Mary,
Thanks for your thoughtful reply.
However, America is the only place, and perhaps the last place, where hatred has a chance to be ended. A place where the cycle of violence ends.
There zero chance that hatred will be ended, for the very reason that you identified in your post: I know for instance there are many non arab, all American Christian type people ( I don't want to put a number on it and also because I don't know how many there are) who actually hate Jews for absolutely no sane reason.
You can try to reason with people but if the people can't be reasoned with. If the "reasoning" is institutionalized and enters the stage of propaganda, indoctrination or intimidation, all you end up attacking the freedom of thought and freedom of conscience. Losing this freedom is incomparably greater tragedy than if someone in his mind hates Jews, Christian or Muslims.
A place where the cycle of violence ends.
Violence has to be judged and suppressed independently of the thought that brought about the violence, because once you try to get into someone's mind, you are either approving or not approving someone's thought, which no-one (other than maybe God) has any business doing. Actions are public, subject to laws. Thought are supremely private, untouchable.
This is why I find Politically Correct movement and its Storm Troopers so comical on one level (considering that they are on a noble quest), but pitiful and reprehensible on another level. Their victory is if the either silence people, or intimidate them into conforming, saying things that are different from their thoughts. What is more un-American that this?
Joe |
