Why People Are Bad

word bad is defined as a poor quality or a low standard, or not such as to be hoped for or desired; unpleasant or unwelcome. In this paper I shall argue that people only do bad things when they are put in a specific situation or if it is how you grew up. Individuals are not all bad, but they are not all good either. There is a balance between the two and if you do too many things that are considered bad, you can tip the scale and cause chaos. While arguing my position, I will use Xunxi’s outlook on peoples nature, the concept of situationism, and Aristotle’s perspective on the incontinent and vice. I will also use sections of Anselm’s view on how one chooses to be bad, Kekes idea of being held accountable for ones actions, and Hamstra’s outlook on how we are fooling ourselves into thinking we are not bad, to further my argument. When a specific situation is brought up, people choose to act the way they do; however, this is

This can be looked at through the eyes of John Doris, he pointed out the theory of situationism. This means that our situation explains our behavior better than our attributions of character traits. Since our situation will explain our behavior, one will never really know how they will react in a certain situation until it arises. Doris points out, “…we believe that the person of good character will behave appropriately, even in situations with substantial pressures to moral failure, and we are similarly confident that we would be foolish to rely on the person of bad character.” What Doris is saying here is that we would like to believe that the good character individual would do the right think in any situation; however, we are unable to determine this because due to situationism, we do not know how one will react. This is why it depends on the situation you are in to determine the behavior that will be enacted upon; whether it is a good or bad