There is no "evil force" that influences people, but there are those who commit acts of evil just the same.

Evil existed in Hitler as well as today's NRA, Republican Party, trumpty dumpty and his Cabinet. White Supremists/KKK .

yes, Just look at Trump and the rest of the swamp

I can find arguments for God being evil just for the genocide in the bible!

You ask this with Trump as president?

Of course evil exists. Just as good does.
One need not believe in any gods to know that both exist.

Look up the old D&D rules. They’ll tell you what good, evil, and neutrality are.

Evil is a conscious human choice, just as much as good is a conscious human choice. One can't exist without the other, simply because we do live in a field of opposites. It is our choices toward one or the other that either reward us or condemn us.

My feeling is that just because evil is a choice, doesn't mean society can't discourage it to the point making it nearly non-existent in a perfect world... Yes, that's naive, but it's a good goal.

It takes shining a light on evil and calling it out when we see it, rather than ignoring it, turning a blind eye and keeping it in the darkness where it thrives.

There will always be the concept of evil, and always a struggle for good to win over evil. Our challenge is to minimize and condemn evil, so good prevails.

I say yes because if you perceive something as good then evil is bad with malicious intent.

It exists as a theological concept.

All that really exists is quantifiable benefits and harms and the societal morality that organically arises to manage them.

Evil does not, and cannot exist.

Cruelty, depravity, and all manner of horrors do, but they're technically not "Evil" per se.

I literally cannot think of anything more evil than some all powerful sadist sending people to hell for not believing in him, or eating lobster, or whatever the fk the rules are, to be tormented forever. In my book, that's about as evil as it gets.

Of course evil exists. Does it exist in a personal being of any kind? NO. Evil is a construct that we use to measure by in the same sense that good is.

Evil is a word that our society (and others) use to identify behavior the society at large does not understand and/or belives to be abhorrant. It is used to manipulate the populace through fear, intimidation, indoctination and superstion. So yes the term "evil" exists as a concept used to exploit humans to behave in very inhumane ways toward each other. The biggest void in our society today is the lack of gut level curiosity about all things in life but especially about ourselves and why we do the things we do.

This seems to be at least a semantics question. How do we define EVIL? Is it something that exists without an action? Is it something that exists without a human? Is an earthquake evil? A flood. "Acts of God" killing thousands of people are not directly caused by humans but does that make God evil? ; ) I do not believe in evil incarnate only evil deeds and evil intentions.

I always think of it as a matter of degree and interpretation.
I think holding a towel over someone's face and then pouring water onto it is pretty evil. Others might think that's just enhanced interrogation.
Or throwing food away knowing that people are hungry....
Evil is often used as an excuse. Gadaffi, Saddam, Kim Jon, Bush.... If someone is evil then whatever we do is OK... Kind of thing

Nietzsche who coined "God is Dead" wrote a book "Beyond Good & Evil", but we are not there yet.

Evil is any intent to destroy or lessen things that I love.
Bad is things that destroy or lessen things I love, but without intent.
Good is anything that creates or enhances things that I love.
Everything I know, believe will cease to exist one day,
before that I will cease to exist,
so I will cease to know and understand or to love these things,
so it really is all about me.

To me it's a label, like many other adjectives. It can be thought of with or without a religious context, but typically is thought of in a biblical context, though not exclusively. Personally, I would prefer 'malevolent' or 'malevolence', if used as a noun.

Charles Manson, to me embodied evil, but I didn't think of his malevolence as in any way Satanic, or contextually biblical. He was just a really, really bad person; most likely psychopathic.

Lets do the words game... if there is good, there is evil.

Only within