Yet by contrast, "I was doing the right thing without realizing it", "The next thing I knew, I was doing good deeds", "In a moment of carelessness, I helped someone". You never hear those things and you surely never will. Righteousness cannot exist without intent and righteous action requires righteous intent. You can't do the right thing unless you consciously try to.
Under this view, unintentionally malicious actions, such as abusing guilt trips without being aware or caring about their harm, are still evil because by default, to prevent them, you have to be aware and paying attention, and if you aren't that's your failure to act righteously.
I disagree with this statement. I carelessly do things and people tend to thank me for my kindness and helpfulness, even though I was never intending to do it. People will do the right things without realizing it all the time, in a thousand little ways. I can talk to a friend just to talk, but to my friend, it may have been a sudden, unexpected, and welcome reprieve from a dark and lonely mental space. I can share an otter video because I think otter youtube is great, and in doing so adjust someone else's viewing algorithm away from so much unhealthy/addictive/extremist stuff on that site.
People's actions are rarely with real justice or malice in intention. Most of the time it is nuances of grey, thoughtlessly. Humans don't have the mental capacity that would be required of thinking otherwise.
My point is that thoughtlessness is by definition evil and that working under that assumption is better than not. You disagree and that's fine. We won't really reach an agreement over this by arguing I don't think.
Additionally, as I mentioned, thoughtless action is subject to the changing environment. What is considered good now is different from what was considered good 100 years ago and what will consider good 100 years from now. If your actions are thoughtless you are simply a product of your environment, no matter how warped and disgusting it may be.
If your environment rewards small good actions, you're not actually acting righteously, because you're just reproducing what's expect by your environment. When the environment turns sour and what's considered good starts becoming more and more warped, you will not have the will to resist it because your actions are thoughtless and not righteous. You will fall into evil, like everyone else, swept moment by moment, without caring about what you're doing as long as the environment responds well.