What About the Bad Guys?

Moral codes are not the same all over, despite what Uncle Ken has said about the Golden Rule.  I doubt that Islamic terrorists practice the Golden Rule, even towards each other, much less towards infidels like us, yet they are fiercely loyal to their own codes of morality.  I suppose that anybody who believes in some kind of ideology considers themselves to be the good guys and the rest of us to be the bad guys, but what about common criminals?  I have known people who would be insulted if you said they were good and complimented if you said they were bad.  Most of them weren't all that bad, but they affected some of the cultural norms and terminology of the real bad guys.  Why would anybody want to do that?  If we try to be good because it makes us feel good, then why do bad guys try to be bad?  Does being bad make them feel good, or do they just like feeling bad?

I would rather have seen my daughter grow up to be a moral janitor than an immoral CEO, but she turned out to be neither.  She does clerical work and has some responsibilities that are commonly associated with management, and she didn't have to do anything immoral to get where she is today.  I have never heard her say that her colleagues, both above and below her on the corporate ladder,  are bad people, although she does admire some of them more than others.

Like I said, Beaglesonia is about a quarter mile outside the city limits, but that part of town is lightly populated.  If you didn't know it was within the city limits, you would think that it was rural or at least suburban.  The built up part of town is probably a mile or more away.  You could indeed paddle a canoe from Duncan Bay to Canada, but it might take you awhile.  The Indians and French voyagers used to paddle canoes all over the Great Lakes, but they stayed close to shore and pulled out when the weather turned bad.