Editorial,
The Week in Review – Analysis, Commentary, Opinion
05.26.2018
There is hatred all
around the world the world. We come to hate those we fear, who make us angry.
Hatred is not a justification for violence, fear provides that, and anger
provides the impetus.
Hatred allows the violence
we perpetrate against one another to feel good. Violence satisfies the hateful
heart. The hateful are addicted to it.
Human being are not
naturally hateful. We are not born with hate in our hearts. We learn it. We are
coaxed into it, manipulated toward it with greater and lesser degrees of
willingness.
When hatred becomes a
part of a person’s identity, their way of seeing themselves, it is exceedingly
difficult to move that person away from it. They cannot see their way to free
themselves from hating, anymore than they are able to see another face in the
mirror. Hate becomes part of them and they cannot give it up without
engendering the sense that they are losing themselves.
When we are called to the
altar of hate, and our political leaders are ringing this bell, every hour of
every day, the words they use to describe the object of their hatred, are words
that dehumanize, impersonalize, demean and degrade.
The objects of their
wrath, are no longer described as people; they are animals, things, alien and
demons, they are terrorists and criminals. They are presented as being unworthy
of the protections we afford our equals, the protections we demand for those we
love; due process, liberty, even life itself.
People of good conscience
have a duty to challenge these messages, to shed a light on the vile way in
which hate and the architects of hate try to undermine our civil society.
Stand up, and stand in
the way of it.
