Hate and hating the hater.

[tar]

After Orlando, there has been a huge conversation on TV news where commentators emphasize that love wins and hate causes more hate.

 

But I have been confused as to how one is supposed to address people that hate them.

 

For instance people gather to show their hatred for haters. They hate the haters, and give them no quarter, no benefit of the doubt.

 

What is our current understanding of Hate? It must have a survival benefit, or we would not all have the emotion.

Edited June 14, 2016 by tar

[Strange]

I would point to South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation process as an alternative approach. Similarly, restorative justice projects seem to had a lot of success.

[StringJunky]

Evolutionarily, it probably selects and reinforces certain behaviours that conform to a particular group's norms of what constitutes moral behaviour. Everybody that's not hated forms part a stable nuclear group that is more likely to act in a harmonious, concerted manner. The stronger the group the better the survival of their offspring, improving reproductive success and continuity.

Edited June 14, 2016 by StringJunky

[DrP]

@Tar -According to the Christian faith you should try to love your enemies... This can sometimes be hard, but, I find it a commendable stance. Just because I have worked out that the faith is utter BS doesn't mean I intend to rescind on the practices that I have strived to live by most my life... Although I have been guilty of NOT loving my enemies, I still think it is a commendable goal.... Still, how do you love a mass murderer? - I don't think you do - you love the people who have similar views and try to educate them to a better, kinder, more acceptable way of thinking.

 

@SJ - As to reproductive success and evolved social and mental ideals, I would have thought that, even as little as a few hundred years ago, a certain amount of xenophobia would have been healthy and even necessary to survival in some groups... maybe we are going through an evolutionary change where we no longer need or desire to hate strangers and are striving to integrate the world into a single loving mind. There will be however, a remaining sense of fear at the unknown and of strangers due to our long past ancesters who needed to be cautious.

 

So - (playing advocate) - maybe we should feel sorry for the poor guy who was so fuelled by hatred due to his outdated beliefs and his evolutionary retarded brain that he hates people so much he feels the need to mass murder them rather than accept them for who they are without fearing them... hmm, not sure - tough one.

Edited June 14, 2016 by DrP

[Phi for All]

What is our current understanding of Hate? It must have a survival benefit, or we would not all have the emotion.

 

I don't think of hate as an emotion developed by evolution for survival. I think of it rather as an event, something that is made up of lots of little unrelated bits that get together to form it, like a fire or a tornado or a bomb.

 

I think most of the little unrelated bits are created by the heavy wealth disparity we have in the world today. If more people were modestly prosperous, with fewer in both aching poverty and exorbitant wealth, I think there would be less of the bits that help hatred form. Remove as many of the reasons why people feel the frustration that leads to violence, rather than just stomping on the violence with combat boots, and you smother the fire, the tornado loses the strength to hold itself together, and the bomb is defused.

[tar]

Phi,

 

You make it political and a war between the haves and have nots. Jealousy it seems you are talking, not hatred.

 

The killer in Orlando was confused as to which terrorist group he was killing for. He had been seen at the gay club multiple times before, been drunk and belligerent, his religion's moral code did not allow him to be gay, he hated himself as much as he hated the rich. His hatred was not against gays or rich or partygoers or the great Satan or ISIL or the ruling powers of any country or his Father or his wife...it seems the only thing that makes sense is he hated being hated by himself.

 

Conflicted. Just like the rest of us. String Junky points out we group together, and side with others that hold our values. With the internet, and so many differing value systems mishmoshed together, it is difficult to find any more that pure evil one should side against. And difficult to resolve one's Muslim faith, with tolerance for gays, or to resolve the fact that you are Muslim AND gay, and feel to be right you probably have to throw yourself off a building.

 

Personally I think we need some new narratives, some new stories that more carefully include everyone on the good side, and stay away from painting whole races or social statuses or religions or nationalities or sexual persuasions or whatever, as the embodiment of evil. We need stories that make everybody right to begin with and that do not promote winners and losers. It should not be 'til all the world is for Islam or until all the world embraces Western values. We need a story that takes the best, the constructive and meaningful from Eastern religions and Western religions and native religions from all over, and ties us all together . I certainly don't know how that story should go. I just don't think we have a common one yet, and we badly need one, considering how instant and widespread our relationships now are.

 

But hatred I think is more a psychological issue than a political one. And one thing I have figured out after 62 years of interaction with other humans, is that one is rarely angry at the thing one is yelling at. It is usually something else one hates, and it is often an internal battle.

 

Regards, TAR

Edited June 14, 2016 by tar

[StringJunky]

 

But hatred I think is more a psychological issue than a political one. And one thing I have figured out after 62 years of interaction with other humans, is that one is rarely angry at the thing one is yelling at. It is usually something else one hates, and it is often an internal battle.

 

Regards, TAR

The only person a hater really hurts is themselves; assuming no outward violence is expressed.

[DrP]

"Difficult to resolve one's Muslim faith with tolerance for gays....."

 

I would have thought that in this day and age it would be hard to resolve any body's religious faith with the actual facts we know about the world. It is a load of tripe invented to control the masses - we know this now and need to get away from such bunkum.

[tar]

DrP,

 

So you hate religions?

 

Regards, TAR

String Junky,

 

Just thinking. I personally am hurt when somebody hates me. So I don't think the only person that is hurt by a hater is the hater herself. There is a power to being shunned. When others turn their back on you in disgust, it means something. You are taken down a notch and you do not have the strength of those that you would rather have the strength of. Some people can be lone wolves, march to the beat of a different drummer and all, but its a rare individual who does not cry when cast out.

Regards, TAR

Edited June 14, 2016 by tar

[rangerx]

"We can forgive [them] for killing our children. We cannot forgive [them] from forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with [them] when they love their children more than they hate us." Golda Meir.

[DrP]

I don't hate them Tar... They had their purpose. I am an advocate of loving your neighbour and giving mercy, kindness, compassion and forgiveness. I guess I hate lies. What is the point of perpetuating this lie in this day and age?

 

Also - it doesn't mean I hate them just because I said they are bunkum.... I don't hate the flat earthers, I am just pretty certain they are wrong based on what evidence I have seen. Do I think of them as intellectually challenged? Maybe, the flat earthers anyway, I know all too well why someone would fall for the god lie, I was taken in by it for many many years.

Edited June 15, 2016 by DrP

[tar]

DrP,

 

I was, in asking the question, after a better understanding of hate. The positive aspects of hate. The challenge you make to the faithful, to release the lies and deal with the truth, in this day and age, carried with it a disgust, a disbelief that people in this day and age would hold to ancient falsehoods. This is not a negative desire on your part, it is a wish to pull the whole group into a better situation, one that deals with reality, takes the best of how to live together from ancient teachings, and discards the unworkable lies.

 

But this is the aspect of hate that I am interested in exploring. The look a mother gives the child when the child is about to do the wrong thing. The anger and whack on the butt that comes when the child is behaving improperly. The disgust we show to killers and liars and cheats and purveyors of injustice. We hate, I think, when the other does it wrong, in order to make the other aware that they are doing it wrong, so that they will do it right, and keep faith with the rest of the group.

 

In this, it is incorrect to hate haters, as if with less hate there will be more love, because the hate is not a bad thing in itself that needs to be removed. It is the action that creates the disgust that needs to be stopped in order for the morals and morays and rules of the group to be enforced by "the look" in the eyes of the other people in the group that notice a transgression.

 

Regards, TAR

Complicated these days, when morays change, and behavior, like homosexuality, that used to get a stern look from others, now is "allowed" and the people that give the stern look get a stern look for giving the stern look.

And particularly important to understand when two traditions, like Christianity and Islam, disagree on something like homosexuality, in terms of who should receive "the look".

Just noticed that the transgressions I listed toward which we show disgust were closely related to, if not purely taken from, the Ten Commandments.

Edited June 15, 2016 by tar

[CharonY]

 

And particularly important to understand when two traditions, like Christianity and Islam, disagree on something like homosexuality, in terms of who should receive "the look".

 

 

 

Actually it is one of the things where both religions agree quite well. But I am still not sure what point you are trying to make. You are conflating social acceptance with hate. The hate part is only at the fringe of each side of the argument, although often it is a loud fringe.

[dimreepr]

Hate is hate, whatever the source.

[tar]

CharonY,

 

The religions do not agree. Although the scriptures of the old Testament fueled both the New Testament and the Koran, the New Testament allows for compassion and forgiveness in manners that the Koran does not.

 

Under Sharia law one should stone an adulterer and ISIS throws gays off of buildings based on "being right" in the eyes of Allah. In Christianity Christ washes the feet of the outcasts.

 

Christian charity and tolerance is a hallmark of our nation, because it is steeped in the Judeo/Christian tradition.

 

And my point here, is about hate as a corrective emotion, that guides members of society in a direction where they will be loved and trusted and depended upon by others, and that guides people away from behavior that would hurt the group.

 

And as such, being gay here is allowed and being gay in Raqqa is not allowed.

 

Regards, TAR

The Orlando killer had an internal conflict and hated himself, in my estimation. Calling his murders a hate crime against gays and linking his heart with the heart of an American Christian fundamentalist is not accurate. There is a lot more love apparent from the pulpits in the Methodist and Baptist and other Protestant churches I have attended, than is apparently coming from this guy's Mosque.

[CharonY]

 

Christian charity and tolerance is a hallmark of our nation, because it is steeped in the Judeo/Christian tradition.

 

 

 

I disagree, and to me it seems like whitewashing history. Religious reasons have been at the heart of many aspects of intolerance against homosexuality throughout history (starting ~ 4th century) and still continue. Legislature has only been relatively recently been decriminalized often against religious opposition. It is that tolerance has arisen despite, not because of the religious tradition (also claiming a Judeo/Christian tradition is a bit of modern whitewashing itself, considering how Jews were marginalized in Christian societies, but that is another matter).

 

But just to make things clear about the timeline: In the US only 2003 all state sodomy laws, which were clearly targeted at homosexuals were abolished.In Germany it was only after the reunification that homosexual acts between males was decriminalized. And if you want to see positive examples in the the Muslim world in comparison: homosexuality was decriminalized in 1858 in the Ottoman Empire. It is clear it is not the type of religion but rather a matter of how religious the population is. And, as the example of the Ottoman empires shows, it is not even the only factor. Either way, drawing a direct line between Christianity and tolerance is a significant stretch. People can be tolerant because of a religion, but they can also be intolerant because of that. Luckily there has been a modernization of values which emphasizes personal freedom over moral doctrine, which traditionally has been under the auspice of religion. And before anyone starts, no we did not magically get those modern values (including equality) simply by sudden enlightenment. For that I like to remind everyone that colonialism was conducted during the age of enlightenment and includes the development of modern racism. Instead it has been a multifactorial process that is still ongoing and will continue as long as people think about the human condition.

 

Also, I wonder why this thread is in the medical section.

Edited June 15, 2016 by CharonY

[tar]

I was interesting finding out what we knew of the psychology of hate so I put it in the phychology section

 

the current political climate is an example of human psychology, and in particular the mindset of the Orlando killer

 

where when and how we became tolerant is not as important as the fact that we are

Edited June 15, 2016 by tar

[CharonY]

 

where when and how we became tolerant is not as important as the fact that we are

 

In that case there was no reason for you to bring it up in the first pace, was there? If you wonder about the psychology of the Orlando killer, it will be difficult to the a psych evaluation post mortem. His circumstance can lead to some speculation especially with more details coming to light. However, it will take some time until the data is collected and released.

I am not sure how that relates to the current political climate, though.

If your question is about the psychology of hate, in a more generalized manner, I would think that no one on this board (that I know of) has the expertise to provide a decent answer. There are tomes out there on various aspects, ranging from self-hate, hate in psychopathic individuals to mob behaviour. There also books geared toward the genera public on this subject, though I am in no position to comment on their quality, as for example This one

Edited June 15, 2016 by CharonY

[tar]

CharonY,

 

Absolutely important to discern the killer's feelings about gays, and being gay. Separate completely from the politics.

 

Regards, TAR

[disarray]

Phi stated that "I think most of the little unrelated bits are created by the heavy wealth disparity we have in the world today."

Tar stated that "it seems the only thing that makes sense is he hated being hated by himself."

 

Similar comments, it seems to me, connect self-esteem with hatred, and, I would add myself, with anger. Public health studies show that violence and depression (as well as a whole range of health issues) arise for the "poor" in societies where there is a large discrepancy between rich and "poor." Health issues etc., seem to be an outcome of discrepancies in power and sense of worth, which indirectly get back to the issue of self-esteem. This seems to be particularly true for males, which makes sense given their traditional role of being the hunters and "bread winners" and the related notion that males gain attention from women, generally speaking, by displaying their financial success.

 

It is often claimed that low self-esteem, for whatever reason, often leads to frustration and thus to either anger/aggression when the frustration is turned outwards, or to withdrawal/depression when the frustration is expressed turned inwardly.

 

And yes, their are tomes devoted to theories of aggression, but I think it worthwhile to discuss the relationship between cultural attitudes and individual aggression/violence. It seems that the occasional individual is often pushed to the brink of desperation when unable to fit into the expected roles that his culture expects him to squeeze into, and therefore, like the proverbial Procrustes, feels a sense of extreme cognitive dissonance, which is what seems to be what happened in the Orlando case. I say "his" because it seems to be a documented fact that males are statistically more likely to commit violent "hate" crimes than females.

Edited June 16, 2016 by disarray

[Phi for All]

Phi,

 

You make it political and a war between the haves and have nots. Jealousy it seems you are talking, not hatred.

 

I'm not surprised you see it that way. Historically, you pretend that it's all black and white, have and have nots, But life isn't really like that, and the truth is you ignore all the shades of "don't have enough" that are that way because the system has been stacked against them for the last fifty years. It's not a war, it's about incredibly rich people being incredibly greedy, and all the myriad ways that adversely affects our society.

 

Hatred of the psychological kind you're talking about is not the problem. Crazy hatred is identifiable in most cases, and treatable as long as you don't sell those people guns. But when normal people can't get what they need in life, everything starts to pile up, they feel ripped off, let down, misunderstood, ignored, and downtrodden. In the US, we live in legal corruption, we have 25% of Earth's prisoners, the rich don't want the poor to have healthcare, they barely want to pay for public pools and roads. The business owners in general won't pay living wages and when they can't find enough workers they go to foreign countries. We have all this hypocritical religious crap mixed up in our government, even thought there's supposed to be a clear separation. Christians are supposedly running this country, with their persecution of tolerance, other religions, and lifestyles that aren't theirs.

 

So yes, I think most of the hate you see nowadays is the direct result of conservative policies that have pushed people to the limit over the last several decades. When you feel like you're doing the right thing, being fair with people, upholding the law, but your society keeps kicking you in the teeth, resentment can lead you to much worse places.

[disarray]

Phi..In your last post you seem to be making the point that many (minority/disadvantaged) people who become hateful (and perhaps resentful?) have become that way because they are oppressed and unfairly treated. I certainly agree that this says a lot more than claiming that they are just jealous.

 

But, on a deeper level, it is almost as questionable to say that there is such a thing as "hate" per se as it is to say that there is such a thing as "evil." I think that these two terms in particular are political terms of derision, used by those in power to discredit those who resent or rebel against against the "Establishment" (aka "Combine" as mentioned in Keysey's novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest) e.g., politicians etc. who dismiss their opponents as being led by the devil, evil, malicious, hateful, etc. Ironically, politicians on both sides of an international conflict give each other these same disparaging labels.

 

In reality, the human mind is not ruled by angels and demons, but rather it is a complex set of organized perceptions that sometimes, "rightly or wrongly" fail to function harmoniously within a the social dynamics with which they are faced. I say "complex" because a more specific evaluation would break this general, rather slang-like term, into more clinical phrases such as projection of qualities one does not want in oneself, resentment issuing from unfair treatment, cognitive dissonance, xenophobic reaction, displacement of aggression, fear of association, association with pain, displaced guilt, etc.

 

Hate is a simple term that is relevant to ones point of view, and is often the term used by people who are too lazy to investigate further into the minds of those they are describing, or else a label they use to get others to quickly accept their assessment of someone else as being full of hatred.

 

I say "relevant to ones point of view" because, for example, even an extreme 'hater' such as Hitler believed, from his point of view, that he was a benevolent person trying save Germany (a country that he thought was being mistreated or attacked by others within and without), and to make the world a better place, free of haters and degenerates. I have no reason to think that he saw himself as anything other than this, nor did millions of people at the time, nor do perhaps millions even today. Indeed, we see his kindness towards German children and his dogs:

 

"Blondi (1934 - 29 April 1945) was Adolf Hitler's female German Shepherd dog, given to him as a gift in 1941 by Martin Bormann. Blondi stayed with Hitler even after his move to the underground bunker in January 1945. During the Battle of Berlin in April 1945, she had a litter of five puppies with Gerdy Troost's German Shepherd, Harras. Hitler named one of the puppies "Wolf", his favorite nickname and the meaning of his own first name, Adolf (Noble wolf).

By all accounts, Hitler was very fond of Blondi, keeping her by his side and allowing her to sleep in his bedroom in the bunker, an affection not shared by Eva Braun, Hitler's girlfriend, who hated Blondi and was known to kick her under the dining table, according to Hitler's secretary Traudl Junge."

http://answers.wikia.com/wiki/Did_Adolf_Hitler_have_any_pets

 

Judging just from the passage quoted above, for example, a reader who knew nothing else about Hitler might conclude that he is a much nicer person than that evil, hateful girlfriend of his...no wonder he made her sleep on the couch!

Edited June 16, 2016 by disarray

[tar]

Phi,

 

I have been thinking along the lines of what Disarray says about one projecting the qualaties one does not want in oneself onto the other, the hated one.

 

In this regard, if the killer hated gays, it was because he did not want to see that quality in himself.

 

Why he would not want to see that quality in himself is obviouly related to his religion, and therefore his religion could be blamed for the hatred...but where I think that is what we should be talking about, you are talking about income inequality, which I do not think, in this case was a driving force. I saw the pictures of the guy's apartment, torn apart by the investigators, and they had plenty of stuff. Toys and clothes and objects of all sorts. And the computers and such were probably taken as evidence and not in the picture.

 

Regards, TAR

[dimreepr]

Phi,

 

I have been thinking along the lines of what Disarray says about one projecting the qualaties one does not want in oneself onto the other, the hated one.

 

In this regard, if the killer hated gays, it was because he did not want to see that quality in himself.

 

 

But if gays weren't hated in the first place, he wouldn't hate himself/them because he wouldn't care.

Edited June 16, 2016 by dimreepr

[tar]

dimreeper,

 

But if we hate those who hate gays, because our relative is gay and we hate those who hate our relatives, are we hating appropriately or inappropriately?

 

Earlier someone said hate Is hate.

 

I am thinking hating is something more along the line of what disarray said concerning putting a certain quality out, and assigning this quality to the people you put out.

 

Out of what is the clue I am trying to follow here. I am thinking in terms of the first second and third person, and thinking in terms of friends and enemies, and thinking in terms of those on your team and those on the rival team.

 

Boston fans hate the Yankees. I hate Boston fans that hate the Yankees because I am a Yankee fan.

 

Both teams are athletes with mothers and fathers and families and arms and legs and brains and emotions and uniforms and such, to where hating the one team and loving the other is not sensible. Yet we all do this team thing, this enemy thing. Hilary is proud that she is enemy of the Republicans, the drug companies and the Iranians. Yet she hates haters. What if you are an Iranian, a Republican and work for a drug company. Should you love Hilary, hate her or what?

 

Hate must have a survival benefit, must be a way we have of teaming up and fighting wars against evil stuff we don't want to be associated with. Things that would destroy us, that we instead destroy in order to survive.

 

Regards, TAR

Phi hates selfish greedy people.

I suppose the funny thing about hating the hater is similar to fighting for a lasting Peace.

Edited June 16, 2016 by tar