ArticleAmid a distressing stream of antisemitic incidents, the Federal and NSW Governments have passed legislation that strengthen laws against the incitement of hatred based on race. Some claim such moves go too far, bordering on unenforceable thought-policing. Others say they don’t go far enough, excluding other vulnerable groups. Regardless of your opinion of the laws, the problem identified and the solution offered allude to something more pervasive in our cultural fabric: hate.
We’re herded into online echo-chambers where we wait like coiled up cobras, ready to be triggered by coded phrases that are designed to enrage us based on our aversions.
Public discourse, activism and social media algorithms are all geared to make sure we hate the same things that our tribes do. Wokeness. Anti-wokeness. Meghan Markle. Cyclists. Wellness influencers. The list of candidates for hatred are endless. All we have to do is pick our tribe and get on with the hate-signalling.
The etymology of the word ‘hate’ has many ancestors. It emerges from old English, Proto-Germanic and old Norse words, all of which conveyed the notion of hostility and enmity for something in particular. It’s modern lexical range has largely held to this, with common vernacular for hatred now being focussed on intense dislike, animosity, or – at its most nasty – the desire to cause harm and bring about suffering. It’s rare that such an old word has held so steady in its meaning over time. And yet it hasn’t been until recent times – perhaps ironically, not until the age of codified human rights – that we’ve needed laws and public policy debates around the kinds of public hatred that are ok and the kinds that aren’t.
Could it be that hatred has always been there, but our modern interconnected world has merely provided us with more efficient channels for communicating it?
Certainly, the evidence is strong that much of the tribalism and polarisation of modern times has been both caused and catalysed by social media, the 24-7 news cycle and an algorithm driven digital eco-system that seeks to harvest attention by drenching people in content that reinforces their prejudices. Our digital universe has made both the generation and dissemination of hatred easier and more efficient than ever before. However, our increasingly digital lives may not be the sole cause of the modern escalation of hatred.
In his recent book The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism, Financial Times journalist Martin Wolf writes of the systemic disaffection that the liberal free-market order has yielded – leaving too many behind and eroding trust in the historical marriage between capitalism and democracy. For all of the good it has achieved – pulling hundreds of millions out of poverty and seeding the largest and most comfortable global middle class in human history – the fruits and opportunities of modernity are manifestly unequal in their spread. There will always be winners and losers. But when there are too many losers, people will lash out. People will start hating.
We need to be more occupied with furthering that which we consider good than enraged by that which we consider bad. When we limit our thinking to what we’re against, we deal in the diminished currency of the negative. The journey from outrage to hope is not an easy one, but it begins with focusing on what we love rather than being enraged by what we hate.
The rise of ‘autonomy’ in a world of increasing disconnection hasn’t helped either. We’ve built societies in which meaningful connections and authentic relationships of trust are increasingly rare, especially with those who are different from us. I’ve lived in four countries and have experienced at least some racism in each of them. Interestingly, every incidence of racism I’ve endured has been clearly caused by one of two motivations: My skin colour led the perpetrator to believe that they were better than me; or they were upset because they perceived my life to be better than theirs. It’s always either an inferiority or a superiority complex. We are jealous. We are anxious. We are scared. We are confused. And we are repeatedly told that other people are the reason for those things. This is what drives most of the bigotry and hatred out there. As Pope John Paul II aptly put it:
“If the promotion of the self is understood in terms of absolute autonomy, people inevitably reach the point of rejecting one another. Everyone else is considered an enemy from whom one has to defend oneself. Thus, society becomes a mass of individuals placed side by side, but without any mutual bonds. Each one wished to assert himself independently of the other and in fact intends to make his own interests prevail.”
This milkshake of disaffection, polarising digital eco-systems and market-catalysed individualism is a toxic recipe. Its combined effect is to portray those unlike us not merely as different, but as opposed to us. We turn in on ourselves and see more and more people not only as the other, but as the enemy.
Seemingly gone are the days when public expressions were driven by things we stood for. Net zero. Family values. The sanctity of life. Social justice. Once upon a time, terms like these were ethical touchpoints used – some by the left and others by the right – to communicate values positively. These days, they’re moral ignition sparks, more likely to upset their opponents than to inspire their guardians.
Don’t get me wrong. Knowing what we hate is important. Discrimination. Violence. Abuse. Suffering. All of these should be condemned, denounced and to the extent that it’s reasonable and possible, stopped. But there’s a time to set hatred aside. Otherwise, it can hijack our collective disposition. A preoccupied gardener can spend so much time waiving their fists at the weeds and the weather that they forget what they’re about – planting, watering, nurturing and growing something.
As a young lawyer, I remember working a case in which the law firm representing the other side had been built up as the arch-nemesis of my firm. They were Thanos and we were the Avengers, or so rookie lawyers like me were repeatedly told. I remember being preoccupied – not with wanting to win for my client – but with wanting to inflict the pain of defeat on my opponent. We lost (thankfully, for other reasons), but it was a painful lesson I’ve always remembered.
When I’m obsessed with beating the other guy, I’m never at my best. And that’s bad for me and for the system.
Part of the challenge comes back to our basic wiring. Neurologically, we’re never happier than when we’re unhappy. Psychologists and behavioural economists have explored the phenomenon known as cognitive negativity bias – the quirk by which we feel negative things more readily and intensely than we do positive things. We’re more upset about losing $100 than we are happy about gaining $100. We’re more deflated by the end of a holiday than excited by its beginning. And I know enough politicians from both sides that enjoy the defeats of their opponents more than they enjoy their own victories.
A few weeks ago, the broadly conservative Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) held its second global conference in London. Caricatured as ‘Davos for Christians’ the most important speech of the conference was given by New York Times columnist David Brooks. Cerebral and softly spoken, Brooks presents like a cross between Clark Kent and a freshly shaven Dumbledore. Perhaps surprisingly – and to a smattering of mild cheers and grumpy boos – Brooks called out the left and the right for being overly negative and insufficiently hopeful. His message to those with cultural power was clear: Be defined by what you love, not what you hate.
Brooks – Jewish by descent and Christian by conversion – was channelling the obscure prophet Amos from the Bible. Amos declared that when our cries for change are bitter, we have a problem. Our desire for a better future should be motivated by constructive restoration, not destructive anger.
On overcoming our love of hatred, the new science and the old scriptures are agreed. We need to be more occupied with furthering that which we consider good than enraged by that which we consider bad. When we limit our thinking to what we’re against, we deal in the diminished currency of the negative. The journey from outrage to hope is not an easy one, but it begins with focusing on what we love rather than being enraged by what we hate.
Max Jeganathan is a senior research fellow at the Centre for Public Christianity. He served as a political and social policy adviser in the Rudd and Gillard Labor governments. This article was first published in Eureka Street.