Why do you hate me? :(

[Czas na Zywiec]

I just felt like started a very serious topic. Why do you think there is so much prejudice in Amercia? And it's not just these days, there was prejudice in America even before it became a country. The first prejudie was during the old Massachusetts Bay Colony days, as all of you probably know. People came to America to escape religious persecuton, and to live away from prejudice. Well when they got here, they started to hang and burn people who they thought were witches, but in fact they did nothing. Prejudice means "Pre-Judge." African-Ameicans, Hispanic-Americans, Native-Americans, Asian-Americans, Jews, Catholics, Muslims have all been persecuted, but this is just a small gorup of people. Fact is that every group of people on this earth has been at least once in our history been persecuted against. So, do you think it is just us Americans and our way of life that persecute against people, or is it just human nature?

[dawsongirl]

I think it's pure ignorance. People don't want to learn anything about the way other people live because it's "scary" and "weird." Unfortuantely, I think that's human nature.

[Kay Scarpetta]

Originally posted by dawsongirl
Unfortuantely, I think that's human nature.

So do I. I personally think it hapens in other countries too, and not just America.

[Chocoholic]

Originally posted by dawsongirl
I think it's pure ignorance. People don't want to learn anything about the way other people live because it's "scary" and "weird." Unfortuantely, I think that's human nature.

I feel the same way. We can educate people about different races, religions, lifestyles, etc., but it won't change a thing. I think there will always be hatred and ignorance in this world, no matter what.

I really hate to say this because I am a devout Christian, but I think the Bible tends to breed ignorance and hatred in people. Most of the narrow-minded, ignorant people I know go to Church every Sunday morning. It really bothers me when people use the Bible to promote ignorance when Christianity is supposed to be about loving and accepting our neighbors. Jesus hung out with the "undesirables" of society and loved them dearly and I think that's what He wants us to do too.

[Czas na Zywiec]

Originally posted by WingsFan


I feel the same way. We can educate people about different races, religions, lifestyles, etc., but it won't change a thing. I think there will always be hatred and ignorance in this world, no matter what.

I really hate to say this because I am a devout Christian, but I think the Bible tends to breed ignorance and hatred in people. Most of the narrow-minded, ignorant people I know go to Church every Sunday morning. It really bothers me when people use the Bible to promote ignorance when Christianity is supposed to be about loving and accepting our neighbors. Jesus hung out with the "undesirables" of society and loved them dearly and I think that's what He wants us to do too.

That's exactly how I feel. Remember the story of the Good Samaratan? Anyone who's a Christian should know it.

[Kitt]

Try not to take a defeatest attitude. The problem is all countries, all cultures all throughout history. But education absolutely does help. There is an organization that brings together Palestiian and Israeli young people in order to learn through their own individual face to face experience. I've heard them speak about, and with each other after spending time together. What they learn and what they say is very heartening. Hatred and misunderstanding stems from ignorance, and ignorance can be overcome.

[Swimfan85]

I agree with for the most part that everything that has been said, yet it is more complicated because people will controdict themselves by saying "Education is the key and accepting others for who they are" and then sometimes (not all cases so dont jump down my throat) they will be the ones who "unknowningly" descrimanate against others...in the school systems(least in my town) it has been enbedded in our minds that prejuices are bad(not just racial prejudices but all types) and but what we do not actually learn how to not to act...like even a something as small as a joke can be taken so offensivly...like karli I believe said, "it is all in human nature." which I believe it is and people not only need to learn that prejudices are bad but learn how to prevent it by doing things as thinking before we make a comment that can be taken the wrong, and sometimes a joke that one person may find amusing, it could seriously hurt another person


and the problem is not only in America, look for example how most all countries hate Americans

[Czas na Zywiec]

Originally posted by kittflynn
Try not to take a defeatest attitude. The problem is all countries, all cultures all throughout history. But education absolutely does help. There is an organization that brings together Palestiian and Israeli young people in order to learn through their own individual face to face experience. I've heard them speak about, and with each other after spending time together. What they learn and what they say is very heartening. Hatred and misunderstanding stems from ignorance, and ignorance can be overcome.

No, that's not what I meant. I only asked what others think, and that's what i meant.

[Plata]

Originally posted by WingsFan
[B
I really hate to say this because I am a devout Christian, but I think the Bible tends to breed ignorance and hatred in people. Most of the narrow-minded, ignorant people I know go to Church every Sunday morning. It really bothers me when people use the Bible to promote ignorance when Christianity is supposed to be about loving and accepting our neighbors. Jesus hung out with the "undesirables" of society and loved them dearly and I think that's what He wants us to do too. [/B]

I totally agree with you, Wingsfan. Sometimes I think religion is really twisted. There are days when I wonder about what those religious people really think they believe in.

[Kitt]

Originally posted by Ricky Ricardo


No, that's not what I meant. I only asked what others think, and that's what i meant. I wasn't speaking specifically to you. I'm not sure what you're questioning in what I said. Some of the comments have been defeatest. I was addressing those.

[Kitt]

Originally posted by WingsFan
I really hate to say this because I am a devout Christian, but I think the Bible tends to breed ignorance and hatred in people. Most of the narrow-minded, ignorant people I know go to Church every Sunday morning. It really bothers me when people use the Bible to promote ignorance. People's self serving interpretation of the bible is more the problem than the bible is.

[Bootsy Whoosh]

Originally posted by WingsFan
I really hate to say this because I am a devout Christian, but I think the Bible tends to breed ignorance and hatred in people. Most of the narrow-minded, ignorant people I know go to Church every Sunday morning. It really bothers me when people use the Bible to promote ignorance when Christianity is supposed to be about loving and accepting our neighbors. Jesus hung out with the "undesirables" of society and loved them dearly and I think that's what He wants us to do too.

I would tend to agree, though I would extend it to many more religions, not just Christianity. Religion does seem to breed hatred and intolerance in the world. Obviously not in everyone, but even devoutly religious people cannot deny the existence of fundamentalists. However, I agree with Kitt about people's interpretations of religious texts being the biggest problem with regards to religion.

Originally posted by kittflynn
But education absolutely does help.

I agree that education absolutely does help. I fear we will never rid ourselves of these problems, but we can chip away at them little by little. Also, sometimes nothing more than a little exposure to other races and cultures can help. Near where I live, legislators and school board members recently decided to end over 30 years of mandatory school busing, which was keeping the schools in the area mixed. I can understand why they wanted to end it, and in the short term, I think it may have been the right decision. The school system has been in a terrible state for years now, and ending busing brings in extra revenues to those schools that can be used to get better books, hire better teachers, and make some much-needed structural improvements to the school buildings. However, I can't help but wonder how this may effect the community 10, 15, 20 years from now, when we will again have children growing up never having interacted with members of a different race.

Originally posted by hockeybabe528
people not only need to learn that prejudices are bad but learn how to prevent it by doing things as thinking before we make a comment that can be taken the wrong, and sometimes a joke that one person may find amusing, it could seriously hurt another person


I agree with this statement whole-heartedly. I have always felt that there is not much one single person can do to end centuries of hatred in the world, but the one thing we certainly all can do is be sensitive to others feelings. I also think it is important to not laught at racial jokes, even if there is no one of the joked-about race around. Like if your friend makes a joke about a black person, even if there are no black people around to see you laughing, I think it is important to not laugh anyway. Not laughing sends a message to your friend or whomever made the joke that you don't appreciate that kind of humor, and they will very likey stop making those jokes, at least around you, and, you can only hope, perhaps around others as well.

[XoVanillaRain90oX]

We discussed this in school....this is what my teacher said, "If there wasn't any bad in the world, how would we know what was good? and if there wasn't any good in the world, how would we know whats bad?"

But what has been going on could of been prevented. People choose to hate, us, americans. and yea, it's nature.

[Kitt]

By education, I don't only mean going to school. Jerry Falwell is educated and he is a fanatical bigot. If you would like to read a tremendously uplifting example of what I mean, please go to pbs.org and read the interview of Laura Blumenfeld by Margaret Warner which was aired on The Newshour a few days ago. Laura Blumenfeld is a reporter for the Washington Post. She has written a book titled "Revenge: A Story of Hope". Her father was shot, but not killed, while in Jerusalem as a visitor in 1986. He was shot for no other reason than he is Jewish. Laura Blumenfeld found a way to confront her father's shooter and accomplish revenge with "an act of generosity".that transformed her enemy rather than destroying him. She began writing to him in prison without him knowing that she was the daughter of his victim.Through some dramatic events that gave me the chillls and brought tears to my eyes this story unfolds. I can't possibly tell it better than laura Blumenfeld has told it in the interview. You all would do well to read the interview under,The Newshour - Essays & Dialogues.

[ChickenLegz]

It must happen in other countries, look what just happened to a school in Germany yesterday or Thursday.

I think all of this crap about what people look like and what they do should not be taken so literal. Poeple just have to let other live. I hate that mentally challenged people get made fun of and people that dont wear Polo, Nike or Limited Too are called poor. This ****, im sorry but thats exaclty what it is, has got to stop before another Holocaust or school shooting or segregation\Civil Rights thing happens.

-ChickenLegz

[DarleneIllyria]

Hate and prejudice just filters through the air, some people can walk by and not have their hearts pollutted- other people can walk by and it does pollute them. Hate is just a part of human nature. Its a mystery why it exists, and why it just won't die. Hatred comes in all forms and people go against people for all kinds of insane reasons. I don't know if the person is jealous of the other person or what.

I don't think anybody knows how sick I get when somebody uses the n word. I usually tell the person that says that word to stop talking about that in front of me because I don't like hearing it. People are people and that's how it should be. People shouldn't divide themselves between white, black, Chinese, Japanese, whatever.

Pay attention to the insides because if a person is sweet and kind on the inside is all that matters. If the person acts like a total ******* on the inside, then don't associate with them. Don't associate a book by the cover and assume that a person's skin color can project their insides.

Edited to say: I just remembered somebody mentioning something about ignorance can be overcome. A person can ignore ignorance, but ignorance can't be wiped out of a person. The ignorant have a place in their heart that spews ignorance. A person that grew up ignorant probably won't wake up one morning and say, "Boy, I've been a total horses ass for 40 years. I want to change." Nobody can wake up one morning and decide they want to change. It takes a society to decide when to change, but I seriously doubt the ignorant all want to change at once.

[Kitt]

Those of you who are interestested in the subject of this thread, this is the interview from pbs.org.


MARGARET WARNER: The book is Revenge: A Story of Hope. The author is Laura Blumenfeld a reporter at The Washington Post. It recounts her personal journey into the psychology of revenge. As a brief excerpt on the book's cover puts it, "My father was shot by a terrorist; a decade later, I went looking for him."

Laura Blumenfeld welcome.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Thank you. Good to be here.

MARGARET WARNER: You were a student at Harvard in 1986. Your father, a rabbi, was in Jerusalem on business, and he was shot. Explain to us the connection between that event and this project of yours.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Well, I realized that these attacks didn't begin or end with my father. They were really part of a mindset, which said it was okay to target innocent civilians to make a political point. And that really bothered me. That sort of shook up my sense of the world. I was a college student at the time, and I was just about to step out into the world. It wasn't just a shot at my father, it was a shot at my innocence and my sense of security. I thought, "if people can think and act this way, then none of us are safe." And I need to find a way take that bullet, to track it down to its source, and challenge that mindset in some way.

MARGARET WARNER: And we should point out, your father lived in fact. He wasn't even seriously wounded. But did he have the same urge to explore this the way you did?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Well, my father got lucky, but other tourists who were shot were killed. And so I felt like it was important to look at... this man, this gunman was more than just someone who shot my father. He was a symbol of a way of approaching the world.

MARGARET WARNER: So tell us how you proceeded. You got yourself to Jerusalem.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Right. I got myself to Jerusalem, and it took about six months to find the actual gunman. I dug around in police records and newspaper archives, and turned out there were a list of 25 suspects who had been rounded up for shooting and killing various foreign tourists. I didn't have any addresses or phone numbers. I just went to the West Bank and kind of went door to door to try to find these families, until I knocked on the right door and his mother welcomed me inside with a glass of orange soda to drink.

MARGARET WARNER: That must have been very difficult. I mean, because I gather you didn't tell them who you were?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: I introduced myself simply as Laura, "I'm a journalist writing a book about revenge," which was true. I just didn't mention my last name, which was the same as the victim's, my father. And they were quite open about it. They said, "yes, my son tried to kill a man, he shot him one time in the head." When I asked, "who was he?" They said, they sort of shrugged and laughed a little bit, and said it was some Jew; they said it was public relations, it was a way to get people to look at us, was how they explained the shooting.

MARGARET WARNER: Now you write at one point, you said, "I wanted to make the shooter realize he had done something wrong." When did you decide that was the form your revenge would take, that that's what you wanted to do?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: There were two competing impulses all the way through. Part of me was just this angry daughter. Someone had tried to hurt a member of my family, to kill a member of my family. And we all have these dark fantasies about grabbing that person who hurts our child and shaking them up or smacking them around. But I had to be realistic. I don't have an army, I don't have arm muscles, I'm not Sylvester Stallone. So I had another idea of a different kind of shaking up, a sort of reaching inside of this person and shaking him up from the inside.

MARGARET WARNER: So you began writing to him in prison. And what were you trying to find out from him?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: I was trying to find out who he was, why he had done it, and more important, I wanted him to slowly discover who his victim was. The first time he wrote to me he described shooting a, "chosen military target," and I just thought about a radar station. I couldn't even picture a human being the way he described it. And so I told him in my letters that, as a reporter, I also had interviewed his victim, David Blumenfeld, and he wasn't a military target. In fact, he was an American, and he was just visiting Jerusalem for a week.

MARGARET WARNER: And from reading it, it appears that his... the shooter, Omar Katib, is that his name?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: That's right.

MARGARET WARNER: That his communications with you evolved over time. They were very sort of nationalistic, polemical at first. Tell us a little bit about that.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: The first letter was eight pages of just ideological screed. My husband said, "it sounds like a stereotype of a crazed terrorist espousing ideology." But as he relaxed, and I guess he grew more comfortable with me, he started to talk about details from his childhood. He became more human to me as well, about hiding under his bed during the 1967 War, hearing the foot falls of Israeli soldiers, and being afraid.

MARGARET WARNER: So the big moment in the book, the big dramatic moment, is the confrontation that you have with him when you go to his parole hearing. Tell us about that.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Well, as I traveled the world and listened to other people's stories of revenge, it seems that there was a stark choice of turn the other cheek or an eye for an eye. And what I had discovered really was a third way, which is transformation, which basically says that you don't have to destroy your enemy, you can transform your enemy instead. That's a new way of getting revenge. I decided it was something risky and definitely optimistic, but I had to try it. I decided if I performed some kind of act of generosity toward him, maybe that would turn him around. Maybe I could restore my father's humanity that had been denied at the time.

MARGARET WARNER: And so?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: And so he was sick. This was a medical hearing. And I had a medical report from his doctor saying that he was gravely ill, and I asked my father how he felt about him being released on medical grounds. My father was very pragmatic. He said, "I don't want revenge. I'm not here for forgiveness. If he's sorry and if he's sick, let him go home." So I managed to argue my way up to the front of the courtroom and speak at this hearing.

I spoke in Hebrew. All along I had spoken only in Arabic or English with the family, because I didn't want them to know I was Jewish. And when I started talking in Hebrew, of course, they got very concerned. Omar himself jumped up and said, "What is going on here? Who is this journalist, this woman? She's clearly not the person she pretended to be." I was introduced as anonymous in front of the courtroom. I said, "My name is Laura, I come from the United States, and I have gotten to know the family and through the family Omar, and I don't know all the facts of the case, but I do believe that he would not repeat his violence. There would be no more violence if he were freed. And I spoke to the victim, David Blumenfeld, and he also thinks if he's truly ill, 12 years in prison is enough ,and it's time for him to go home. This is what David Blumenfeld said."

And the judges yelled at me and told me to sit down, and of course, the prosecutor was seething and saying this is classic hearsay. There was a storm really in the courtroom. And I kept insisting I do have a right to speak. I do have a right to speak. They said, "Why?" And I said, "Because I'm his daughter." And there was just a silence in the courtroom, and I said, "I'm Laura Blumenfeld." And I heard one woman crying behind me, it was Omar's sister. And then everybody broke down in tears. It was only then that I turned around to face Omar for the first time and really look him in the eyes, and I said to him, "And you made a promise, this is on your honor between the Katib family and the Blumenfeld family that you'll never hurt anybody ever again." He was flabbergasted.

MARGARET WARNER: And so, the denouement? They didn't let him out.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: They didn't let him out. He wrote me a letter and he said, haven't slept for days, you know, trying to reassemble this puzzle of your letters and our whole relationship, but he said, "You made me feel so stupid that I ever caused you or your kind mother any pain. Sorry." More important he wrote my father a letter. And he said, "Laura was a mirror held up to your face to see you as a human being deserved to be admired and respected, and I'm sorry I missed her message from the beginning." And for me that was a very sweet kind of revenge. It was what I had been looking for all along really.

MARGARET WARNER: And based on your own story and then all the travels you did-- I mean, you were in Albania, Sicily, Iran-- what have you concluded about the psychology of revenge, and why some people need revenge and others don't?

LAURA BLUMENFELD: It's very interesting. Sometimes it's not even the offense, it's not even how much somebody hurts you, but whether they humiliate you or not, whether you've been shamed. If you think into your own life, whether it was a friend or a boss or a colleague, it's the sense of powerlessness and humiliation. That's on a personal level, but also on a national level when you think about some of our international conflicts.

I also think memory is really important. Memory is the fuel that keeps revenge going. And countries and cultures and individuals who are steeped in memory and tend to remember dates and history, often carry through at least revenge fantasies, if not actual revenge. Cultures and people that are forward looking, like America frankly, tend to be more resilient. It's also people who have a group identity or some kind of tribal identity. I think that, also, it's people who have a very simple view of justice, where it's us versus them, who can easily externalize their hate and are able to separate things in very simple terms. Those are also the kind of people who seek revenge.

MARGARET WARNER: Given what's been happening the last few months in that region-- the suicide attacks, the reprisals-- do you still consider this story what you call it in your title, "a story of hope?"

LAURA BLUMENFELD: I think more than ever it's a story of hope, but it's a story we need to hold on to, because there's a saying in the Middle East, "when you seek revenge you should dig two graves: One for your enemy and one for yourself." And we see that being played out every single day. There's no question that in the Middle East and, also, in our country after 9/11, these are very, very dark times. There is a spark of hope in my story, because it says that the more we can see each other as individuals, the more likely the violence will decline. If we can step way back from the... from the daily hatred and if you can look someone in the eye, it's hard to shoot him in the head.

MARGARET WARNER: Laura Blumenfeld, thank you.

LAURA BLUMENFELD: Thank you.

 

[Kitt]

Part of me apologizes for re-entering this subject. I wondered whether or not I should bother bringing this up. But, I decided to explain myself and then go ahead. After posting the interview above, which so perfectly addressed the subject of this thread, and practically everything that everyone has said about the subject, I've wondered if anyone read the interview. Since there was no response I've assumed that no one did. Although reading the interview would be helpful to anyone who'd like to better understand prejidice, and would like to believe that there is hope of snuffing it out, incrementally at least, I'm not posting to again ask that anyone read the interview. I guess I'm posting now because I'm surprised and disappointed that after someone brought this subject up it was, in my view, dropped before it's time. In another thread many of you have written candidly about depression. Trying to understand tough subjects such as the one in this thread, that we all have a stake in, can be helpful in overcoming depression because it helps each of us to feel less alone.

[Montana Ponine]

I don't know, but I DO know that it's really stupid. Why should we care about what color our skin is and what our beliefs are? it's really dumb that we should judge people by looks...It's definitely not fair. it's these kinds of things that always make me so sad... :(