Evil Begins with Candy Land

At what point in a life does one develop the capacity for evil? Or maybe not evil so much, but at least the capacity for doing something that you know to be wrong, but you really don't care. We are all born selfish, simply on an evolutionary level, because we had to be to survive. Of course, we are all born with the capacity for love, sympathy and cooperation, again purely for survival. But at what point do we consciously learn to channel those attributes to gain an edge over the competition? For me anyway, it was around the age of 4.

This is when I figured out, of my own volition, that I could subtly mark cards and stack the deck in order to win at Candy Land. No one suspected me, I was unstoppable and mad with power. Eventually my mom caught onto me and told me I was cheating. So, it was that day that I learned what I was doing had a title, but other than that, I failed to see how it was a problem.

I further honed my cheating skills by mercilessly beating my elderly neighbor at UNO. Little did she know I could see the reflection of her cards in her giant trifocals. I was on a power trip of Kim Jong Il proportions. I was a good kid with good grades, the rules of the world didn’t actually apply to me. Rules were created to keep the “others” in line. I felt a kinship with the rulemakers, the teachers, the grownups. I imagined we had kind of a secret society relationship. A nod-in-hallway type camaraderie.

I don’t think that cheating at Candy Land or UNO actually made me any different than any other kid, but it was the way I went about it and how good I was at it that makes me a little worried about my capacity for sociopathic tendencies. That and this little stunt that I pulled in first grade: the neighbor girls were a year older and a year younger than me. They had some doll toys that I felt were very important for me to have. Namely a small baby bottle that had pretend milk in it that disappeared when you turned it up (amazing!) and a pink and white rattle. Rather than steal them, demand they give them to me or beg my parents to buy them like most first graders, I decided to hold a birthday party for my stuffed cat instead.

It’s not that my stuffed cat was that important to me, but this particular stuffed cat was a baby cat. No, not a kitten. A cat-baby with a diaper, a pacifier and a bib. What this cat lacked was a bottle with magical disappearing liquid and a sweet-ass pink rattle.

How could I market this so it was a win-win situation? A birthday bash for said cat was the perfect solution. Everyone wins, especially me! I created birthday invitations with a hand drawn picture of the cat in question. Inside I wrote the time and location of the party (tomorrow afternoon, my bedroom) and just a general list of what the cat might like for a present, just something little, maybe a bottle or a rattle or something, nothing major.

My mom helped me make Kool-Aid and we had some Little Debbie snacks for treats. The girls came over at the proper time clutching small presents. We adjourned to the party suite. The stuffed cat was very excited to receive such thoughtful presents, namely one magic bottle and one rattle. The cat displayed the proper amount of enthusiasm and gratitude and a wonderful time was had by all. My diabolical scheme had been successful.

Subsequently I bent the rules on many occasions and never once got called on it. I plagiarized reports, made up books and authors for a bibliography, even going so far as to make up fake Library of Congress numbers. That scored me another A in 5th grade.

I am the worst kind of person. A terrible person wearing the face of a completely normal one. If you fully acknowledge the awful facets of your personality, does that make them ok? I’m inclined to think it does not. It’s like those heinous bumper stickers that fill me with rage, you know the ones “100% Bitch” or “I’m not a bitch, I’m THE bitch” etc. If you are fully accepting that you are a difficult person, that doesn’t necessarily make that behavior fully acceptable. I fully acknowledge that I’m a snarky, pretentious and judgmental know it all, but I don’t expect other people to think it’s ok and I sure as hell don’t welcome those traits in others (which is awful, I know) It’s ok for me of course, but not for anyone else.

Can you ever really know another person? I don’t think so.