in some sort of comic book world, with a soundtrack featuring lots of  “POW” and “BIFF” effects.  And I recall being simultaneously amused and disturbed when, after 9/11, President Bush declared his intention to “rid the world of evil-doers.”  I thereupon dubbed him “President Batman” for the rest of his administration.

 Perhaps this is why so many fundamentalists seem to believe god is the only thing keeping them from going off the deep end into debauchery and so forth; their idea of evil is some kind of joyous celebration of horribleness. It’s just so much fun to be evil that without god, the temptation to torture people, suck drugs and be gay is just too much for anybody to resist.

 Again, it’s a comic book world they live in.  I suppose that’s why they seem to think The Flintstones was a documentary.

feralboy12 lives here, at Killed By Fish..