If All Your Friends Were Jumping Off a Cliff

You've heard the interchange before, haven't you?

A youngster gives the reason for wanting to do something  -  something that the parent sees as wrong, foolish, dangerous, or a mixture of all three  -  by saying, "All my friends are doing it."

The immediate parental response: "If all your friends were jumping off a cliff, would you want to do it, too?"

Of course, the youngster in question probably has a whole list of "it depends" statements flowing through his or her head, but if they're a little bit smart, they'll bow their head and meekly say, "No."

This whole scenario popped into my head upon reading a commandment (not part of The Big Ten) in Exodus 23:2 - "Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd."

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Truth is...Evil is still evil, no matter how popular it is; no matter how big the crowd of people is that rushes to do it; no matter how loudly it is supported on how many channels, news feeds, or Twitter accounts.