I Don't Hate Donald Trump

Misanthropy 

I heard the word "misanthropy" while watching Jessica Jones of all places. It rang a bell. My wife asked what it meant. I said (trying to sound impressive and fairly sure I'd get it wrong), "Well, "mis-" is a prefix that means wrong, bad, miss, askew and "thrope" is in the word anthropology which has something to do with humans, so... dislike of humans?"

Not a bad guess :) Miriam and Webster (two of my favourite people) define it as "a hatred or distrust of humankind."

I recalled a play from my years of studying literature. Not sure I'd ever read it, I looked it up: The Misanthrope, a seventeenth century French satirical play.

And then, I thought, hmm, misanthrope... Facebook/misanthrope: Damn -- that's half of my Facebook feed! After nearly two years of Donald Trump, what I've found even more disturbing that Donald Trump is the hate and venom that people are showing toward one another over ideology.

I've heard several times in recent weeks the notion that Facebook monetizes polarization. I'm all for a good debate, but I don't see much healthy, respectful discourse happening on Facebook. Mostly what I see is the echo chamber of posting to your particular pole, followed mostly by likes from your like-minded friends, with perhaps a few trollish comments thrown in.

I know it's not a new thought, but it bears repeating: it's too easy to say mean things in social media. I wonder how many people -- people I know, people who I think are reasonable, caring individuals -- would say some of the things they say online to someone's face. An immigrant's, a Muslim's, a First Nation person's face, for example.

Or a right wing, conservative person's face!

Yes, just to be clear, this isn't a liberal vs conservative thing: it goes both ways. We had an election in Ontario recently. Our Conservative candidate, Doug Ford -- brother of former Toronto mayer, Rob Ford -- won.  There were a lot of people on social media who were upset. I get that. But some of these same people who posted that they were angry with the lack of compassion and empathy shown to marginalized groups by the winning party were the same people who subsequently were name-calling those who voted for Ford. They were calling these voters "stupid" and "ignorant" among other things.

In the past, while looking at my Facebook feed, I've often thought:  ____________(fill in the blank with a FB friend's name): really!? Do you really believe what you're posting? This, followed by the thought: I should comment on that... No. Bad idea. I should call up __________ and have a coffee with him/her.

Maybe I'm naive, but I suspect the conversation wouldn't end in fisticuffs and/or throwing labels at each other. I suspect it would be a good, respectful conversation. We'd probably agree to disagree. Because I know ____________ to be a thoughtful, intelligent, caring person.

Our pastor is fond of pointing out the difference between intent and impact. Ie. maybe you didn't intend for your hearer to feel hated, belittled, bullied and de-valued, but that's the impact your words had. Our pastor goes on to say, that, all things being equal, that's mostly the encoder's, not the decoder's, fault.

Misanthropy is strongly connected to poles. What tends to happen when you get radically entrenched in your ideological pole is that the Idea becomes King. And for a king, you're either his loyal subject or an enemy. It's a very binary, if you're for me you're against me, kind of thing.

This became all too sadly/comically clear when I read posts in response to what was meant to be a feel-good/cute video. It was a video of two lesbians who were simultaneously (unbeknownst to the other) proposing. Each presented an  engagement ring to the other at the exact same moment.

There were several smiley faces, hearts, "Oh, how sweet" kinds of responses followed by -- you guessed it (BAM): a religious rant about how homosexuality is an abomination worthy of imminent hell. This was followed by a post, in essence, telling said religious person, you're everything that's wrong with religion. And it went on and on, neither party listening to the other because listening implies a lot of things: empathy, a deep desire to understand, care for the person being listened to -- none of which is the usual stuff of polarizing Facebook posts.

I wanted to close with an audio recording, but I can't find it. So I'll just describe it instead: I believe he's a teen -- a very young man, at any rate. He's gay and was getting a lot of hate in social media from people he didn't even know. He decided to do something unconventional about it. Instead of engaging in mud-slinging, he decided to ask his trolls for their phone numbers. He recorded some fascinating conversations in which he opened with, "Why do you hate me?" By the end of one conversation, this young man's bully admitted to having had a horrible high school experience himself because he was overweight and constantly teased.

All this is to return to my point. The more we insulate ourselves behind the walls of social media, the easier it is to "hate" people. And let's be clear: hate has many faces -- only the most extreme being to wish someone dead. It can also look like disdain, ridicule, contempt, repulsion, scorn and the list goes on. But when we step out from behind our walls and actually meet someone who is wildly different from us, that's when hate ceases to feel normal and right. That's when the opposite of hate becomes possible -- that is to say, respect, care, affection, good will, regard and (dare I say it? I know this is crazy talk but, yes, even) love.