Hate as an ideology

[billvon 2,732]

Nowadays we see hate employed as a political tool, as a way to motivate voters and supporters to do a politician's bidding.  Hate is a powerful emotion, and if you can get people hating, you can get them to do almost anything.  (Plenty of examples here.)  And all too often, the political language today is employed to fire up this very useful emotion.  "FAGS in your son's PANTS!" is a headline I remember from this very forum not too long ago.  And recently a poster here has used similar tactics; "globohomos" was in the title of a recent post.

When Schwarzenegger ran the first time I didn't vote for him because I thought he'd be like a bull in a china shop.  And he was, at first.  But much to my surprise he learned from his mistakes and actually took responsibility for them, a rare trait in politics.  I voted for him the second time around, because a politician who can admit his mistakes is a promising politician indeed.

He recently gave a speech and I thought part of it was very relevant for today's political environment:

=======================

Some of them joined . . .because they were filled with hate. Some of them joined because they thought they deserved more out of life. And they bought into the idea that the only way to make their lives better was to make other lives worse. Some of them joined because they were frustrated with the government, and some of them just joined because everyone else was doing it.

In the end, it didn't really matter why they joined. They were all broken in the same way. That's the bottom line here. I mean, if you find yourself at the crossroads, wondering if that path of hate might make sense to you for one reason or the other, or even wrapping yourself with the flag of hate, I want you to know where that path ends.

I want you to see very clearly in front of you, in your minds. Because throughout history, hate is always been the easy path, the path of least resistance. It's easy to find a scapegoat for a problem than to try to make things better ourselves. Right? But let me be clear. You will not find success in the end of this rope.

You will not find fulfillment or happiness because hate burns fast and bright. It might make you feel empowered for a while, but eventually consumes whatever vessel it fuels. It breaks you. It's the path of the weak. And that's why there has never been a successful movement based on hate.

=======================

[gowlerk 2,099]

Hate is closely related to fear and therefore is among the most basic of emotions. We all are tempted by it at many points in our lives. It is always just one step from the even more common emotion we call anger. Once people are made angry it is very easy to get them to hate.

Edited March 8, 2023 by gowlerk

[JerryBaumchen 1,265]

2 hours ago, billvon said:

Nowadays we see hate employed as a political tool, as a way to motivate voters and supporters to do a politician's bidding.  Hate is a powerful emotion, and if you can get people hating, you can get them to do almost anything.  (Plenty of examples here.)  And all too often, the political language today is employed to fire up this very useful emotion.  "FAGS in your son's PANTS!" is a headline I remember from this very forum not too long ago.  And recently a poster here has used similar tactics; "globohomos" was in the title of a recent post.

When Schwarzenegger ran the first time I didn't vote for him because I thought he'd be like a bull in a china shop.  And he was, at first.  But much to my surprise he learned from his mistakes and actually took responsibility for them, a rare trait in politics.  I voted for him the second time around, because a politician who can admit his mistakes is a promising politician indeed.

He recently gave a speech and I thought part of it was very relevant for today's political environment:

=======================

Some of them joined . . .because they were filled with hate. Some of them joined because they thought they deserved more out of life. And they bought into the idea that the only way to make their lives better was to make other lives worse. Some of them joined because they were frustrated with the government, and some of them just joined because everyone else was doing it.

In the end, it didn't really matter why they joined. They were all broken in the same way. That's the bottom line here. I mean, if you find yourself at the crossroads, wondering if that path of hate might make sense to you for one reason or the other, or even wrapping yourself with the flag of hate, I want you to know where that path ends.

I want you to see very clearly in front of you, in your minds. Because throughout history, hate is always been the easy path, the path of least resistance. It's easy to find a scapegoat for a problem than to try to make things better ourselves. Right? But let me be clear. You will not find success in the end of this rope.

You will not find fulfillment or happiness because hate burns fast and bright. It might make you feel empowered for a while, but eventually consumes whatever vessel it fuels. It breaks you. It's the path of the weak. And that's why there has never been a successful movement based on hate.

=======================

Hi Bill,

It worked quite well in the '30's in Germany.  It is working today.  It will work in the future.

Jerry Baumchen

[riggerrob 599]

Fear works 100 times faster than love.

The disadvantage is that fear soon burns-out the vessel.

That is why I refer to "fire and brimstone" sermons as lazy preacher's methods. I could never worship a god that I feared.

[JoeWeber 2,567]

Just now, riggerrob said:

Fear works 100 times faster than love.

The disadvantage is that fear soon burns-out the vessel.

That is why I refer to "fire and brimstone" sermons as lazy preacher's methods. I could never worship a god that I feared.

Then don't get married.

[riggerrob 599]

1 minute ago, JoeWeber said:

Then don't get married.

My ex-wife is still baffled as to why I left her.

Something about "death by a thousand cuts." ... of was it ... "May you be cursed by a wife with a sharp tongue."?????

[RonD1120 58]

14 hours ago, riggerrob said:

That is why I refer to "fire and brimstone" sermons as lazy preacher's methods. I could never worship a god that I feared.

I agree with you first position. In these days we need teachers. The main obstacle is the student must accept the subject first or they won't listen and follow instruction. Thus the born again experience becomes paramount.

God loves you and does not want you to perish. Jesus died so that you can be free, right now.

The scripture shows:

Pro 9:10

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding

 Pro 14:27

The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life,
To turn one away from the snares of death.

 Pro 3:5

Trust in the LORD with all your heart,
And lean not on your own understanding;

[normiss 723]

1 hour ago, RonD1120 said:

I agree with you first position. In these days we need teachers. The main obstacle is the student must accept the subject first or they won't listen and follow instruction. Thus the born again experience becomes paramount.

God loves you and does not want you to perish. Jesus died so that you can be free, right now.

The scripture shows:

Pro 9:10

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding

 Pro 14:27

The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life,
To turn one away from the snares of death.

 Pro 3:5

Trust in the LORD with all your heart,
And lean not on your own understanding;

Oh the questions! 

I'll never follow some dude that knocked up another guy's wife so he could kill her son for us to all "believe". 

Love me and fear me or I will torture you for all eternity. FOH.

 

That shit's going to require chemicals I won't put in my body.

[JoeWeber 2,567]

Just now, RonD1120 said:

The main obstacle is the student must accept the subject first or they won't listen and follow instruction.

Negative. The needn't accept the subject. Anytime you seek to learn a thing, that the thing is a subject is manifest. No, for your purposes they must first accept the proposition as true. All you want to do is finish the job. Try as we all do, you will never see the fallacy of your method. No matter, I forgive you for you know not what you do.

[gowlerk 2,099]

1 minute ago, JoeWeber said:

No matter, I forgive you for you know not what you do.

Excellent

[riggerrob 599]

1 hour ago, gowlerk said:

Excellent

This get us to Hanlon's Razor: never attribute to malice that which can equally be attributed to stupidity.

If the student does not "know" at the start of the lesson ...

[tonyhays 86]

4 hours ago, RonD1120 said:

I agree with you first position. In these days we need teachers. The main obstacle is the student must accept the subject first or they won't listen and follow instruction. Thus the born again experience becomes paramount.

God loves you and does not want you to perish. Jesus died so that you can be free, right now.

The scripture shows:

Pro 9:10

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding

 Pro 14:27

The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life,
To turn one away from the snares of death.

 Pro 3:5

Trust in the LORD with all your heart,
And lean not on your own understanding;

Why should anyone believe anything the bible has to say?  Conflicting creation accounts in Genesis, a global flood that clearly never happened, even Jewish scholars say the exodus never occurred, and contradicting gospels that were written anonymously at best 25 years after the supposed events took place.  

[gowlerk 2,099]

9 minutes ago, tonyhays said:

Why should anyone believe anything the bible has to say?

Why should anyone believe anything? Especially coming from RonD1120. I wonder what the 1120 is? Maybe it's his secret agent number.

[JoeWeber 2,567]

Just now, gowlerk said:

Why should anyone believe anything? Especially coming from RonD1120. I wonder what the 1120 is? Maybe it's his secret agent number.

Oh, it's his D License number I'm guessing. It's an early one to be proud of and actually used to mean something. These days it's how many jumps you have before winning your first World Meet.

[gowlerk 2,099]

4 minutes ago, JoeWeber said:

Oh, it's his D License number I'm guessing. It's an early one to be proud of and actually used to mean something. These days it's how many jumps you have before winning your first World Meet.

Makes sense, I should've known that. A simple Google search turns up his real ID and a couple pics. Along with the specific area of GA that he worships in.

[billvon 2,732]

One of the reasons that this has become more of an issue lately is that the Trump movement has given bigots the support they need to stop hiding their particular brand of bigotry.

Lots of people have prejudices and biases.  I do, my family does, my friends do, everyone here does.  Realizing that, and working to counteract them, is important whether you are hiring people, communicating with people, even just living in this more and more diverse world.  That's just basic golden rule stuff - if you want your oddities accepted (being gay, having 300 guns in your collection, working as a mime, whatever) then you have to accept other people's.  And if you want to participate in society as an equal, you have to accept those people as equals.

But some people see no value in counteracting their biases or treating others as equals.  In their morality, if they feel that (for example) blacks are stupid and violent, they want to be able to say that - to be a "free person who speaks his mind, and understands plain common sense."  The reason they do not do this is that they feel like they are forced by society to be "politically correct."  And some people, of course, ARE forced to be politically correct.  Bobby keeps grabbing his co-worker's butt until he is told to stop, and stops only because that bitch in HR doesn't get it, and he doesn't want to get in trouble.

These people lived in resentment for a long time, with periodic complaining about political correctness and being neutered and not being honest and direct.  Why couldn't they call a spade a spade?  That's just basic biology and common sense!

Then Trump arrived on the scene.  He said that he liked to grab women by the pussy - and got away with it.  He said he wanted Jews, not Blacks, counting his money - and got away with it.  His former wife accused him of rape - and he got away with it.  Suddenly, all those people who felt they had been held down by political correctness had found a hero - a guy who got away with all the stuff they'd been told they couldn't do.  They are, of course, the same people they always were, but now they feel freer to bring that hate out into the open.

The latest example of this is Scott Adams of Dilbert fame.  He's always been on the right side of the political spectrum, and has used his comic strip and blog to mock everything from climate change to political correctness.  But he's avoided the farther-right sexism, racism and nativism - until recently.  In 2021 he posted an anti-vax cartoon, followed by by an opinion that "natural immunity" was better/safer than vaccination on his podcast.  In 2022 he tweeted he would "self-identify as a Black woman."  In 2020 he tweeted that his TV animated show wasn't renewed after the first season, and it was "the third job I lost for being white."

More recently this has been making it into cartoons - workers asked to identify as gay to meet DEI guidelines, incompetent workers hired to meet quotas.  And finally he "came out" in a Tweet:

"As you know, I’ve been identifying as Black for a while, years now, because I like to be on the winning team.  But as of today, I’m going to re-identify as White, because I don’t want to be a member of a hate group.  I would say, based on the current way things are going, the best advice I would give to White people is to get the hell away from Black people … because there is no fixing this."

Now, all the usual suspects are defending him, saying all the usual things.  And he is now responding to the backlash with language right out of Trump's lexicon: "Only the dying leftist Fake News industry canceled me (for out-of-context news of course),  Social media and banking unaffected. Personal life improved. Never been more popular in my life . . .Black and White conservatives solidly supporting me."  He now feels "supported" in his racism because of the environment (and even the language) that Trump brought to the national discussion.

[gowlerk 2,099]

1 hour ago, billvon said:

He now feels "supported" in his racism because of the environment (and even the language) that Trump brought to the national discussion.

All that is true. Plus he made all his money back when comic syndication was a very profitable thing at the level of popularity he attained. He does not have to worry about that woman in HR who doesn't get it. He's got it made and if you don't like it ,....well, you know just where you can shove it. But that's alright he can still serve as an example of what can happen when you go too far. Even Trump has to face the fact that he was defeated by Sleepy Joe.

[DougH 270]

17 hours ago, gowlerk said:

Plus he made all his money back when comic syndication was a very profitable thing at the level of popularity he attained. He does not have to worry about that woman in HR who doesn't get it. He's got it made and if you don't like it ,....well, you know just where you can shove it

An unfortunate fact of life. Huge pieces of shit are sometimes able to obtain success, instead of getting flushed into the sewer where they belong.

Edited March 10, 2023 by DougH

[gowlerk 2,099]

And just in time for our discussion comes this new Christian/Nazi symbol. On display quite openly in good old FL.

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/10/1158344050/florida-far-right-extremism-politics-desantis

[JoeWeber 2,567]

Just now, gowlerk said:

And just in time for our discussion comes this new Christian/Nazi symbol. On display quite openly in good old FL.

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/10/1158344050/florida-far-right-extremism-politics-desantis

Very artful and honest. I like it. 

[gowlerk 2,099]

30 minutes ago, JoeWeber said:

Very artful and honest. I like it. 

Yes, it is very likely to catch on and become common on social media soon. Especially Twitter. Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war. With the cross of Jesus going on before.

[RonD1120 58]

On 3/9/2023 at 3:01 PM, gowlerk said:

Why should anyone believe anything? Especially coming from RonD1120. I wonder what the 1120 is? Maybe it's his secret agent number.

D1120 is in fact my expert license number, issued 1965 by the PCA.

[airdvr 201]

On 3/8/2023 at 7:43 PM, JoeWeber said:

Then don't get married.

Absolutely.  Just find someone you can't stand and by them a house.