http://www.hatewatch.org

info@hatewatch.org

Gentlemen, Nuns, or whatever:

After viewing portions of your site, I remain unclear as to its purpose, that is, beyond the typical Internet anonymous yammering into electronic space. The purpose is obviously not to inform people of the definition of "hate" since that is amply covered by standard reference books. Neither do I assume that the intent is to magically infuse that emotion, to those curious enough to exercise their fingers, for all who have ever been the on the short end of traumatic episodes certainly know that feeling on a personal basis.

Hate is one of the requisites for a strong flow of adrenaline (epinephrine) in the bloodstream and all should know that this is a natural part of one of our biological responsive mechanisms. People once charged with this hormone are capable of extraordinary physical feats which, more often than not, enable them to emerge victorious over an otherwise superior enemy of whatever form or nature. If one has the misfortune to observe the rape of his daughter, I would hope that his feelings greatly surpass one of mere anxiety. By the way, the word enmity, that is, deep seated hatred, is derived from "enemy."

As I continue, I shall assume that we are above the immature positions which allow us to declare our personal hatred as "good" and, when that emotion has us for a target, to declare that hatred to be "bad." Sadly so, this double-standard stance is far too common.

Perhaps we might agree that to hate the person who has raped our daughter is justified. But what if she is gang-raped? That would constitute a crime by a group and our feelings would then be of hatred for an identifiable group.

Suppose I declare you to be my enemy and that, given the opportunity, I will try to kill you and burn your whole family alive. Will you have hatred for me or will you "love" me as a fellow human equal and disapprove only of my intent. Would you be willing to forgive my naughty behavior if I nearly succeeded in my intended exercise and only went as far as burning your family alive?

The killing of anything does not necessarily involve a state of hatred. Each day, animal slaughter proceeds on an unprecedented level without one butcher having any emotion whatsoever relative to those hapless animals. Thousands of people acquiesce to the killing of a convicted murderer and only a handful are emotional involved. The immediate execution of a degenerate who is spreading AIDS would be more a matter of public health than one of emotion. The fire bombing of Tokyo, which killed more people than the Nagasaki or Hiroshima bombings, was due more to a sense of duty, and mistaken beliefs, than to one of hatred.

One can no more educate people "out of" hate than one can educate them "into" a state of love. All emotions -- and hatred is one -- are reactionary. Some condition, or set of conditions, must preexist. A person unknown to me invokes absolutely no emotion in me. If he were to walk past my house, urinate on the lawn and kick my sleeping dog, I would then start to get emotional. If this fellow persisted in his attacks against my property, and escalated them, my emotions would also escalate and not in the direction of brotherly love. In fact, the greatest impetus for the development of hatred is the use of force, with its attendant transgressions, and in particular, the forcing of groups of people together who do not wish to be together.

Any entity who's established objective is the abolition of hate, has about as much chance of success as does a flea -- parked on the rump of an elephant -- with the intent of rape. Moreover, what would the world be like if there were not "Nazis," "racists" or even "haters" to hate?

Hate is a symptom and only the foolish would believe that abolishing the symptom will remove the cause, even if this were possible.

Americans might be defined as a batch of self-indulgent and self-righteous hypocrites emotionally handicapped by wishful thinking. If this is indeed the case, then your site is flag-waving American.

by Robert Frenz

1 June 1998