intolerance of intolerance. Is it going anywhere and where will it lead us.

[Justme]

Are people who hate people who hate others self absorbed, self righteous or self aggrandizing? Are stereotypes a means or a justification and how can these false images be refuted without the refuter defaulting to their own mental images of the types of people who use stereotypes?

In this day and age we are sometimes inundated with the term "Rights" but the precursor is always a subgroup of a group instead of the rights of an individual within the entire group to be treated equally with anyone else in that group. Is it not in the best interest of the entire group, as a whole to protect and defend anyone or any subgroup within the entirety of group lest the subgroup they're in be the next to be placed on the chopping block?

Is the simple fact that there are subgroups within society make that society vulnerable to being fractured and why would we give ear to those who claim to want save society by carving it into separate groups?

Do those who wish to lead society into a promised land actually have one in mind or is it this just an image they delude us into believing in because they know we would not personally believe in them?

When can a sanctuary become a prison? When is the idea of a higher order thinking or acting or being anything more than a palatable means of promoting arrogance? When does all this and much much more begin to create something that is a benefit to everyone?

 

[Devor]

Are people who hate people who hate others self absorbed, self righteous or self aggrandizing?

I'll just try to answer that one.

I think people who hate others for hating people are themselves being hateful. But I think that's an excuse, a defensive reaction. "Well, if they're going to hate me, or somebody that I like, then **** 'em." Insomuch as it's just something that's said to make you or somebody else feel better, then whatever. But insomuch as it's meant - and I think it's usually meant at least a little bit - I think it's hypocritical and unhelpful to the healing which needs to take place in society. It's cementing the division, when usually there are ways to soften and blur those barriers between groups, without necessarily even compromising the integrity of either.

I just think there's better, healthier ways.

 

[Kit]

Like what?

How do you react to someone like those Westboro Baptist Church evil nut jobs? They picket funerals to tell people who have lost family members in tornados, or being blown up in Iraq: "It's your own fault your child died- this is your punishment from God for being complicit in allowing homosexuals to live in this country". How do you respond to that sort of cruel, insane hatred?

 

[Devor]

How do you react to someone like those Westboro Baptist Church evil nut jobs? They picket funerals to tell people who have lost family members in tornados, or being blown up in Iraq: "It's your own fault your child died- this is your punishment from God for being complicit in allowing homosexuals to live in this country". How do you respond to that sort of cruel, insane hatred?

You fight hate by trying to be the sort of person who is difficult to hate. There's no other way, short of warfare - metaphorical or otherwise - but of course, warfare leads to escalation and pain and wounds before anything is ever resolved.

 

[Justme]

Like what?

How do you react to someone like those Westboro Baptist Church evil nut jobs? They picket funerals to tell people who have lost family members in tornado, or being blown up in Iraq: "It's your own fault your child died- this is your punishment from God for being complicit in allowing homosexuals to live in this country". How do you respond to that sort of cruel, insane hatred?

The best way I've found to fight hatred is to not offer it an audience. The true power of any ideal, good, bad or ugly is the amount of people who embrace it. The media gives the Westboro Baptist Church it's sting and they suck it up like milk. What I'd like to see is an entire town come out to one of their protests. Lock arms and as a human wall just slowly walk into them and calmly remove them from wherever they are congregating. There would be no fists, so there will be no assualt, but they would be removed all the same.

What I think would be funny as heck is if they brought in some people dressed in Catholic preachers garb to do exorcisms on the WBC members who are protesting. I'd love to see their faces when someone was trying to pull the demons from out of them.

 

[Jabrosky]

Are people who hate people who hate others self absorbed, self righteous or self aggrandizing?

Yeah, because considering racism, sexism, homophobia, religious fanaticism, authoritarianism, and other wingnut values morally repugnant is something decent people should be ashamed of.

EDIT: I replaced "conservative" with "wingnut" because of course not everyone who identifies as politically conservative is evil. My bad.

 

[Kit]

You fight hate by trying to be the sort of person who is difficult to hate.

I would think a parent at their kid's funeral would be a little hard to hate, but apparently not for those wingnuts.

And if you're gay, apparently that makes it much easier for a lot of people to hate you. One can't stop being gay- or black, or Muslim, or whatever- just because it draws the hate of others. Some people will always find a "reason" to hate you.

 

[Ophiucha]

Depends. I think it's naive to think all problems can be solved with politeness. And I think it is wrong to expect it from someone who is hated. I mean, sincerely, hated. It's easy to say "put on a smile" when you just see a scumbag group like the WBC. If you've never been targeted by them, it's easy to dismiss them as scum and walk away, laugh about it, ignore it. But if you're the object of hate - for your sexuality, your gender, the colour of your skin - then you have every right to hate back, in my opinion. If you're the mother of a gay boy who's been killed in a hate crime, and there are a bunch of people saying he's going to hell or whatever else, then yeah, you should hate them right back.

It's a nice idea, to think that we're all already equal, and that these groups are fringe groups we should ignore for the sake of holding hands and being friends. And while groups like the WBC and their equivalents are fringe, their ideas aren't. One day, maybe there won't be divisions. Maybe then hating the hateful will be pointless. But right now? It's a defence mechanism. If women don't learn to hate every man who thinks it's okay to take away our health care, we're going to lose it. Sitting back and politely requesting that they don't simply doesn't work, not in the grand scheme of things. It might pass a law or two, but successful social change needs somebody with a loud voice and, unfortunately, often a bit more than that.

Even if that weren't the case... we're human. How many times can you listen to somebody say they hate you, that what you do is sinful, that what you are is disgusting and vile, before you think the same of them? In that kind of situation, it's hate them or hate yourself.

 

[Chilari]

I don't think the "I'm gonna love and tolerate the **** out of you" approach is one which necessarily works all the time, or even most of the time. It makes the behaviour of the intolerant appear more acceptable if their behaviour is tolerated even by a small group. One cannot simply say to people like the WBC that we're not going to hate them, because what message does that give the fence-sitters, when one side of the argument are vocal and confrontational and the other side are passive, non-confrontaional and tolerant. The vocal side will get the most attention - which is what groups like the WBC want. Failing to protest doesn't stop them getting attention, it only removes the balance. The only way to remove bigotry from society is to demonstrate that it is unacceptable and force those who practice bigotted behaviour to question it and disassociate themselves with it lest they be ostracised.

Obviously going too far in the other direction cannot be healthy either; assuming that one member of a group holds identical views to the rest of the group simply because they belong to that group is not healthy, and in fact a feature of bigotry and prejudice. The trick, I think, is not to direct hate at the individuals, but at the views they hold - to say that homophobia is unwelcome rather than the WBC, for example. If that makes sense. Because then those part of that group are shown that it is not them, personally, that we react to, but the views they hold, and therefore they may ultimately come to a point where those views are abandoned. When a group is villified, rather than their views, it seems more likely their reaction will be to stick together more, to think "if they're going to hate us anyway, why stop?" But when it is clear that it is not membership of the group but the views of the group which is hated, for social acceptance if nothing else there is the chance an individual might abandon those views.

Does that make sense?

 

[Benjamin Clayborne]

I don't really think a lot of moral justification is needed to despise bigots. Generally, it might be more productive to try and approach it like a sociological problem and help those people instead of shunning/scorning them (if the bigots feel "oppressed" then they'll get all defensive and be even less likely to let go of their prejudices), but that's really hard to do when such strong emotions are involved.

 

[Devor]

Dumping hate on the people who disagree with you, just because they did it first, only works a little if you've got the most hate to dump - it escalates and antagonizes and stirs up the pot until all parties end up at least a little burned, and the results have nothing to do with whether your particular position was the "right" one. There are better ways.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

A funny thing on bigotry... one of my coworkers (I teach at a high school) told a student how people are surprised that her oldest child is 7. She's my about age (~40), but she and the students figured that "everyone" assumed she would be 15 years older than her first kid because she's Puerto Rican. The students were Puerto Rican, too, and said, "You know how we Hispanics are... having kids at six years old."

The reality is that bigotry exists and the students here feel it. They're used to their culture being used as a statistic, and this town does have a high teen pregnancy rate, so there is a true story behind the statistic.

In any case, I thought the way they were joking about it was a healthy way to deal with an ugliness. The word "discrimination" came up on this week's vocabulary list, so my students and I talked about this conversation which we overheard.

I don't have the answer to stopping bigots from being bigots. I thought what my coworker and her students did was a great way to keep bigotry from affecting them.

 

[Caged Maiden]

In every group there will be people worth knowing and others who are merely wastes of air and water. What can I say? I am probably a hater, but it has nothing to do with skin color or sexual orientation but personal selfishness and sense of entitlement.

 

[Steerpike]

Often the self-proclaimed most tolerant are the most hateful and intolerant. As a rule, even though I'm very liberal on political social issues, I find my fellow liberals to be a lot more mean-spirited and hateful than the conservatives. Not sure why that is. You can point out certain idiot groups, of course, like Westboro, but on the whole I find the rhetoric of the left far more nasty, and that's rather embarrassing much of the time.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

I hear you there, Steerpike. A coworker and I were talking about the typical intellectuals you meet in the world of education. So many live privileged lives and claim to understand inner city kids, minorities, etc.

I know what the statistics are in my district... I just don't care. I relate to my students because I treat them as individuals and with dignity. (Even when breaking up fights--ten this year!)

 

[Jabrosky]

As a rule, even though I'm very liberal on political social issues, I find my fellow liberals to be a lot more mean-spirited and hateful than the conservatives.

I've had the opposite experience. Conservatives are the most immature, xenophobic, anti-intellectual, and volatile brutes I have ever encountered. I've never seen a liberal equivalent to the popular conservative charge that Obama is a Kenyan Muslim Black Supremacist Communist. Yes, some liberals were guilty of hyperbole when they likened Bush to Hitler, but at least their attacks against him were rooted in his actions rather than his ethnicity, which is more than can be said for the conservative jihad against Obama.

I've also never seen a liberal equivalent to this:

Right Wing Stuff Bumps Off Liberal Enemies

 

[Steerpike]

I've had the opposite experience. Conservatives are the most immature, xenophobic, anti-intellectual, and volatile brutes I have ever encountered.

You probably don't know many conservatives, Jabrosky. One of the smartest, kindest, and most highly intellectual (and educated) people I know is ultra conservative.

In furtherance of my earlier point, you are a liberal (apparently) and your post is probably the most insulting post in the thread. That's precisely the sort of thing I was getting at. I don't see other posts with that same amount of name-calling and so on, do you? You are reducing people to caricatures, and caricatures are always easy to attack.

Fact is, there are nuts on either side. Most reasonable people can respect and get along just fine with people of other political persuasions. But for some reason, my liberal friends have a lot harder time doing to and being cordial than my conservative friends. I'm not talking about finding nuts on the internet, or general statements of what the crazies on one side or the other might say. I'm talking about actual personal experience with people I know and interact with in day to day life.

 

[Ophiucha]

Sorry Steerpike, but I'm siding with Jabrosky on this one. Are their hateful liberals? Of course there are. But by and large they hate people for who they are, not what they are. Every liberal I know who is full of hate directs that hate towards racists, sexists, homophobes, transphobes, and the sorts of people who think universal healthcare is socialism. Which is a damn site better than being a racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, fascist asshole, which is what most of the hateful conservative individuals tend to be.

As for who speaks louder, maybe in personal situations the liberals won't shut up, but it doesn't take five minutes of watching the news to see which side speaks the loudest when it matters. There is no liberal equivalent to abortion clinic bombers. There's no liberal equivalent to the WBC. There's no liberal equivalent to the KKK. Not on the same scale, not with the same history, not with the same media attention, and in some cases, simply not at all.

And while there certainly are racist liberals, and there are LGBT-friendly conservatives, the fact is that the parties have specific policies relating to these issues. Conservative agenda is in favour of stricter immigration, they're against policies to help minorities get jobs and get paid fairly at those jobs, they're against abortion, they're against gay marriage. There are more people who are conservative that are also RSHT than there are liberals because, otherwise, why would they vote the way they do? And frankly, some forms of hate are objectively worse than others.

 

[Steerpike]

I disagree again, and as I said I am basing this on personal interactions with people, not on what fringe groups do. Again, the most "hateful" rhetoric in this very thread is coming from liberals. It is dressed up in self-righteous indignation, by which excuse liberals think they can be exactly like those they despise and get away with it. I reject the notion.

 

[Kit]

Ophiucha said sort of what I was going to say.

I usually save my hate not for people who simply DISAGREE with me (everyone's entitled to their opinion), but for people who feel that certain others should not be allowed to exist- and ACT upon it.

For me, the line is when you (generic "you") transfer thought to action: you bring your opinions out of your own small head and little closed world and start trying to IMPOSE them upon me and upon others (and that includes your impressionable and helpless children... it makes me crazy to see four-year-olds dressed up in Klan robes, and carrying "abortion doctors are going to burn in hell" signs at rallies).