To escape hate, turn off media and deal with others in love, kindness

By David McElroy · October 28, 2018

What we call the news has become “hate speech lite” for people who see themselves as too sophisticated to be guilty of hate.

There’s a lot of angst this weekend among good people who are full of rage about other people who were also full of rage and attacked or murdered some other people. A lot of decent people want to know what they can do to stem the tide of hatred that leads to violence.

Because they’re listening to news media — and to angry friends on social media — they’ve mostly accepted the narrative that the way to stop hate is to vote for Democrats in congressional elections. In reality, voting for anybody is just a way to keep the cycle of hatred going on and on and on.

The best thing you can do to fight evil is to turn off electronic media — to stop the alarmist hate you hear from almost everyone there — and to deal with the people around you in kindness and love. The answers you’re looking for won’t be found on cable news or social media.

If you listen to the news media, the source of hatred is whatever group opposes your ideological beliefs. For most of the media, the source of hatred is Donald Trump and any conservative or libertarian, because those people oppose their progressive agenda. For conservative media, the source of hatred is “the liberal Democrats,” especially certain hated figures on the progressive left.

As long as you are listening to media, you are hearing someone’s attempt to sell you on joining his crusade against a hated political enemy. You are being told that if the Democrats had power, hate would be defeated. (And if you watch Fox News or other conservative media, you are being told that Democrats are the source of all the hatred.)

But the truth about partisan politics is something you rarely hear. The battle between Democrats and Republicans (or whatever the groups call themselves in a different context) is over who gets to control everybody else.

Politics isn’t about “doing what’s right.” Politics is about which group gets to coercively impose its will on everybody else.

When Republicans take power, they pass rules which benefit them and their friends. They force everyone to pay for the things they want to do and allow freedom on the things they don’t care about.

When Democrats take power, they pass rules which benefit them and their friends. They force everyone to pay for the things they want to do and allow freedom on the things they don’t care about.

Do you see how much alike these groups are? They want to do different things, but they are identical in their willingness to use force to get you and others to obey them.

So if Democrats set the rules and force people to obey them, those who are being controlled are filled with rage. Periodically, a small minority of those people will eventually turn their hatred to violence. We’ve seen that long-term anger and resentment played out this week in the dysfunctional Florida man who mailed crude bombs to Democrats and news media.

If Republicans set the rules and force people to obey them, those who are being controlled are also filled with rage. Periodically, a small minority of them will eventually turn their hatred to violence. We saw a lot of that during the 1960s and early ’70s — and I suspect we’re heading toward a period of more of it today.

If you participate in this evil contest to decide who gets to control everybody else, you are contributing to the continued growth and spread of hatred.

The only way to break out of this cycle is to quit supporting either side in an evil war for control.

You cannot change everything by yourself. You can’t stop evil men from murdering Jews because they have internalized lies about this group. You can’t stop dysfunctional (and mentally ill) people from launching violent attacks on political enemies. Nothing you do can change that. You are doing nobody any good when you fill your mind with the garbage that is going on in the world.

The only thing you can do is to back away from this evil system and all the news about it — and focus on what you can control in your own world.

You can love people around you in the best ways you know how. You can be kind to the people you encounter. You can do a million things — voluntarily — to change the world right around you.

This doesn’t involve voting. This involves starting with your own mind and heart. It means taking your focus away from things you can’t control and focusing instead on your friends and family and neighbors.

As long as the vast majority of people support an evil system which controls everybody and turns one person against another, the sad truth is that you will be ruled by one group or another. You can either get mad at the Red Team (or the Blue Team) and you can try to install different rulers instead — or you can reject their evil system entirely.

If you reject their system, you can take your eyes off their quarrels. You can quit arguing about who has blame for what. You can stop believing the lie that your group being in charge will bring peace and love to your world.

You are the only person who can bring peace and love to your own world. It starts in your mind and heart. It’s reflected in how you treat the people around you — and it reflects itself in your being able to disconnect from the ongoing blame game about who is responsible for hatred.

Turn the political media off, not just the ones you disagree with, but all of them. Turn away from the arguments on social media. Focus on changing yourself and then on showing love and kindness to people around you.

This won’t stop the hatred that others are neck-deep in, but it will remove you from their cess pool. And if enough people make this voluntary change, we could change the world — not by forcing others to obey us, but by showing that people can choose to live in love and peace when they voluntarily choose to change their own hearts.

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Have you ever wondered how the social media world works for so-called “influencers”? I find it comical, so I thought I’d share with you. I frequently get offers such as what I’m about to describe. And if I’m getting such offers — as a relative nobody in the online world — you can only imagine what people with huge audiences are offered. It starts with an email appealing to my ego: “We came across your online presence and we LOVE your style. We’d love to have you as one of our Brand Ambassadors. To celebrate our new [Brand Name] collection, we want to give you a FREE Watch so you can post a picture of you wearing it and drive more exposure to our brand.” Did you hear that? They love me. They want me to be seen wearing their cheap $59 watch so other people will think, “If this amazing influencer wears that, surely I should buy one.” They even offer me commissions on the watches sold from people clicking from my site. So the next time you see some alleged “influencer” touting something online or on social media, remember that this is what it’s probably all about. It’s laughable.

Modern culture is going insane. The latest evidence comes from the effort to redefine children’s author Dr. Seuss as a racist whose books should be banned. Why? Because a few images in those books don’t meet modern political standards. The drawing you see here is one of those “dangerously racist images,” and it comes from the Dr. Seuss classic, “And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street.” The book catalogs all the wild diversity seen by a child on one street, including the offending drawing of a Chinese boy. What’s racist about it? Apparently, it was racist to show the boy eating rice, wearing a funny hat, using chopsticks and (worst of all) having eyes represented by a slit. (The bearded man near him has dots for eyes, but that’s apparently OK.) In other words, the stereotypes are considered racist today. (Oddly, the culture warriors who fret over such things are never concerned if a white southerner is depicted as ignorant trash living in a trailer. Some stereotypes are great, especially if the left hates those people anyway.) Theodore Geisel — the name of the real-life Dr. Seuss — was a product of his time and nobody at that time would have seen any of this as racist. Using stereotypes and exaggerations is how artists depict differences in simple ways. You can argue that it’s better to achieve the end result in a different way, but it’s insane to pretend that everybody from the past should have his work erased because it doesn’t match the preferences of modern leftists. Unfortunately, the company that publishes Dr. Seuss books has caved to the insane people — and six of his popular works will no longer be published. The world has simply gone insane.

Tyler Barnes will never be a basketball star. He probably peaked as a star high school player in Louisville, Ky. But for the last four years, he’s been a walk-on player for the University of Alabama. He’s a chemical engineering major with lots of academic honors who rides the bench because he loves being part of a team. He sometimes gets into games with a minute or two to go, but only if Alabama has a big lead. This Saturday, it was senior day for Alabama basketball, so it was his last chance to play in Coleman Coliseum. Alabama Coach Nate Oats says that one of the team starter’s came to him an hour before the game started — and fellow senior Alex Reese asked Oats if Barnes could start in his place for this one game. Even though the game was huge for Alabama, which is ranked No. 6 in the country and trying to wrap up an SEC title, Oats agreed. Barnes started and played the first three minutes, grabbing what was only the fourth rebound of his career and missing his only shot. Barnes has a great future as an engineer, but you’ll never again hear from him as a basketball player. For three shining minutes Saturday, though, he was a starter for a top-10 college basketball team — and his parents were in the stands from Kentucky to see it. There’s a lot of ugliness in college basketball right now, but this story makes me happy.

It was five years ago tonight when Lucy first rode in the car with me. She was on her way to her “forever home” with me that night, but she didn’t know it, so she was terrified. It was a much happier and braver girl who took a ride in the car tonight so we could go through a drive-through window and order a hamburger for her — to celebrate five years with me. She had a great time. If she could remember five years ago tonight, she would be proud of how far she’s come, too. If you’d like to know more about Lucy’s journey from scared dog to brave queen of the household, here’s something I wrote after her first year with me. I’m hoping this girl will have many more happy years with me.

I’ve never been attracted to skinny women. There’s nothing wrong with someone who’s naturally thin, but it’s never been my preference. What has shocked me, though, is the judgment I’ve heard from women all through my life — about themselves and others — about who’s “fat.” I concluded long ago that most women in our culture have been brainwashed to believe that skinny is attractive — and that anything other than skinny is ugly. I first assumed that I was the oddball — for preferring women with bigger and heavier bodies — but I’m coming to the conclusion that most men naturally feel this way to one extent or another. I just ran across new research by a couple of Northwestern University psychology professors that shows that women seriously overestimate how much a straight man will be attracted to a skinny woman. In a perfect world, we would all be at a healthy weight, but when it comes to attractiveness, too heavy is more attractive than skinny. At least to me — and to a lot of men, too.

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