Definition of hate
a: intense hostility and aversion usually deriving
from fear, anger, or sense of injury
b: extreme dislike or disgust: antipathy,
loathing had a great hate of hard work
After hearing the news this morning about the attack on
basically children in Manchester, England, my emotions kept jumping from fear
to tears to hate. When I would reach hate, I would tell myself, “No!”,
because they would win.
The hostile environment around the world is becoming
prolific purely by the emotional actions of other people. We have a
choice to hate or not to hate. We have a choice to examine deeply those
little fears and prejudices we hide away, with many no longer hiding them.
Sometimes our fears, prejudices, and potential hate work in reverse. We
are in some way one of the targets of hate, therefore have the potential to
hate back. Maybe because we are liberal or conservative, Christian,
Muslim, Buddhist, Atheist, Gay, Straight, Bi, Trans, or in denial? Or
because we are black, brown, white, English speaking, Spanish speaking,
Mandarin speaking, or Arabic speaking, or speak one of the 6,905 other
languages in the world? And what about all those damn dialects within
languages that you don’t understand!? Maybe it is because you are from one of
the “other” 195 countries in the world?
Perhaps it is a different type of scary group. Such as
“old people” (me), people with disabilities always in your way, or someone with
a chronic illness (they probably did something to cause it)? Perhaps it
is veterans, police officers, or people who like guns!? You know they are
all violent! Maybe it is the poor you shun because they are a burden on society
and thus you, or the rich because they have it easy and get away with
everything? It could be as simple as long hair, shaved heads, pony tails
on men, chubby people, tattoos, or some other physical manifestation that just
wrecks your sensibilities?
“Darkness cannot drive
out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can
do that.” - Martin
Luther King, Jr.
We must embrace our
differences if we are to survive and flourish. Why? Look at these
statistics and hopefully it will give you reason to pause and think about the actions
you take. Hopefully it will help you self-examine your own biases and
prejudices.
- World
Population: 7.5 Billion human beings
- Languages
Spoken: 1.1B Mandarin Chinese, 490M Hindi, 420M Spanish, 510M
English, 230M Arabic, 213M Portuguese, 215M Bengali, 255M Russian, 127M
Japanese, 229M German, and then the rest of the world languages with many
in the millions
- Religions:
2.2B Christians, 1.6B Muslims, 1.1B Unaffiliated, 1.0B Hindus, 488M
Buddhists, 405M Folk Religions, 58M Other Minor Religions, 14M Jewish
- Population
by Gender: 3.8B M and 3.7B F
- Population
by Sexual Identify: basically, all over the board depending on which
research or source – briefly, we are a very diverse world population by
sexual orientation and gender identification with the younger population
being more like “Who cares?”
In summary and based on just
this sampling of reasons for potential fear and hate, you can’t possibly make
all this diversity into a “you”. It is impossible, impractical, and in
reality, ridiculous. However, think of all the knowledge you could gain
from knowing some of these human beings who are so different from you.
Here is a quote from my blog on February 9, 2014.
“If Nature, or God, or
Allah, or Jehovah, or evolution, or whatever you wish to call the force that
causes us and all life to exist can create roses of a vast and beautiful array,
why is it so complicated and fearful to believe that force can also create a
beautiful and vast array of us? Rage against the injustice people.
Do not be part of the silent majority. Your uniqueness may be next.”
Namaste,
Tom
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