LET'S LIVE HARM-FREE!: LET'S BE GOOD PEOPLE

A good person is one who does no harm to anyone, to any sentient and suffering being, with the exception of legitimate self-defense and the defense of others, and always against the aggressor, never towards an innocent party. A better person is one who does something to prevent others from causing suffering. And an even better person is one who, in addition to all this, helps others.

And what is not, by itself, synonymous with being a good person, even if it seems so?:

• Being pleasant and friendly to others. In fact, psychopaths are often charming.

• Loving your children and family and helping them. For example, Stalin adored his daughter Svetlana but committed genocide against tens of millions of innocent people and made life a hell for tens of millions more.

• Being a good friend, like Hitler, who was sentimental and loyal to his friends.

• Doing favors. Even the most evil do so, such as SS members who exterminated Jews or inquisitors who tortured innocent victims.

• Making contributions to an NGO, whether money or time. In reality, scientific research on this topic suggests that dictators who steal wealth are more prone to solidarity than honest people who generate it. This is the case of the bloodthirsty Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, who cruelly tortured daily and committed massacres of some 100,000-300,000 innocent people. Despite this, whenever he could, he sent trucks with food aid to the British to help them cope with the economic crisis of the late 1970s. This is because, contrary to what many believe, good deeds do not “purify” the abuses committed.

Read LET’S REPAIR THE DAMAGE!: Acts of charity cleanse the harm we cause

All of the above is very good, but it is not enough to be a good person; rather, again, it is necessary to do no harm to any sentient being, regardless of their label, unless it is legitimate self-defense, neither directly nor indirectly, neither as an perpetrator nor as an accomplice or assistant. The latter constitutes the foundations and structure of the building of goodness, while the former aspects are the embellishments that adorn it.

LIVE HARM-FREE: Let’s avoid labels that are a carte blanche for harm

HOW TO LIVE HARM-FREE?: Let’s not be accomplices or assistants to injustice

And to be an even better person, it is necessary to do something to prevent evil and cruelty, reacting to injustice, as well as providing some kind of help to those in need.

Every human being is situated somewhere on the spectrum ranging from maximum evil to the greatest possible goodness. If we measured it with a thermometer with a scale from 0 to 10, where would you like to be?

The good thing is that we can choose what kind of person we are. We are not determined by our DNA. We all have the genes for abuse and for the credulous assimilation of harmful mindsets that we absorbed like sponges in our childhood and youth, since the education received usually has a benign part and an unjust one. Likewise, we carry in our blood the herd effect that leads us to do what our pack does, however evil it may be, or the gregarious spirit that leads many to be accomplices of their tribe, no matter how many cruelties it commits.

FOR A HARM-FREE WORLD: Let’s think for ourselves and avoid toxic indoctrination

THE ART OF LIVING HARM-FREE: Let’s not follow the herd to cause harm

But we also have the genes for empathy, a sense of justice, and rational and critical thinking that allow us to stop blindly believing in the harmful patterns normalized by our group.

THE REVOLUTION OF LIVING HARM-FREE: Let’s be guided by our innate sense of ethics

LET’S LIVE HARM-FREE!: Let’s be rational

We can choose between several options of modus operandi and pensandi, of ways of doing and thinking. We can go beyond tradition, beyond the influence of society (nurturing on one hand but toxic on the other), beyond our congenital negative selfishness and the rest of the conditioning factors to be authors of ourselves and choose the path of goodness.

You choose:

Evil? Something in between? Or a good person?

Illiterate, a bit barbaric, quite considerate, or very civilized?

Thank you for making the best choice for everyone,