There is a state of moral development in which a person is inclined to condemn not so much what is done but to whom it is done. We are horrified by this when we see it directed against the peoples that we value—how can you celebrate the harm done to them? And we find ways to soften or overlook this when we direct it against enemies or people for whom we do not care.

Am I endorsing that? No. Is it shocking? Yes, sometimes. Are you the one person who has never felt joy when someone you hate suffers? I doubt it, but if that is so, life may give you an opportunity yet.

There is also a stage of moral development in which we condemn what is done no matter to whom it is done. It is righteous and fraught with opportunities to make exceptions. Indeed it goes hand in hand with the other stage. Murder is wrong, but in some cases we carve out an exception and do not call it murder because we socially empowered a group of people to be able to do it, ideally under constraint.

For more than a year now I’ve been baffled by the exception-making, people who condemn one group for war crimes and minimize or even celebrate another for the same actions but the opposing cause. We could tell a story that this is social decline but I think it is only a revelation of the truth in our souls. We are not intrinsically evil, but the problem of evil may be studied within one’s own heart for the courageous.