Hate is not for Brussels Sprouts

Growing up I was taught that "hate" was a strong word, that we don't hate things, we "strongly dislike" them. I understand this, now. When I was young I didn't know what hate was. There was nothing in my little life that I had any right to hate, and my mother and father weren't about to teach me what hate truly was. They were right – hate is far too strong a word for Brussels sprouts.

Hate is for the cruelty of this world. For the IDF soldiers who attack children and parents and aid workers. For the fundamentalist "Christian" freaks who think it's God's test to force a 12-year-old victim to carry a pregnancy to term. For Nazis and their modern day adherents. For Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, who accrue the wealth of a nation by enabling and spreading evil, undermining our rights and pitting us against each other. For the racist organizations that have reemerged, emboldened by Donald Trump and his cult. The world of today does warrant hate.

I have always had a strong sense of justice. The red-faced, tears-pooling, bone-deep anger that I feel today is no stranger to me. It has long been a source of embarrassment, that I could feel so strongly, often over such little things. Over the years, my assessment of what was truly unjust has often been wrong, the consequences of a worldview still in its calibration phase. But the big things have always seemed obvious. I refused to join the Boy Scouts of America over their discrimination against queer scouts. I knew it was wrong to assume all Asian people are Chinese. At school I chose which students to hang out with based on how nice they were and how many interests we shared, not based on their skin color. I certainly had my own flaws and missteps, but much of the time, it just seemed so easy to treat people with basic respect.

I know that people learn to hate. It's a deep aversion that isn't just conjured in a vacuum – it's made. We encounter things in life that are so offensive to our values that it leaves a scar on us, an otherwise happy countenance marred by the knowledge of something disgusting. A beautiful face screwed up in a furious scowl.

Or perhaps someone you trust teaches you to hate. Perhaps they see your fresh face, your smooth skin and fear you because you don't look like them. They replicate their own scars on you, blaming a formless other for their own transgression against your innocence. Hate is a horrible thing to teach someone.

I know that people learn to hate, but I cannot understand why they cling to it so. My hatred is for those who choose to advance their goals at the expense of innocents. It is a hatred of hatred. It does not warm me. It does not soothe me. It keeps me vigilant, not happy. If the hatred that fuels the IDF, or the KKK, or the right wing were to suddenly disappear, so would mine. I do not want it. I would not miss it.

As a parent myself, I now understand what my parents meant back then. I do not want my son to hate. I want him to grow up in a world where there is nothing worthy of hate. I want him not to understand me, never to understand me, for saying "we don't hate our Brussels sprouts. We strongly dislike them."