The instinctive, selfish Human ego is harmful, but it is not “evil”…
Opinion from the Internet about the selfish Human nature:
“I respectfully have to disagree with the ego not being harmful. Although it’s most likely true in this day and age, that most are hear for their own glory, the part I disagree on is where you said it’s not wrong. It is, at the very least, very detrimental to society as a whole. Does anyone remember when almost everyone was more than willing to help others? And everything was so much better then. In a previous comment I said we should all make sure our needs are met, but that’s alot different than only caring about our own glory. That’s where the uncaring, cut throat, dog eat dog society we now live in came from.”
I agree with you.
I didn’t say (in a previous post) that being selfish, egotist, using, exploiting others is not wrong or harmful. What I said was that it is not evil, or sinful, after all we can’t behave in any other way, we are born with a program which makes only self-serving, self-justifying, egotistic calculations.
We didn’t have a free choice about the nature we are born with, thus it is not on our account that we behave that way.
The fact that it wasn’t so obvious before - at least not on such a mass scale as we can observe today - is because our selfish ego is not static, but it constantly, exponentially grows.
So by today it reached such intensity where we don’t even feel shame when manipulating, using, exploiting everybody else for our own benefit openly, in front of everybody, from the top to the bottom of Humanity’s pyramid.
It is true that there are still some people who try to do good to others. Reportedly there is about 10% of the population that is born with an instinctive inclination towards helping others, to be charitable. In these people the instinctive self-justification, fulfilling their own need is expressed in such an externally altruistic fashion. But most people knowingly, unknowingly behave solely based on self-interest.
True changes will come when we recognize that the selfish ego is the primary engine not only in certain people, groups of people, but in all of us, and that by instinctively, blindly following the ego we will mutually, collectively self-destruct.
Then we can use, awaken our unique Human intellect that is capable of critical self-assessment, initiating the necessary self-changes. Then we will be able to complement our original program with an “upgrade” from Nature perfect, selfless, altruistically cooperating, complementing system.
The “truly Human” being will be a composite of the two contrasting qualities, consciously, methodically using the power, aspirations, driving force of the ego in a Natural, altruistic way.