When is greed bad?

Question

How can it be bad for people to have a sense of self worth and to want things to be better?

Getting better things for your self is always at the expense of others because there are limited resources and unlimited wants in the world.

Who is to say how much is "good for you"? if having more makes you happy is'nt that good - or should we aim to increase unhappiness?

Answer 1

Greed is bad when it leads you to make unbalanced decisions.
Don't forget that a greater than usual attraction is exactly what is used to bait a trap.

Answer 2

Wanting something better for yourself, and greed are two different things. There's nothing wrong with having self worth and wanting things to be better. Greed is a different matter. Greed is wanting more and more in spite of how it may harm others. It's wanting more than you need and never having enough, no matter how much you have. With greed, there's no self worth. There's always a sense of emptiness that the person thinks will be filled by getting more, but it never is.

Answer 3

It's not bad for people to have a sense of self worth and to want things to be better. But that is not greed. That's a sense of self worth and a desire for better things :)

Greed is when you have what you need but want something more.

And that is just acquisitiveness and is not a good trait.

Answer 4

A desire for things to get better is not greed nor is having a sense of self worth. However, a sense of self worth should be earned, not assumed otherwise it can be entirely negative. For example, if you think that you are better than you actually are then this is not self worth but delusion.

Greed is never a good thing.

Answer 5

A sense of self worth and wanting things to be better has nothing to do with greed. Greed is always used in a negative context as it signifies the unhealthy pursuit and aquisition of possessions. Furthermore, in the Christian world it also is one of the seven deadly sins. Even if one is not religious the word cannot be spun into a virtue. My answer is: always.

Answer 6

self worth and wanting to improve things isn't the same as greed. Greed is when you keep wanting more and more over and beyond what you need or is good for you.

Answer 7

Greed is bad when your spoils are the next man's sustenance. Call me crazy, but I think it's just for society and the self for people to actually give a crap about one another.

Answer 8

greed is bad, when personal desire supersedes your respect for and way you treat others.
an important aspect of sin (or just badness) is that they are never inherently wrong. to attempt to live without sin is a convoluted nonsense. the seven deadly sins are the aspects of ourselves that, when engaged in often bring us harm or sadness. greed is just the idea of the point at which looking out for number one becomes a *** hole thing to do. like clambering over an old granny in the bus to get the only empty seat.

Answer 9

What makes you imagine they're undesirable? Neither of them are extremely undesirable till taken contained in the extreme. And maximum issues taken contained in the extreme are undesirable. evaluate the opposites. in case you often gave away each little thing unmarried ingredient you had and did not take some thing for your self, you'll die. If no one felt any sexual emotions in the direction of one yet another we may all die. Even the option of greed and lust, even as taken contained in the extreme, are undesirable. it really is like saying water is undesirable because you are able to drown in it.

Answer 10

certainly you can't believe that greed leads to a healthy sense of self worth and a better tomorrow? there are many other non sociopathic roads to those phenomena, eh? greed is not a positive way of being. or, perhaps i missed something. it is not unlikely in a hypermaterialistic, toxic culture like ours that greed is, in fact, now looked upon as a positive character trait. that view certainly works for the bush crime family, does it not? and for gordon gecko, too, as i recall ;-)