do you ever doubt your essential goodness?

Wait, the rhetorical answer to your question is "No," right?

"BECAUSE we are unwilling to falter under claims that we are reactionary "reverse sexists" AND NOT THE TRUEPUNKROCK-SOULCRUSADERS THAT WE KNOW we really are."

Like I said, evolutionary gold. And that's not (necessarily) a put-down -- being unswervingly convinced of your essential goodness is a very efficient way of getting things done. The question is, of course, what those things turn out to be.

isn't saying it's good from an evolutionary standpoint buying into the myth of the noble savage tho?

jesse being unswervingly convinced of your essential RIGHTNESS is a very efficient way of getting things done; qualitative goodness has nothing to do with your example (see: every genocidal religious leader ever)

(i'm not especially talking abt hitler or momus, but eg abraham lincoln is often said to have embraced, almost willed, his assassination as a personal atonement for the blood his decisions had shed, EVEN THOUGH he absolutely thought those decisions were correct...)

this quote in itself justifies the existence of ilx

Uh, this is a rhetorical question, right? :) I think the question is whether Hitler was convinced of his essential goodness, not whether, from any sane or rational standpoint, he was, which he obviously wasn't. To be honest, though, I'm not enough of a Hitlerologist to really know the answer to this. I do know that Mao seemed to believe, in a literal sense, in "essential goodness", given his endorsement of the Blank Slatist theory of culture -- i.e., all babies are born equally unblemished and good, and it's only societal influences that ever makes anyone do any bad things.

i was also brought up catholic and we're big on original sin...

Okay, that makes perfect sense as a distinction, and I agree with it. With your advanced logic circuits, it's clear why you're considered two iterations ahead of the ILX Mark P model.

there's a big difference between asking yourself "am i a good person?" (the bugaboo being that it's basically an impossible question to answer, cf. hornby's unreadable book) and "am i doing the right thing?" (which can be answered resolutely without ever deference to any traditional precepts of 'goodness')

accepting that (which i think i do), it's logical to contend that it is NOT necessarily a given that everyone will be concerned with questions of their essential goodness. so what (if anything) can we suggest about the ones that are?

however i attribute my superiority to the beneficent gaze of mr blobby

who is curiously 18 iterations BEHIND you

Paradoxically, the job of culture and religion is to retrain this goodly/godly feeling, by instilling doubt in our essential goodness. It sharpens our sense that we are capable of doing bad things to the point where we are able to refrain from acting on all our impulses. That lets us operate more smoothly in a social setting. Damn good thing, too. Without this retraining we'd be murdered by the adults before puberty.

Er, no. In the vast majority of cases the good (= compassionate, non-malicous) thing to do is extremely clear, we just don't do it because we don't want to.

Assuming that these leaders ARE doing the 'right' thing to help others--- and not to simply look good to their peers---it depends on how far their influence truly stretches (ie. do they truly have the ability to help others, or are they a figurehead for someone else?)

I hope you mean by the standards of various churches, rather than it being impossible to be a christian and consider you a good person.

Just because you think about doing a horrible action, this does not make you a worse person than you were five seconds before. Goodness is based on how you conduct yourself, despite inner feelings

I'm also hopeful that those of you who know what my religious background is wouldn't assume that I think of you any less because of your difference in religious opinions. I've had the chance to meet some wonderful human beings who are secular humanists (basically atheists with hearts of gold) whom I felt God (the God I worship) would be very pleased with. Just because you don't happen to believe in God doesn't mean you're not a good person in my eyes. I would also appreciate some open-mindedness my way, too, because it does really disappoint me whenever someone is automatically dismissive of my faith and calls it a "crutch" to lean on or consider me brainless or mindless for being Christian.

Just because you think about doing a horrible action, this does not make you a worse person than you were five seconds before. Goodness is based on how you conduct yourself, despite inner feelings

I would hope so, Nichole. Because I feel so guilty about thinking some of the things I think of that I instantly feel the need to ask forgiveness to God. One of my parish priests says it's all right to think most of the thoughts I was thinking about, just so long as it doesn't take hold of me and leads to something that would hurt someone else. I want to believe that.

Hmm. Maybe this is all a part of how self-critical I am. I do hope I always stay on the ball about trying to be as nice as I possibly can be because I truly want people to be happy, save for those who have done unforgivable or unpleasant things to me or those who treat me badly (which right now covers maybe 15 people at most out of the thousands I've met just IRL).

Does this make a bit of sense at all?

Yes, Andrew - in fact, I'd probably have said "Christians' standards" if I'd meant the other. My favourite Christian here, for instance (my dear friend Anthony), seems to consider me a good person. But there are various areas where my morality and that generally considered good by Christianity differ. This doesn't exercise me at all, except when I'm asked, as on this thread.

this is what i was getting at.

There's no reason that you shouldn't, Dee. So-called 'dirty' thoughts are what make us human....and I'm not necessarily talking about sex, either. Your priest is right: just having those thoughts isn't worth guilty feelings.

Well, hopefully this is the case. I just feel like I should be superhuman at times, you know? With as few flaws as I possibly can have. Else I disappoint myself. As for the whole "sex" thinking -- *laughs* kinda hard to think about something I really have no clue about. The dirtiest thoughts I have are thoughts of kissing. Sad and pathetic for my age? Maybe. And maybe another example of freakdom, too. Um, I'll shut up now.