"Haud ignara mali miseris succurrere disco." — R.L. Dabney, On Dangerous Reading
(Not at all ignorant of evil, I learn to support the wretched.)
Those who begin by empathizing with villainy end up playing the part themselves.
Jeremiah 10:2
Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen.
One of the dangers of being entertained by evil is that you begin to empathize with evildoers.
"I am well aware that men are usually more influenced to evil by one bad example than they are towards good by ten good arguments." — R.L. Dabney, On Dangerous Reading
Due to our depraved nature, we are more easily attracted to shortcuts than we are to straight and narrows.
“Hypocrisy is a tribute that vice pays to virtue.” — Francois Duc De La Rochefoucald
We are somewhat attracted to those who have persevered on the straight and narrow, but then we honor them by trying to find a shortcut to their kind of honor without their kind of sacrifice.
1 Corinthians 15:33
Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.
You cannot regularly engage in communication with the corrupt without being conscripted into their misconduct.
Leviticus 18:3
After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do: and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do: neither shall ye walk in their ordinances.
Wisdom is not learning the ins and outs of evil, but studying the rights and wrongs of holiness. You can gain experiential knowledge of evil by doing it, but you lose spiritual knowledge by doing so. You cannot advance your insight into purity by spoiling it.
Leviticus 20:23
Ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.
One does not have to dabble in devilry to be saved from it. The devil's schemes do not require us to obtain participation trophies in order to understand them. Sin is to be studied from the outside like a caged animal not from the inside by mimicking the mayhem.
Deuteronomy 12:30
Take heed to thyself that thou be not snared by following them, after that they be destroyed from before thee; and that thou inquire not after their gods, saying, "How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise."
You shall not go after other gods. You don't need first-hand experience of falling off a cliff to know not to do it. You may never know what it's "really" like to fall like that, but you will be free to know many other things because you didn’t.
Ephesians 5:6-12
Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them. For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret.
In his short article, Dabney goes as far to argue that, "Novel-reading is the murder of time." Dangerous reading (and to our purposes: watching, listening, etc...) is not, in his estimation, merely a waste of time, it is a slayer of days. Being entertained by evil is foolish for the sake of playing with poison, but it is also foolish for it steals time that could have been used in noodling on nourishment.
Ephesians 5:15-17
See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.
Watch how you walk and watch out for those who prescribe perversion as a mandatory path to broad-mindedness as though a hole needed to be bigger in order to be holier.
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