You've Got To Be Taught To Hate and Fear

I have been thinking a lot about the word hate, this week. It is not a word I want a part of my vocabulary. Growing up, I had teachers who, if a child in my class used the word hate, would question them saying, “Hate is a really strong word, do you really mean that?”  or simply state, “Hate is a bad word, please don’t use that in my class.”  I remember many times as a young person considering using the word hate but stopping and remembering what my teachers had said.  I think I still do, because when I hear the word, today, it makes me cringe. It seems so vitriol and damning.  

Sadly, throughout my life, I was also taught to fear and then even hate certain groups and people different than me. Not that hard in the sheltered world I grew up in. Today, when I look back, I find it weird that forms of hate were often taught to me in the church.  There were other denominations that we were to hate for not believing like us. Organizations and people in society that we were to hate for trying to challenge our beliefs. And this even creeped into our family lives with people living in the “bad” parts of town – and God forbid that someone from those areas would move into our neighborhood and bring down our house value. Even though it was a bad word, we were indoctrinated to hate people different than us.  We hated the kind of cars they drove.  The way they dressed.  The music they played. Where they came from. It all ended up being taught to us as a way of keeping us safe and pure from outside thoughts and beliefs.  

I have always enjoyed listening to James Taylor (who is said to attend a Quaker Meeting), this week I ran across a song he covered from the Rogers and Hammerstein classic, South Pacific. The song is about when Nellie discovers that Emile’s children are of mixed-race lineage, she decides she cannot marry him. Lt. Cable, unable to overcome his own prejudices and marry Liat, bitterly comments on the hate he and Nellie were raised to internalize in the following lyrics.  

You’ve got to be taught to hate and fear,
You’ve got to be taught from year to year,
It’s got to be drummed in your dear little ear—
You’ve got to be carefully taught!

You’ve got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a different shade—
You’ve got to be carefully taught.

You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate—
You’ve got to be carefully taught!

These lyrics hit me hard last week as our President said, “I hate my opponents and do not want the best for them.”  My teachers would have said, “Oh Mr. President, hate is a strong word, you don’t want to say that?” But just writing that makes me cringe. To think that our leaders have decided to “drum” hate and fear into our ears makes me sick. Another generation is being raised to hate their neighbors – and I know how long it took me to get this thinking out of my system. Actually, I am still trying to rid it from my life. 

If Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has taught us anything, it is that we need to stick to love, because “hate is too great a burden to bear.”  Folks, this is not about politics, this is about our God-created identity.  In Mattthew 5:43-48 from the Message, Jesus challenges hate saying, 

“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the supple moves of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.

In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.

I sense it is time for us to put away hate and live out our God-created identity by loving unconditionally the world around us. Find someone to love this week!