How Can People Hate Other People They Don't Even Know?

[MineralMan]

I've never understood that. They might hate people who look different than they do. They might hate people who do not speak the same language they do. They might hate people who have different body parts than they do or who use those parts differently.

They might hate people who don't worship the same deities as themselves, or who worship no deities at all They might hate people who treat other people differently than they do. They might even hate people who drive a different kind of car than they do, or support some different sports team, for goodness' sake.

Somehow, I can't hate someone I don't even know. I can only hate people I do know if they are hateful to others. And even then, I'm going to cut them some slack in hopes they stop doing that. I can hate people who harm other people out of blind hatred. I do hate people who do that.

But, I have to think long and hard before committing to hating anyone. I have to have full justification for that emotion. Hate is a self-destructive emotion. It is best avoided altogether.

[Lovie777]

1. In most cases it's called prejudice.......

[Walleye]

2. I think part of the reason they hate, other than the fact that it feels good, is that it puts them in a club

They’re comfortable being with people who hate the same people they do. It’s like a family. It may be their only true connection to other humans. It’s all very baffling, especially since they drummed up hatred against Joe Biden, honestly the nicest person you would ever want to meet.

[applegrove]

3. Some people need a scapegoat.

[John1956PA]

4. Nixon said, "Others will hate you . . .

. . . but they win only if you hate them back."

[jalan48]

5. Tribalism, it's been going on for thousands of years.

[Jim__]

13. Hunter-gatherers first launched violent raids at least 13,400 years ago

This study from ScienceNews supports your claim. A short excerpt:

More than 8,000 years before the rise of Egyptian civilization, hunter-gatherers went on the attack in the Nile Valley.

Skeletons of adults, teens and children excavated in the 1960s at an ancient cemetery in Sudan known as Jebel Sahaba display injuries incurred in repeated skirmishes, raids or ambushes, say paleoanthropologist Isabelle Crevecoeur and her colleagues. The site, which dates to between 13,400 and 18,600 years ago, provides the oldest known evidence of regular, small-scale conflicts among human groups, says Crevecoeur, of the University of Bordeaux in France.

Although people buried at Jebel Sahaba don’t show signs of having fought in a one-time battle, they participated in an early form of sporadic warfare, the researchers conclude May 27 in Scientific Reports.

“Repeated violent episodes were probably triggered by well-recorded environmental changes” around the time people were buried at Jebel Sahaba, Crevecoeur says.

...

[jalan48]

30. Thanks for the article. We've been brutalizing one another for a long time

“Repeated violent episodes were probably triggered by well-recorded environmental changes” around the time people were buried at Jebel Sahaba, Crevecoeur says.

This doesn't bode well for us given the current climate crisis we are going through.

[pwb]

6. It will be nice to get back to life BT, before trump.

I already have. I love everybody. I voted and will accept the results and move on.

[0rganism]

7. Seems like it's generally easier to hate (and fear) those one doesn't know

With notable exceptions, to know someone is to chance sympathy or understanding, both of which can really get in the way of a solid hate session.

It's almost as if hate is something a mature person would rather avoid

[TomSlick]

18. Exactly.

[chowder66]

8. It's the only way for some to feel good about themselves.

It also makes them feel like they have power (to sit in judgement of others).

[lees1975]

9. I'm with you, I don't understand blind hatred.

I was raised in a very conservative, Christian faith, and while the rhetoric was "love your neighbor" and "love your enemies," the actions were hate anyone who doesn't agree with your doctrine and set yourself apart as some kind of exclusive guardian of your church against its enemies. And you can do that and believe God is on your side and cheering you on because you got it right.

Blind hatred is a symptom of personal insecurity.

[Ocelot II]

10. Fear. They've been persuaded that those *other* people will cause harm to them,

their communities, their standards, their money, whatever. The (mostly brown) immigrants will flood the country in order to murder children, rape women and steal jobs (while also living off welfare - the conundrum of Schrödinger's Immigrants). Jews will hoard all the money. Black Americans will riot and burn down our cities. Muslims are anti-Christian terrorists who have declared jihad on the suburbs. Feminists want to abort all the babies and become men. Democrats want to turn the government Communist and send everyone to collective farms where they will sleep on dirt floors and be paid in potatoes. And so forth. If you fear someone that much you're gonna hate them - and the anger arising from hate is exciting because it makes you feel like a righteous, unfairly persecuted victim.

[NameAlreadyTaken]

11. "You've Got to be Carefully Taught"

[susanr516]

33. You beat me to it! NT

[ProudMNDemocrat]

12. People are not born to HATE, they are TAUGHT or TOLD who to hate.

[cloudbase]

14. "Now, I don't hate anybody,

but there are a few shitasses that I loathe."


-Sam Rayburn

[GaYellowDawg]

15. That's the main reason they hate.

Because they don't know them, they fear the unfamiliar, and they hate what they fear. Much easier to dehumanize what you don't know.

I like to think that most people, once they get to know someone in a demographic they have previously hated or feared, realize that almost all of us have more in common than not. When that happens, the stranger is no longer strange, and isn't feared to nearly the same extent.

[-misanthroptimist]

16. Beats me.

I mean, I'm human so I must have the capacity for hate. But I seem to lack the attention span. Instead, I just remove that person from my presence and, when possible, my thoughts. There's too much else to do and too many good people in the world to waste my time with that hate nonsense.

[maxsolomon]

17. It's pretty easy.

Look at the entire history of Homo Sapiens.

[krawhitham]

19. I don't know trump, but I HATE HIM

[sheshe2]

23. You are back again!

Paul, Bill, Kevin, Dave, Mike …..etc

[littlemissmartypants]

24. ...

❤️

[sheshe2]

25. Tee hee hee 😉

[GP6971]

32. Hello !! Back again I see.

[haele]

21. Hate destroys your center.

I try very hard not to hate.

I have no enemies, except for those who are actively trying to harm me, and even those, I try not to hate.
Maybe dis-respect. Maybe intentionally avoid. Maybe get disgusted at. Maybe judge negatively against or actively work against. But not hate. Hate itself makes me physically ill.

Haele

[lindysalsagal]

22. Darwinian ethnocentrism: It has served a purpose for most of our human history: Tribal preservation

https://engl2523.wordpress.com/2021/02/18/charles-darwin-the-ethnocentric-beginnings-of-evolutionary-theory/

Explains religion.

But as our planetary resources dwindle, we can't afford this lower-brain thinking anymore. We've all got global communication in out pockets and on our tv screens. We need to get over it, for sure.

[randr]

26. If you think you need to hate other people

You may belong to a cult.

[Voltaire2]

27. It is entirely trivial to hate people you don't know.

Which is why it is the favorite organizing principal for fascism.

[Freethinker65]

28. How do you feel about people that take your rights away?

How do you feel about the people that vote for people that promise to take your rights away? How do you feel knowing many of those voters delight in knowing people like yourself will suffer because of who they voted for?

[FalloutShelter]

29. Help me understand.

?si=K2CC2kLcS_5iNCDA

[Ping Tung]

34. The most important aspect of hate is fear.

Late into my 4 year employment in the USMC Vietnam replaced Cuba as the main bogeyman that we were supposed to kill. I had been paying attention to the international news and read up on the history of Vietnam. There was much talk about from the bosses and we were being prepared by lectures about the Dirty Commies, falling dominoes, and every crime imaginable by "Them" the new enemy.

It was at the rifle range that the fact that some of the targets were silhouettes of men. And it struck me that these were actual people that I was supposed to kill.. People I didn't know. People that didn't' know me. People I had nothing against. People I might like if I met them. Why in the hell should kill such people just to shine up LBJ's anti-Commie creds?

It was my first real steps to becoming a pacifist.

My enlistment was up 6/29/65. They asked me to re-enlist, offered me another stripe, and being stationed wherever I wanted. All I had to do was become willing to kill people.

Nope. I added my opinions to the Gunny Sergeant trying to get me reenlist of extend my enlistment.

I didn't kill anyone. I had some friends whose enlistments weren't up. Their names are on that wall they built to salve their consciences.