Editing Evil (section)

===Usefulness as a term===
There is debate on how useful the term "evil" is, since it is often associated with spirits and the devil. Some see the term as useless because they say it lacks any real ability to explain what it names. There is also real danger of the harm that being labeled "evil" can do when used in moral, political, and legal contexts.<ref name="Todd Calder"/>{{rp|1–2}} Those who support the usefulness of the term say there is a secular view of evil that offers plausible analyses without reference to the supernatural.<ref name="Eve Garrard"/>{{rp|325}} Garrard and Russell argue that evil is as useful an explanation as any moral concept.<ref name="Eve Garrard"/>{{rp|322–326}}<ref name="Russell2009">{{cite journal |last1=Russell |first1=Luke |title=He Did It Because He Was Evil |journal=American Philosophical Quarterly |date=July 2009 |volume=46 |issue=3 |pages=268–269 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40606922 |publisher=University of Illinois Press|jstor=40606922 }}</ref> Garrard adds that evil actions result from a particular kind of motivation, such as taking pleasure in the suffering of others, and this distinctive motivation provides a partial explanation even if it does not provide a complete explanation.<ref name="Eve Garrard"/>{{rp|323–325}}<ref name="Russell2009"/>{{rp|268–269}} Most theorists agree use of the term evil can be harmful but disagree over what response that requires. Some argue it is "more dangerous to ignore evil than to try to understand it".<ref name="Todd Calder"/>

Those who support the usefulness of the term, such as Eve Garrard and [[David McNaughton]], argue that the term evil "captures a distinct part of our moral phenomenology, specifically, 'collect[ing] together those wrongful actions to which we have ... a response of moral horror'."<ref name="GARRARD and MCNAUGHTON">{{cite journal |last1=Garrard|first1=Eve|last2=McNaughton|first2=David|title=Speak No Evil? |journal=Midwest Studies in Philosophy |date=2 September 2012 |volume=36 |issue=1 |pages=13–17 |doi=10.1111/j.1475-4975.2012.00230.x |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1475-4975.2012.00230.x}}</ref> Claudia Card asserts it is only by understanding the nature of evil that we can preserve humanitarian values and prevent evil in the future.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Card |first1=Claudia |title=Confronting Evils: Terrorism, Torture, Genocide |date=2010 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9781139491709 |page=i}}</ref>  If evils are the worst sorts of moral wrongs, social policy should focus limited energy and resources on reducing evil over other wrongs.<ref name="Card 2005">{{cite book |last1=Card |first1=Claudia |title=The Atrocity Paradigm A Theory of Evil |date=2005 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780195181265 |page=109}}</ref> Card asserts that by categorizing certain actions and practices as evil, we are better able to recognize and guard against responding to evil with more evil which will "interrupt cycles of hostility generated by past evils".<ref name="Card 2005"/>{{rp|166}}

One school of thought holds that no ''person'' is evil and that only ''acts'' may be properly considered evil. Some theorists define an evil action simply as a kind of action an evil person performs,<ref name="Daniel M. Haybron">{{cite journal |last1=Haybron |first1=Daniel M. |title=Moral Monsters and Saints |journal=The Monist |date=2002 |volume=85 |issue=2 |pages=260–284 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/27903772 |publisher=Oxford University Press|doi=10.5840/monist20028529 |jstor=27903772 }}</ref>{{rp|280}} but just as many theorists believe that an evil character is one who is inclined toward evil acts.<ref name="John Kekes">{{cite book |last1=Kekes |first1=John |title=The Roots of Evil |date=2005 |publisher=Cornell University Press |isbn=9780801443688}}</ref>{{rp|2}}
Luke Russell argues that both evil actions and evil feelings are necessary to identify a person as evil, while [[Daniel Haybron]] argues that evil feelings and evil motivations are necessary.<ref name="Todd Calder"/>{{rp|4–4.1}}

American psychiatrist [[M. Scott Peck]] describes evil as a kind of personal "militant ignorance".<ref name="Liemult">Peck, M. Scott. (1983, 1988). ''People of the Lie: The hope for healing human evil''. Century Hutchinson.</ref> According to Peck, an evil person is consistently self-deceiving, deceives others, [[psychological projection|psychologically projects]] his or her evil onto very specific targets,<ref>Peck, 1983/1988, p. 105</ref> hates, abuses power, and lies incessantly.<ref name="Liemult"/><ref>Peck, M. Scott. (1978, 1992), ''The Road Less Travelled''. Arrow.</ref>  Evil people are unable to think from the viewpoint of their victim. Peck considers those he calls evil to be attempting to escape and hide from their own conscience (through self-deception) and views this as being quite distinct from the apparent absence of conscience evident in [[Psychopathy|sociopaths]]. He also considers that certain institutions may be evil, using the [[My Lai massacre]] to illustrate. By this definition, acts of [[terrorism|criminal]] and [[state terrorism]] would also be considered evil.