Villains

          A scoundrel and villain, who goes about with a corrupt mouth, who winks with his eye, signals with his feet, and motions with his fingers, who plots evil with deceit in his heart—he always stirs up dissension. Therefore disaster will overtake him in an instant; he will suddenly be destroyed—without remedy. (Proverbs 6:12-15)

          As I begin considering today’s passage, I feel naïve, sheltered, protected. I find it hard to believe that such people exist. I’m sure that they must, but I want to think it’s outside of my own circle of experience. That’s because in my mind, I picture these people as greasy, melodramatic, comic-opera style villains. There’s part of me, just as it is part of a lot of other people, that has this notion that serial killers somehow look like serial killers. Ted Bundy looked like “the boy next door.”

          I have met people who post things in social media like someone putting bait into the water and tow it slowly behind their “boat.” They’re hoping someone will take the bait and comment so that they can abuse the commenter. And one of the first things these people who troll for commenters do is accuse the commenter of being a troll. I know others who can’t wait to post the most recent pictures of “Walmart customers,” or the videos in which person after person is hurt (or could have been hurt) in ways that they think “funny.” 

          “Lighten up, it’s just a joke,” right?

         Of course, then there are the more serious Internet predators, the ones who steal an identity either as a prank, or with more harmful intent, who pretend to be someone they are not, who introduce malware – or even just claim to have introduced malware to manipulate. There are people who claim to be from the IRS who threaten to have you arrested if you don’t use your credit card to send them money. Others walk door-to-door, claiming to represent the Public Utility Commission and offering to verify that you’re getting your electricity at the lowest cost possible…if they can just look at your bill.

          The things these sorts have in common is that they prey on naivete, and they profit  (if only emotionally) at the expense of others. They are out there. Now, let’s deal in some hard truth. They’re also in here, and the best thing we can do to our internal villains is to make sure that they encounter disaster at our hands rather than someone else’s.