Essay: What We Love to Hate

The things that people love to hate are many. Most people just can’t stand someone being different from them while others cannot stand someone of another race for some or no reason. Some people hate those with more power then them or those who abuse their power. Some even hate people who sell things, be it over the phone or at your door. People hate because they are taught to. No child hates anyone, when a child is growing up the hatred his or her parent’s feel toward others teaches the child to hate. People fear that which is different, fear leads to anger and anger quickly becomes hate. Everything and everyone who is or has ever been hated was once feared to some degree. Almost always in the origin of hate fear, though most might not notice it has began as a fear or insecurity that eventually grew into what is now hate.

The fact that someone is different makes many people afraid and that fear eventually makes them angry at who ever they find to be different and that anger eventually simmers down into hate. Racism is one of the greatest examples of fear becoming hate because of differences that exist. Racism is the degradation of an entire race, or a portion thereof by making those who belong to that race feel inferior or selling them into slavery and thereby making them feel an even greater lowliness. The people who conquered South Africa are prime examples of how I might define racist. They set up a ruling class made up of only Afrikaans, to keep them away from the people they feared, and took away the majority of the rights of the native people. The Afrikaans also segregated the communities to keep them apart from the native people. All because they where afraid of the native peoples of South Africa because they where different.

People with power are afraid of people with more power than they. This fear of someone with greater power eventually becomes anger and that anger ultimately becomes hate. This hate of greater power is caused by the fear of that greater power being used against you. Terrorists, for example, have power in the form of bombs and planes that they crash into buildings, people fear terrorists and eventually they hate them due to their fear of death. The fear that someone or something has the power to cause death is also a great source of power-based hate. The hate of power not only comes from a greater power but also from lesser power. The hate of a lesser power comes from the fear that one day the lesser power will be greater than yours. The hate of a lesser power can also come from the fear that the lesser power has enough power to cause you harm and remove your power.

Salesmen are a very common focus for hate in this world. This hatred is very weak and fleeting; it comes from annoyance more than it does fear like most other forms of hatred. Therefore the hatred most people feel towards salesmen is only mild and is more often than not easy to ignore if the need arises. The problem is that having a constant, though minor, hate in the lives of people can eventually lead to greater hate and possibly violence and suffering. Some people however feel a deeper hatred for salesmen. This hatred probably comes from a bad experience or somehow a fear of salesmen that became anger that grew into hate. The strange thing about the common hate of salesmen is that people usually don’t have specific salesmen they hate; they hate salesmen in general. Hating a group is akin to racism, though the odium felt towards salesmen is minor, and can be equally destructive.

Though true hate has many forms it shares one central characteristic, it is fueled and has its origins in fear. When someone is afraid they eventually become angry at the source of their fear, that anger rages through them and eventually takes a new form as hate. The more anger and fear that the person the greater their hate will become. Minor hate which is more like a deep annoyance is fueled and has its origins elsewhere is nothing compared to the true hat that many people feel sometimes. If mankind where to embrace compassion and understanding prejudice and hate would melt away like ice on a hot griddle. Without the armaments of love and understanding for our fellow man we are like leaves in a windstorm, powerless against the forces of nature. If we posses them we are like stolid fortress walls against the tempest. With love and understanding for our fellow man the world would be a peaceful place unified with no prejudice or contention of any kind.