When What You Love is Under Attack — Of Course You Hate

People who disagree with me on opposing Obamacare have in some cases written to me, “You’re full of hatred.”

They throw around the word “hatred” as if it’s supposed to intellectually and morally disarm you. It’s not only Obamacare, but a lot of issues. You’re supposed to think,  “Oh, no. Somebody said I’m hateful. I better stop opposing Obamacare, then.”

I call this an attempt to morally and psychologically disarm you. It won’t work with me, and it need not work with you, either.

People who seek to disarm others in this way have no positive principle or case for which they stand. They only know that they HATE yours, that you cannot be right, and they don’t want you to be right. In psychology, this is called projection. One accuses another of what one dreads and loathes in oneself.

Let’s get something straight here. Hatred can be rational.

I happen to HATE the following things:

Slavery.

Serfdom and dictatorship.

Busybodies.

Control freaks.

Government bureaucrats undermining doctor care.

Government mandates and government regulations.

Presidents, Senators and other politicians who act as if they “care” when really they’re just trying to seize and hold on to personal power. Politicians who claim to be upholding individual rights for all when, in practice, they sacrifice the rights and well-being of some for the sake of favored others.

The reason I HATE these things is because I LOVE the following things:

Freedom.

Liberty.

Individual rights.

Reason and rationality, the things freedom is supposed to make safe — especially in the all-important arena of medicine.

Free markets and freedom of competition in all areas — especially medicine!

It’s rational to HATE something when the reason you HATE it is because it’s undermining or destroying something you LOVE.

I’m sure the people who claim someone is a “hater” for opposing Obamacare love and hate things as well. They’re not intellectually entitled to condemn another for hating/loving something when they do the same thing themselves.

People who imply that hate is always wrong, and who express hatred of “haters,’ are contradicting themselves in the very act of doing so. You cannot morally condemn someone for hating, when you’re engaged in hatred yourself.

Hatred does not swallow you up and destroy you if it’s in defense of something you LOVE — and if what you love is rational.

Racists and other haters do not love anything in particular. They simply hate the group that they’re trying to undermine because they don’t know what they love, they don’t know what they stand for in life, and they feel like they have to blame somebody. This is psychologically irrational and destructive, to be sure.

Such haters were unhappy in the first place. The irrational hatred you observe in them is merely a symptom of their underlying unhappiness.

You cannot generalize from the existence of irrational hatred that it’s always wrong to hate. To do so is to undermine the beautiful things you love.

Do you love your spouse? Your child? Your pet? Your house?

If you love or value anything in a meaningful way, you will quite naturally and logically feel hatred towards anyone who threatened these values.

A rapist, a murderer, a thief, an arsonist — anyone who seeks to undermine or destroy that which you love? Do you mean to tell me you don’t hate someone or something which threatens what’s most important to you? Do you mean to suggest that you don’t hate what they’re trying to do?

I’m making a psychological point here. I’m talking about the necessary psychological basis for a free society. It’s crucial to developing and maintaining self-esteem to grasp what I’m saying. A humble society will never be a free one. If people continue to bow their heads in humble uncertainty, and become ashamed when told not to disagree with authority (when authority is so clearly wrong), then freedom, liberty—and all we hold dear, and most of us take for granted—are surely doomed.

 

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