Hate, Inc.

Ever since I wrote a post about racism, my mind has been ruminating on the concepts of that post: degrees of racism, what I actively dismiss from my life, thihngs like that. I thought about editing the racism post to include more of the racist behaviors that I do not tolerate, such as Islamaphobia (which is suddenly appearing more frequently in news stories, not specifically being discussed as Islamaphobia, but as what seems to me an obvious undercurrent in the tone of a lot of mainstream media hoopla).

There also must be a word for despising and being condescending to children, as Diane Feinstein did in her office with the very young climate activists (talking about her thirty years of experience). Aha, found it: ephebiphobia for teenagers, pedophobia for babies. I don’t think I’m going to be able to remember that terminology just to add it to my list of things I avoid in my life.

Avoiding Bad People

Anyway! The point is that there are countless examples of the types of people I intentionally do not maintain in my inner circle. All of them have been whorling around in my mind lately, because I need to write about the one thing that encompasses all else: hate. I cringe away from hate in any form, and I actively seek and maintain as much separation from hatred as I possibly can.

Now, obviously people can make mistakes. For example, when I was a kid the sheriff came to our house to put me in juvinile detention for two things – riding my four-wheeler on a little segment of dirt road that connected two trails through the woods when the dirt road was clearly marked “No Motorized Vehicles,” and, because the friend riding with me was 12 and I was 13 (or something like that), he wanted to charge me with something like inciting delinqunicy in a minor or some such bogus charge. I had been on my way home, turning off the dirt road and onto the trail that led home when we saw the police car turn on it’s flashing lights. Terrified as only kids can be when they know they’ve been caught something they know they should not be doing, I raced through the trail home and immediately went inside and told my mom all about it: the dirt road, the police car, racing home scared. So when the sheriff showed up at the door, my mom was already completely informed and apparently already had her thoughts together when the sheriff knocked on our door because my mom talked the guy out of all of his irritation with my behavior, and I was not taken to jail for my illegal act of riding a four-wheeler on a non-motorized vehicle road.

I tell that story to make a point. Doing something wrong does not necessarily make somene a bad person that I would not want in my life today. I don’t care if someone has been to jail, I’ve known several very decent people who had been incarcerated at some point in their life. The point is that it’s not about avoiding “bad people,” it’s about avoiding hatred, which has a zillion forms but is always very obvious to me as an indicator of what is in a person’s heart. Screaming at a child (or a dog, for that matter), reveals a darkness harbored in that’s person’s soul. I strive, every moment of every day, to feel as if my soul is the brightest energetic light imaginable. Darkness in others dims my own internal light, making me very uncomfortable to be around it at all.

Hate, Inc. (the novel)

I haven’t actually read the book “Hate, Inc.,” by Matt Taibbi (a fantastic author and journalist, btw), yet, but the bits I’ve seen and the reviews I’ve read suggest it will resonate with me and gave voice to much of what I fear about hate. Even though I haven’t read it yet myself, I already give Matt Taibbi’s book “Hate, Inc.” a full-bodied endorsement. Let’s read it!