Presence of evil

[beachcitygirl]

Aibu to ask if you've ever felt yourself in the presence of evil. Following on from
The intuitiion thread.

I once met a friend of my ex in a coffee shop. The man was nothing but civil & friendly. Soft spoken & was an ex police officer. My then husband was there also.
I went to the loo & spent ages as something about him made me feel afraid. I stress it was just a feeling. Zero untoward behaviour.
Many years later he was arrested & found guilty of violent rape.

Has anyone else ever sensed evil? (For want of a better word)

Not trying to de-rail but in response to your OP there’s no need to distinguish his crime as a ‘violent’ rape, all rape is violent.

Maybe not evil but a man who I'd occasionally work with, after spending time in his company, I would always get restless leg syndrome later that night in bed (we worked in the evening). Very random, just like my vibe didn't match with his!

@georgarina

Went on a first date and as soon as I saw him I felt very unsettled. We walked, and talked about nothing much, but I felt terrified - dizzy, physically nauseous, like I just had to get away.

Later found out these feelings were entirely warranted.

Similar happened to me

To those doubting someone's earlier claim of having narrowly escaped the clutches of Fred West, I've never heard anyone say something like before (apart from on TV programmes about him). It sounded like exactly the type of scenario he used to engineer, picking up young girls etc. The poster was obviously still horrified and shaken up after all these years at having such a close encounter with that monster. It's certainly the first time I've ever told anyone before about my close encounter with a murderer and I've never met anyone else telling a similar story. I wasn't aware it was such a common thing!

I take evil to be a trait. A human trait. Like anger or empathy or cruelty or sensitivity.

I that case we’ve all been evil, just like we’ve all been angry/empathetic. So we’ve all been in the presence of evil.

I think it's more about gut instinct to be honest

ChargingBuck by using your intuition and not getting into friendship with someone who would lead you up the garden path!

I do not know who or what atheists turn to when in the presence of evil. I would think you would recognise evil. A lot of people are surprised that Satan is the ruler of this world.

I deliberately used the word 'faiths' in the plural, because there are many different faiths where people share the same interests, and those faiths keep the evil ones away if they follow the teachings of whichever deity they have faith in.

Faiths help us live by giving us hope that if we do the good we are taught, when our body dies, the soul will have somewhere to go.
Now there is food for thought.

Kanfuzed123 Don't be too hard of critics of Islam. I have not studied your faith so cannot really speak for or against, but from what I see and hear, the Taliban, IS and other terrorist groups are attempting to change the religion to something far stricter, and expecting the Muslims to change immediately, and that is the horrifying side of religion.
Better language might help your cause too.

@llizzie

Kanfuzed123 Don't be too hard of critics of Islam. I have not studied your faith so cannot really speak for or against, but from what I see and hear, the Taliban, IS and other terrorist groups are attempting to change the religion to something far stricter, and expecting the Muslims to change immediately, and that is the horrifying side of religion. Better language might help your cause too.

YeH you’re right, I should be more tolerant of racism and treat racists with kid leather gloves, might help racists like me more. Great shout.

There are no fanatical groups in any other segment or society are there?

You have heard of Christian terrorist groups, haven't you?

Shariah simply means - the straight path, it is extremists that have twisted things to suit their own agenda

@MRSAHILL

Many years ago when I was a teenager, I was walking down a quiet country lane after finishing an afternoon shift at my waitressing job. A fat, ugly, leering man pulled up alongside of me and offered me a lift. He chilled me to the bone and I somehow knew if I got in that car, something terrible would happen to me. I refused and carried on walking very quickly. To my relief, he drove off but instead of waiting ages to catch a bus home as I'd planned, I walked to the nearest phone box and rang my mum at work, begging her to collect me immediately. She told me to wait in the little shop nearby until she arrived. Unfortunately, it was early closing day and I was too shy to tell the shopkeeper about the man and ask if I could wait with her, as I would do if it happened now. I sat outside the shop on a wall, waiting for my mum. It was in a little village and there was absolutely no one around. Suddenly, the car driven by the scary man pulled up alongside me and he asked if I'd had a nice phone call. I realised he must have driven ahead and waited for me, watching while I rang my mum. I was absolutely terrified but told him that I'd rung the police and given them his car registration number and that an officer was on the way to meet me. He swore at me but drove off and my mum arrived soon after. She laughed when I told her and thought I was over exaggerating. Years later I was convinced that I saw the man again on the news. It was levi Bellsfield, the evil monster who murdered young Millie Dowler and some other poor girls.

Really weirdly, as I read the 1st part of your post about him stopping to offer you a lift the name levi bellsfield entered my head.

Wasn't actually asking for your advice @llizzie, but amused you feel I need it :)

I do not know who or what atheists turn to when in the presence of evil

It's very simple. We appeal to our inner morality. Humans know the difference between harming or helping others. It doesn't take 'faith' - it takes a moral decision not to do harm.

Whereas many people have professed their faith, yet committed atrocities in the name of it.

Faith doesn't keep humans kind. Morality & choice does.

@StepAwayFromTheEcclesCakes besides the ill-informed comments about sharia law, this raised my eyebrows as well “ What has changed that we no longer do these things, have people generally discovered a conscience that we didn't used to have, has society enforced a change in behaviour. Child abuse was rife in victorian Britain.” - I’m guessing you don’t work in any capacity where safeguarding training is involved? Child abuse is rife in Britain. Current Elizabethan Britain. I really don’t see that we’ve become more virtuous or moral as a society. Our taboos and norms shift but our brains have essentially stayed the same for thousands and thousands of years.

I was in uni halls and fell asleep one night with my balcony door open in warm weather with the curtains drawn across the door.

I was on the first floor and there was a landing outside the first floor rooms but I think we all felt fairly relaxed about unlocked doors as we were on the first floor.

This particular night I woke up out of my sleep and had a strong sense that someone was outside my door although there was no sound. It was just the most palpable feeling.

When I drew back the curtains there was someone outside my opened door, just standing still, not poised to pounce or anything - just there.

I retreated back into my room and started to holler upon which the entire hall woke up and came running out in various states of undress and the guy just bolted over the balcony.

I think about how easily I could have been assaulted or worse that night and am thankful that I sensed something.

^ Croissantly
This is an interesting thread aside from those who weirdly feel like they need to do a deep dive into whether evil exists and in what form, lighten up ffs. ^

Agreed, this is a great thread but people are being so pedantic AND all the bickering - urgh! No one cares people, we are here to read the creepy stories, stop spoiling it.

@llizzie

ChargingBuck by using your intuition and not getting into friendship with someone who would lead you up the garden path! I do not know who or what atheists turn to when in the presence of evil. I would think you would recognise evil. A lot of people are surprised that Satan is the ruler of this world.

I deliberately used the word 'faiths' in the plural, because there are many different faiths where people share the same interests, and those faiths keep the evil ones away if they follow the teachings of whichever deity they have faith in.

Faiths help us live by giving us hope that if we do the good we are taught, when our body dies, the soul will have somewhere to go.
Now there is food for thought.

Faith (blind unquestioning) serves to keep fear at bay - the fear that this is all there is & there is nothing after we die AND serves to control people. Mass mind control. I think it would make life easier to be so deluded tbh. It would alleviate some of the pressure and responsibility, to have some doctrine to live by and other people to tell me how to abide by it.

disconnected101 There are many faiths going back centuries. It is not blind questioning that keeps fear at bay, so you say. Faiths go back a thousand or more years, and is more often than not passed down in our genetic makeup, in a similar way that we can inherit gifts of music (just one example) from our ancestors.

I see my God through the eyes of Jesus Christ. I have no memory of being taught about Jesus by anyone. I learned the prayers we said at infant school and always understood them. The study of scripture was my favourite subject at grammar school. If I could tell you about the many miracles I have experienced you would not believe me, or you would think it unfair that so much has happened to me and not to you.

This life on earth is not the end. If souls can leave the body while it is still viable, it can certainly do so when the body is dead, and I like to believe and hope that if I follow the Way of Christ, that is where my soul will be when I have finished with this life on earth. Jesus said ''In my Father's House are many mansions. From that, I think that God has a place for the spirit of every faith and that we should only be concerned for our own souls, and satisfy ourselves that God caters for everyone.

I believe that other faiths - Islam included - have also passed down the generations, and we can no more change others or ourselves to other faiths as we can insist they have a different gift passed on from ancestors.

I am sorry you have such an attitude to faith, because I believe everyone needs to be with similarly minded people who understand their reasons for everything they do. I find it very distressing to hear of people being forced to change their religion, because they cannot. It is not in their psyche to do so. That is what is so bad about the Taliban. They are forcing their own version of Islam onto people who cannot protest.

Kanfuzed123 Oh there are - many of them. They come in all shades of colour and religion. I would venture to suggest that it is these fanatics that enable us to continue in our chosen path, because they show us what can happen if we get a lust for power and control.

There have been some groups and sects who have called themselves Christian. If they do not act as Christ taught them, then they are not Christian. They may think they are, but they are not.

Every faith has people who see an easy way to control others by trying to convince them that the stricter they are, the more people will like them, and that just happens to be happening in the Middle East just now. Rule by force will never work, and we know that, but it is still tried over again. I myself have always been treated well by people of other faiths.

ChargingBuck I disagree with you. What do you think gives you that 'inner morality'?