If evil were obvious, very few people would choose it. Those that would
choose it wouldn't have any support from those who don't choose evil, and
very little from fellow evil-doers (since choosing evil requires a
sociopathic level of selfishness).
Evil spreads when it hides under another guise, such as 'defending the
people', 'defending the faith', 'preserving morals', patriotism,
'protecting the family', and so forth. Everyone here would agree that
preserving one's nation or people from enemy attack or subversion (I mean
REAL subversion, not some conservative's paranoid interpretation of social
change), maintaining agreed-upon moral standards (and changing them
if/when they prove untenable) are good things. They become bad things when
the issues are not well-defined.
After WWI, Germany was burdened with ruinous reparations. For a brief
period, loans from foreign banks buoyed the economy, then the Great
Depression destroyed it again. Hitler promised to restore Germany not just
to its pre-WWI status, but to a fictional ancient glory. To people who
needed a wheelbarrow of money to buy a loaf of bread, who had relatives
maimed by the 'Great War', who were hurting, this was powerful. They had
grown up in a European culture that had taught white superiority and had
various other racial and religious stereotypes and fears built into its
structure. When Hitler and his crew popped up with 'the Jews are to
blame!' people were ready to believe, because 'everyone knew' the Jews
were untrustworthy and greedy. Otherwise good people, believing that
things would get better (and there were enough improvements in the gentile
German standard of living for people to think so), looked the other way as
'necessary' steps were taken. So neighbors they had known for years were
now arrested, or forced to leave: ultimately, it would prove for the
benefit of all. But it didn't stop with just pushing 'undesirables' out,
or enclosing them behind walls, or moving them into camps. During that
time, the methods became more repressive and violent. And then, finally,
the decision was made: it was no longer enough to simply isolate the
undesirables from society, to keep their 'inferior blood' from
'contaminating' the healthy German stock -- the undesirables had to die.
Hitler took a desirable goal -- improving the economy of Germany -- and
turned it into a program of genocide and world domination. If he'd jumped
up and said, flat out, 'We're going to slaughter everyone who doesn't meet
our criteria and conquer the world!' very few would have followed him.
They'd already lived through a ruinous war and its aftermath. He would
have stayed the leader of a fringe party, Great Depression or no.
For a speculation on the role of disguised evil more germane to the
modern world: those who desire to 'preserve the family' may not have a
nefarious master plan (except in the darkest corners of the minds of
some), but in their zeal, their actions could have the same effect as if
they did. Most of us on this board agree that a stable marriage, with two
parents, is better for children than an unstable marriage full of
emotional tension and abuse, or a single parent struggling to manage job
and family. But we also know that if the choice is between an abusive
relationship and going it alone, the solo flight is most likely the better
option. The saviors of the family have some rather retro notions of what
the family should be, and lobby for legislation to make their notions into
law. We could easily imagine an 'If this goes on...' scenario in which
laws end up circumscribing and defining every aspect of family life, in
which children are (effectively) the property of their parents until they
reach 'legal age', and parents are required to monitor and fill every
second of a child's time as not only proof of their own fitness to be
parents but also to protect their children from the evil influences of the
world. The practical result of this could be the yearly entry into society
of thousands (millions?) of legal adults who are incapable of ordering
their own lives, making decisions on their own, and otherwise living as
fully functioning individuals. This would require governments around the
country (or within the federal government) to pass further laws and form
various agencies to direct and control the activities of people unused to
freedom. From the laudable (if overgeneralized) goals of preserving the
family, keeping children safe, and controlling youth crime could come a
police state. Keep in mind that eventually the heads of that state would
be men and women raised in the cradle-to-grave system. They would have a
great deal of difficulty coping with any event not covered in the laws.
Along the way to this police state would be the victims of the evil
hidden within the assumptions of the saviors of the family (whether the
saviors could see it or not). What would be the fate of homosexuals,
transsexuals, those who are genetically male and look female (rudimentary
female genitalia and big knockers), and the child who was born female, and
who belatedly develops into a male (rare, but it happens)? What of the
victims and products of incest or pedophilia? Will the shotgun wedding
return with the full force of law behind it, forcing loveless marriages?
Will the unmarried (with or without parents) become official second-class
citizens? What of the status of women? Does the fantasy of the nuclear
family ruled by the all-powerful father become the law? What happens to
anyone who doesn't agree with any of this?
It wouldn't happen all at once, of course. One law at a time. Dissent
silenced with the accusation 'You are anti-family (or anti-child)' and the
attendant implications. People telling themselves that sacrifices are
necessary to 'save our children' or 'save the family' without asking if
these particular sacrifices are the right ones. Other people mindlessly
following anyone who waves a Bible and says the right words. Still others
deciding that things would have been better in THEIR families if there had
been laws to force their parents to be parents, rather than 'mere' social
expectation.
(Hey, I could have gone with the whole 'protecting the nation from
terrorism' slide into tyranny, but others are covering that angle.)