仇恨 Hatred

"If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is a part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us." - Herman Hesse

“当你恨一个人时，你恨的是你在他身上看到自己的一部分。不属于我们的东西，我们无动于衷，不会被它干扰。” - 作家赫曼赫塞

Saw this article in today's Chinese newspapers and felt that this is something pretty interesting. Do we really hate someone because we see something in him that is part of ourselves? Or is it because that is not what is being conditioned to be a social norm by our parents or environment in our upbringing?

Hate is a very strong feeling, a very strong word, used to describe your emotions about someone or something. And I think to hate someone requires a lot of energy, and at the end of the day, you bring so much unhappiness with you to the grave, its really a lot of negative energy!

Because of hate, we let emotions take control of our head and try to find ways to make things difficult for someone or make them feel miserable. Is this what we were taught to behave? or is it because we were desensitised by the surroundings... the myriad of messages or cultural influences from other countries... our peers... our teachers...

"Our children are not born to hate, they are raised to hate." - Thomas della Peruta

The world has become distorted and the word hate fills the air. Recently, a picture of a child executioner from Afghanistan was shown in the papers. The child is so innocent, yet so ruthless when it comes to chopping the head of a caucasian reporter. Because of hatred for his "friends and professors" in university for looking down at him, there's a huge massacre in Virginia Tech by a South Korean.

Could these events be avoided? Why is there so much hatred? These were the bigger picture.

On a more micro level, we may hate our neighbour's dogs for being so noisy. We may hate inconsiderate colleagues for their kiasu or kiasee behaviour.

Sigh... I think this word should be elminated from the dictionary, and hopefully one day, we can find the peace we really want, be it globally or personally, because "an eye for an eye makes two persons blind".