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[NF] Misery of Idealism? Hypersensitivity to Sin

disregard

mrs
Joined
Apr 23, 2007
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Evil... for the purpose of this post, I will mean for evil to mean bad. Bad as in not good and not neutral.

Evil doesn't paralyse me, but it makes me more determined to create security in my life by means of modifying my thoughts, attitudes, and behavior. It makes me take stock of my reactions, my financial freedom, my strengths, my weaknesses... everything that affects how safe I am from the evils of the world. And these evils come on a large scale, I'm not just talking about the night stalker or nuclear war. I'm also talking about people that wish ill upon me. The everyday evils.
 

ladypinkington

Rubber Nipple Salesperson
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Jul 19, 2007
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I know I felt traumatized and emotionally paralyzed when watching the movie, I think it was simply called, Kinsey- it had Liam Neison or however you spell his name in it.

I have such powerful ideals about marriage and sex- and that movie so thoroughly violated those ideals and seeing the violations was too much for me and really disturbed and hurt me to see it. It was emotionally painful to see for me.

The way that the blonde wife character in the movie Knocked Up treated the husband was hurtful for me to see as well because again- marriage is so sacred to me and I have so many defined ideals about it. It hurt me to see someone being treated so unfairly in my opinion. I am the type of woman who is as concerned about the husband being respected of boundaries and loved fairly as I am the woman.

Example- I believe husbands should be gotten a gift for Valentine's Day as well as the woman- something he actually likes. I believe in love equality on both sides. I believe the man should be cherished as much as the woman should be. In that movie the woman was so unreasonable- it was all about her and pay no mind to where he is coming from and what his needs are.

These are just examples of reactions I have from movies- you can imagine in real life- I just feel overwhelming pain and like you said I feel paralyzed.

I don't have many ideals or maybe I should say there aren't many things I have ideals about- but the ones that I do have are felt very passionately and are very defined and strong and to see them violated or to feel alone in my ideals is painful to see, hear, feel.

It is amazing to me in a good way, how God can love the sinner but not the sin.

Is a man defined by his ideals and actions or is he a seperate entity from those things?
 

Metis

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This view has led me to value mercy over justice in everyday life. I can't stand it when people feel the need to seek revenge. I always presume, indicative of my own tendencies, that whenever people sin, their remorse will be so overwhelming that it'd be unfair to come down *too* hard on them.

Justice is an attempt to set things right so that it'll never happen again. (...) Not for revenge, but to prevent further transgressions.

I've usually conceived of mercy as a form of justice, with mercy being primarily for the oppressed, rather than a covering of sin for the benefit of the oppressor.

Some sins of oppression are so long drawn out and leave the victim so without relief, the only mercy for the victim seems to be the hope of torment (hellfire of some sort) against the inflictor. Even if further transgression will have been restrained.

If the character is actually reformed and makes the efforts to redress the oppression, then the inflictor has become in some sense a different person, and in this case justice is the replacement of evil with repentance and goodwill. The great tragedy occurs if the victim now becomes wicked himself, or if he clings to suffering, refusing to find justice in the grace of his oppressor's change of heart.

Accidental oppression is another story.

Anyway, that's how I rationalize them as being noncontradictory values.

Clarification: The torment/hellfire thing would seem to lead to genuine or superior justice only if it involved the "hell burns away sin" transformation, somehow cleansing the character or the heart or whatever. In other words, maybe purgatory is a better term. No mere torment seems adequate to avenge certain (any?) offences.
 

KLessard

Aspiring Troens Ridder
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Apr 25, 2008
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595
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The best I can say was that satan ran that night club.

I don't care what atheists and materialists will say, but yes, demons are crawling all over the place in such "hedonistic" clubs as you say. Ever read "A Divine Revelation of the Spirit Realm" by Mary K. Baxter? You'd find some troubling testimonies in there.
I have felt something similar in places where bad things were happening. Like a chill down my spine.
 

Lateralus

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Is it possible that Fi is better at coping or objectifying "evil" than Fe?
Based on the responses in this thread, it sure sounds like it. xNFJs seem to have a big problem with this, xNFPs, not so much.

I used to be more sensitive when I was younger, like I would cry when people would die on a television show, when I was a child. But I've never been disgusted with the world or with 'evil' within myself (I don't subscribe to duality). I'm a misanthrope, but I don't think that's the same. I have a pretty thick skin, so much that I sometimes question whether or not I'm an NF.

P.S. I consider my type to be ENxP.
 

Athenian200

Protocol Droid
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Reading this thread makes me wonder if there's something wrong with most of you, or something wrong with me.

I don't have nearly the same level of reaction to things as most of you describe unless it's something that personally affects me or someone close to me, and even then it's often based on the few things that irritate me most. I'd admit that sometimes I have a stronger reaction to a misspelled word or misplaced comma than I do hearing about a natural disaster or bombing in a foreign country. :blush:

I do have a reaction to "evil," but it's more like an "ugh" and desire to turn my head away and not look, maybe do something else to get my mind off it if it were bad enough. Things on the news just don't affect me at all, though. To me it's just a bunch of numbers and statistics, and I'm often skeptical that the news is even real rather than just exaggerated to get ratings.

Basically, I have a desire to avoid evil, but it's more like I just want to get my mind off it when I encounter it and try to move on. It just doesn't quite "break" me inside. Although if it's involving someone close to me, I can get worked up about as much as you describe normally happening for a typical event, and then mostly getting over it anyway in a few days or weeks.

I definitely do fear evil in the sense of trying to defend myself from it. I'm rather suspicious and paranoid of other people, in fact.

I do fight evil in my own way, though, by trying to be polite, concerned, helpful, and organized. It seems to me that evil can thrive more easily without clear rules or where people aren't concerned with appropriateness, in more chaotic and haphazard environments. Thus, I try to prevent the creation of those environments. I just focus on doing things to promote a positive outcome in the future rather than dwelling on the pain caused by the bad ones.

So, which is it? Do I have an undersized heart? Or are you all hypersensitive? Maybe a little of both?

Anyway, very interesting reading here.
 

cheap

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Mar 18, 2008
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F00D
There's a difference between justice and vengeance. Justice is an attempt to set things right so that it'll never happen again. Vengeance is emotionally driven and just to seek closure for harms. They can sometimes look similar but they are not the same. For many people, a simple slap on the wrist does nothing.

There's a difference in being too hard on somebody and simply letting them go free. Draconian prisons didn't work because the people who stayed there were more criminal when they left than when they entered. That would be considered too harsh, but just because that doesn't work doesn't mean we should give up trying to deal justice. If people don't understand how their actions are hurting others, there needs to be an artificial system in place. This is why we have 'justice.' Not for revenge, but to prevent further transgressions.

Okay, I just re-read what I wrote and I don’t know why I said “mercy over justice” because I only meant to equate vengeance with justice to comment on it being something I disagree with. When I said “in everyday life” I wasn’t referring to the legal system, I just feel that in some situations not seeking revenge will do a better job of restraining transgression, but for criminals obviously I agree justice is necessary. Sorry it was probably late, my bad wording.
 

cheap

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I don't have nearly the same level of reaction to things as most of you describe unless it's something that personally affects me or someone close to me, and even then it's often based on the few things that irritate me most. I'd admit that sometimes I have a stronger reaction to a misspelled word or misplaced comma than I do hearing about a natural disaster or bombing in a foreign country. :blush:

LOL.

I do have a reaction to "evil," but it's more like an "ugh" and desire to turn my head away and not look, maybe do something else to get my mind off it if it were bad enough. Things on the news just don't affect me at all, though. To me it's just a bunch of numbers and statistics, and I'm often skeptical that the news is even real rather than just exaggerated to get ratings.

Well to be honest sometimes I sort of have to concentrate my efforts into becoming affected, saddened, if only for a moment whenever my empathetic reflexes aren't hypersensitive like they usually are when affliction is personal. I wouldn't say it isn't empathy when the impact is felt through a more conscious grasp on the mourning rather than a natural reaction over something closer to home. It may well be feeling because I should but those values aren't just society's, they're mine internalised as well and *any* trace of apathy goes against my fundamental grain of being. I won't get upset nearly as much for nowhere near as long over something distant either and this frustrates me! I figure that the greater it affects me, the more regularly I'll count my blessings and feel motivated and compelled to help out. I can try to feel as though I care more by trying to get absorbed into events but I wouldn't say someone cared any less if they simply acknowledged them being unfortunate. It doesn't mean you have an undersized heart when television's a helpless barrier. That doesn't speak for the evil you do try to overcome in your everyday life with the differences you can make, which is more productive anyway:

I just focus on doing things to promote a positive outcome in the future rather than dwelling on the pain caused by the bad ones.
 

Metis

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Do you think that having a strong F function helps you cope with sin, rather than leaving you overwhelmed by it?

I'm afraid that if I try to do anything of consequence, I'll be ignorantly fiddling with part of the world, and it will fall apart in some area, large or tiny, that's currently stable. So I "instinctively" do as little as possible.

I'm overwhelmed when I look at the news. I feel like I should come up with a plan to address everything at the root, and that if I become part of someone else's plan without understanding it, I'll end up a pawn in someone's greedy, deceitful scheme.

I don't know if this means I'm an F, or if it's the "shadow Fe" or the "demonic Fi" or just a weird extrapolation of personal experience. It seems like the F's who posted tend to take a way more rational perspective on this stuff.
 

heart

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I think that people cause far more harm by trying to deny evil and being too afraid of it than do those who actually enjoy evil acts.
 

Metis

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Evil does fascinate me. I want to understand it inside and out. Without understanding what evil actually is, what is desires and how it behaves, how would humans have any hope of transmuting it? The only way to beat it, is to become a walking encylopedia about it. Walk beside it, listen to what it has to tell you, let it teach you about itself.

When you do this, how do you do it? Do you empathise with it, argue with yourself in its favor to get perspective on it? What insights have you gotten this way? Do they help?
 

heart

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Oh edited my post...I firgured I was going to a place most people don't really care about...sorry. I read a lot of gnostic materials and Jung and Blake for a start, also read about how things like psychology are used to manipulate us through media to alter our inner sense of morality, how subtle evil is, how we lie to ourselves bit by bit, make compromises with life in order to not burn bridges with others and in the end become changed by life to allow ourselves to become as corrupted by the world as it is. Evil comes as an angel of light, seduces us with our ego and love of ease, argues to us through reason and sympathy. It seldom comes carrying a big stick.

The book, The Godfather is a great education in how evil works in our world. In that book, the mafia is not the main evil, just using evil in others and the system to do its work. The mafia is evil, but not the only one to blame for what they do, it is also the weakness in others and the system that allows it to go on... Just one example. I will try to remember some of the others.
 

heart

heart on fire
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A true sage about evil, Leonard Cohen, if you walk with evil unknowing...watch out, you won't know what is taking you over but it will grow to own you and once you learn this and forget again, you are doubly lost. We tend to want to quickly forget and deny when we are seduced by evil and fall, we should remember:

By the rivers dark
I wandered on.
I lived my life
in Babylon.

And I did forget
My holy song:
And I had no strength
In Babylon.

By the rivers dark
Where I could not see
Who was waiting there
Who was hunting me.

And he cut my lip
And he cut my heart.
So I could not drink
From the river dark.

And he covered me,
And I saw within,
My lawless heart
And my wedding ring,

I did not know
And I could not see
Who was waiting there,
Who was hunting me.

By the rivers dark
[]
I panicked on.
I belonged at last
to Babylon.

Then he struck my heart
With a deadly force,
And he said, ‘This heart:
It is not yours.’

And he gave the wind
My wedding ring;
And he circled us
With everything.

By the rivers dark,
In a wounded dawn,
I live my life
In Babylon.

Though I take my song
From a withered limb,
Both song and tree,
They sing for him.

Be the truth unsaid
And the blessing gone,
If I forget
My Babylon.

I did not know
And I could not see
Who was waiting there,
Who was hunting me.

By the rivers dark,
Where it all goes on;
By the rivers dark
In Babylon.
 

Metis

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I think that people cause far more harm by trying to deny evil and being too afraid of it than do those who actually enjoy evil acts.

We can contribute this way by sweeping corruption under the rug, by covering our eyes to it, and also by reacting without an accurate understanding of the truth when we think we see it. A lot of ways to mess things up with good intentions and ignorance.
 

heart

heart on fire
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We can contribute this way by sweeping corruption under the rug, by covering our eyes to it, and also by reacting without an accurate understanding of the truth when we think we see it. A lot of ways to mess things up with good intentions and ignorance.

Exactly. Also when we go along to get along, when we sell out our principles in the name of what the world tells us is "reasonable." We sell out to evil in pieces most of the time. Our ego, our vanity, our fear, our love of ease, our desire to be in harmony, our desire to fit in and to be respected, even our sympathy and compassion... all of these things can be manipulated by evil to led us to places we never intended to go.

The half lie is used far more often than the outright lie. The half deal, make a compromise with evil to make gains today...these are the ways.

I just saw a good movie about standing up, called The Girl From the Cafe.
 

Skyward

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Exactly. Also when we go along to get along, when we sell out our principles in the name of what the world tells us is "reasonable." We sell out to evil in pieces most of the time. Our ego, our vanity, our fear, our love of ease, our desire to be in harmony, our desire to fit in and to be respected, even our sympathy and compassion... all of these things can be manipulated by evil to led us to places we never intended to go.

The half lie is used far more often than the outright lie. The half deal, make a compromise with evil to make gains today...these are the ways.

When I was reading this I thought of the song 'Devil is a Loser' by Lordi

YouTube - Lordi - Devil Is A Loser

Lordi - Devil is a Loser LYRICS

It seems to be a song about selling out to evil to get ahead or accepted.

---

Also, the Dragon Rouge cult (Ordo Draconis et Atris Adamantis) has an interesting concept of 'grey' evil vs 'true' evil:

This grey evil that surrounds us in our world is mainly committed by frustrated and confused individuals, power mad politicians or criminals, unable to control petty desires. This evil has in reality nothing whatsoever to do with the metaphysical evil that we encounter in religious documents. Man has in fact a unique predilection for brutality and excessive violence which distinguishes him from other animals. We seem to be sole creators of death camps, mass rape, meat factories and extensive killing for amusement purposes. The grey evil is human, all too human, while metaphysical evil is black as night and completely inhuman.

(Dragon Rouge : Ordo Draconis et Atri Adamantis)

---

I feel on the same page as Athenian. I don't know if I'm heartless or oversensitive sometimes, but it feels that I can be either. I have broke down and cried for a half hour over the unfair, sad ending of a book (And felt sad for at least a week) but then be detached to a person who I felt I should be close to.
 
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