When did it happen...?

As I read over Facebook posts, news items and listen to comments by this year's political candidates and pundits, the questions keeps creeping up at the back of my mind: "When did people become so angry, so disrespectful, so downright mean?"

Now, I'm not naive or Pollyana-ish enough to think all of that is new. I've been enjoying enough historical novels (like "Team of Rivals") to know that there were always those running for office and seeking power who have been intent on manipulating the truth in order to sway opinion. But even in the more recent days of talk radio and the Rush Limbaugh's who seem to demonize anyone who doesn't view things the way he does and make up (supposedly) cutesy little names for the people he hates, it seems to have trickled down to the masses in ways that disturb me deeply.

I'm especially grieved when it's coming from the mouths of those who should know better. People of faith, people with ordinarily good manners, people who were not brought up to accuse everyone who didn't agree with them of being "demonic." I recall people in my old hometown who were on opposite sides of the fence about some pretty important issues who could rant and rave, argue passionately--and then to have a drink together! They may not have agreed about some things, but they still had respect and deep affection for one another. And what's more, they would have defended that friend if someone else took a potshot at them!

Will this trend ever turn around? Will there come a day when we realize that we are all in this together and, while we may have different viewpoints as to what the best ways of accomplishing things are, we still want what's best for our country--and our world. Most of us want peace. We want to see hungry people have enough food to eat. We want to see that every person has access to healthcare--doctors, medicines, hospitals, etc. We want to see our cities, large and small, thrive and our schools be safe places for children where they can and do learn and become educated in order to be better people and make a better world for their children. We do, don't we?

In every book of faith that I have read or seen portions of, there is an overarching theme of a desire that all people live a quality of life that is just, allows space for creative thinking, promotes good will toward all and promotes a morality that recognizes some boundaries that make life better for all if we live within them. Yet more wars, even today, are fought in the name of "religion" than any other reason. The Holocaust may have ended many years ago, but genocide still exists in far too many places around our globe. How can this be?

I have friends who send me hate messages that are supposed to make me hate this group or that group who believe or live differently than I do, or who are from a different race than I, or who are just "other." These messages encourage me to be fearful and angry. They encourage me to hate and to pass that hatrid along to others so they will hate, too! Any words I offer back to disagree, question or refuse to pass along seem to do no good. Whether it's undocumented aliens, Muslims, poor people (who they assume are all just lazy and working the system), people of another color, someone from a certain political party--the list goes on and on--I'm supposed to imagine the very worst about them, hate them, try to stay away from them and get others to do the same.

I cannot find those instructions in my book of faith: the Bible. With few exceptions, I see, again and again the instructions to love--even my enemies. After loving God more than anything or anyone else, I am supposed to love others as I love myself. as i love myself...maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe much of the hatred comes from not being able to love ourselves. Some psychologists suggest that those things we hate the most about ourselves are the very things that bother us the most about other people. If I hate people who lie, perhaps it means that deep down inside I recognize that I have a tendency to lie--to be deceptive--even to myself. So I cannot tolerate it in others. I think I will ponder that for awhile...until next post.