Evil or Ignorance?

“What we call ‘evil’ is simply ignorance.”

David Icke

Quite so. Furthermore, it is without question that David Icke has performed an enormous service in exposing huge swathes of ignorance.  All the more paradoxical then, that despite his explicit recognition that “the essence of evil is ignorance” David still uses the term ‘evil’ in the old way - reproducing the old dualistic construct of ‘good versus evil’ that has reproduced itself as a type of ‘meme’ over millennia. 

I myself do not belief in any such thing as ‘intrinsic evil’ or intrinsically ‘evil’ beings, human or otherwise, in this old dualistic and religious sense. Certainly there are masses of ignorant human beings. And there are without any doubt whatsoever certainly also beings with seriously twisted minds - with the result that their acts  (sorry all you Christian readers) are simply unforgiveable and/or have had consequences that have made them unforgiveable. Having an ignorant, greedy, misanthropic, unempathic or even psychopathic mindset however is not the same as being innately ‘evil’ in the old religious sense. Indeed it has always served the purposes of the psychopathic individuals and elites that Icke exposes to maintain the dualistic construct of ‘good versus evil’. This is not to say that we cannot transcend this illusory dualism of thought through a higher awareness, but not without at the same time recognising the many ways in which such continue to play a role in shaping and sustaining a world or ‘reality’ which constantly serves to reinforce our belief in them – in particular in the dualism of good and evil, which rests on a belief in innate ‘evil’  or ‘evil’ forces. 

We are faced therefore, with a vicious circle. The stronger our belief in innately evil beings, groups, or entire races or species, the more evidence one can find that appears to support this. For as I have said, evil is not only essentially ignorance but can and does also have dire and devastating global consequences that cannot be ignored – for these consequences are all too real for billions of people around the world. All the more important therefore, that we do no buy into the belief in ‘evil’ – so cherished by the psychopathic ruling elites whom Icke brands as ‘evil’  - given that it not only serves those  elites but also functions as a self-fulfilling prophecy – the sort of prophecy they wish to see ‘real-ised’ and the sort of ultra-dualistic world they seek to shape. What however, is the alternative to buying into the belief in evil? It is precisely to question the concept of evil itself and understand it in a  different – way, as ignorance. By this I mean both generalised ignorance and also the specific type of ignorance that finds expression in the form of psychopathic individuals and elites.  Here all talk of individuals being ‘possessed’ by ‘evil’ forces or entities or species misses the point entirely. For those forces are themselves ‘possessed’ by a twisted, distorted and psychopathic ‘mindset’. What is most important to recognise therefore is that the assumed ‘possessor’ of others is the one most deeply possessed – not those to whom they wish to impart or implant their own mindset and values. 

There is a still deeper reason why the specific term ‘possession’ is so often used in the context of talk about ‘evil’ forces, entities, spirits, species etc. Possession has to do with ownership, i.e. with property and property relations.  So if we think, for example, of money as a form of property, it is clear that those who possess most money - and seem to possess also an almost perversely insatiable greed for  yet more of it - are themselves not just ‘obsessed’ but in a certain sense also ‘possessed’ by the very thing that they themselves ‘possess’ most of – money.  The same could be said of ‘power’. Those elites and individuals who possess and exercise most monetary and military power in this world use it for one principal aim – to increase that power. In this sense it can be argued  they too are not just obsessed by possessed precisely by what they already possess most of – power as such and not some evil power. Their ignorance or unawareness of this is what sustains their aims and makes their acts so perverse. For perhaps an even better term than ‘ignorance’ would be unawareness. They are no less unaware of the reasons for their own aims and actions – seeking power and money as ends in themselves - than the sheep they exercise power over are unaware of their machinations. 

Yet perhaps we also need to be a little more judicious in our use of the word ‘power’. For ‘power OVER’ is something quite distinct from that what could be called ‘power OF’. Thus one speaks of the power ‘of’ love, just as one could speak of the power OF of authentic human feelings and creativity of any sort – empathy for example.  It is this feeling experience of power OF and experience of the power OF feeling that the psychopath most decisively lacks – and seeks to compensate for this lack through seeking and exercising power OVER others, and power too over their own feelings and capacity for feeling. The capacity for natural feeling awareness of our own bodies, our own being – and that of others - is something they can only come to in a most indirect way – through exercising power OVER their feelings, OVER their bodies, indeed OVER their own being - as well of course, through exercising power OVER other beings, OVER their bodies and OVER their feelings. Their desire for power OVER obsesses and possesses them, because it arises out of and reinforces a basic lack or absence of a different type of power – power OF, and in particular the power of feeling awareness and the creativity that is its fruit.  Hence they are not just unempathic to a psychopathic degree, but are also uncreative to a no lesser degree. That is because, for them, ‘creativity’ is identified purely with calculation – whether in the form of monetary and political calculation, scientific and technological calculation. The fact that their machinations tend to take the form of calculated plans hatched together in conspiratorial cabals is therefore - paradoxically - not something reducible to some form of conspiracy. On the contrary, the conspiratorial nature of their thinking and of their activities is manifestation of the fact that hatching calculated plans to be executed through a whole variety of monetary, political, scientific and technological forms of calculation is the only type of ‘mind’ – indeed the only mode of thinking - that they know. As a result they endow it, like power, money and technology itself with a quasi-religious awe and reverence that would appear perverse to most of us.  The ‘mindset’ that possesses them then, that has them totally in its grip - and which, as a result, they seek to impart and impose globally, was first given a name by the 20^th century German thinker Martin Heidegger. He called it ‘calculative thinking’ – in contrast to thinking in a deeper and truer sense. This other thinking he called ‘meditative thinking’ – thinking that creatively ‘ponders’ rather than calculates - that arises spontaneously and creatively out of patient meditative and also feeling awareness - and not out of sterile, feeling-less calculation. 

Along with the sterile ‘black-and-white’ dualism of good versus evil goes a whole set of associated or parallel dualistic constructs – for example the dualism of light and darkness, or indeed of the very colours white and black. These parallel dualisms, expressed in notions such as ‘white supremacy’. ‘dark’ forces or ‘black’ magic served and continue to serve racism towards blacks, dark-skinned or any non-white peoples very well (for example the ‘yellow’ peril). The idea that there is something innately ‘bad’ about the colour black (or any colour), or something innately threatening (rather than profound or mysterious) about ‘darkness’, is, of course, totally infantile – an expression of fear. Yet like the good/evil dualism it has also persisted as a cultural and mythological ‘meme’ for millennia.  A no less crass parallel dualism is that of high (good) and low (bad) as reflected even in David Icke’s talk of ‘low’ vibrations/frequencies as if they were inherently  negative or detrimental. Why is it then that the lowest frequency of brain wave vibrations also correspond to the deepest and most profound meditative states?

Finally, for all his awareness of the machinations of international finance capitalism, its secret cabals, and its almost total control of the media, David Icke ignores one important point – namely that ‘it takes two to tango’. As my wife put it: “The power of the press lies in the ignorance of the people”  (not the other way round). And the fact of the matter is that just as no hypnotist can get a person to do something they do not consciously or subconsciously want or agree to do, nor can any power influence or control our lives if we reject that control. The world is not made up of evil perpetrators and powerless victims. The danger of Icke’s worldview is that once again it is contradictory on this issue. On the one hand he argues that we mankind can ‘get off its knees’ and reject control and slavery. On the other hand he perpetuates the paranoid myth that the powers that rule today’s world can and create chaos and destruction act at will – as for example, as they have done in Iraq, Libya and Syria. In reality they cannot act at will - for the mayhem they seek to create or have created throughout the ages would not have been possible without the existence of latent sectarian divides amongst their ‘victims’.  There is always an element of subconscious collusion between ruler and ruled, perpetrator and victim – to believe otherwise is to believe in our own powerlessness. And yet through deeper knowledge and awareness we can prevent ourselves consciously or subconsciously colluding with the ‘powers that be’ – thus affirming and exercising our own innate power in the face of them.