Advocating peace requires more than hating those who start wars

By David McElroy · January 7, 2020

If you just hate the people who start wars, you’re ultimately no better than they are.

The cultural reality is that political conservatives are more likely to advocate going to war — especially during a Republican administration — and progressive leftists are more likely to express strong hatred for warmongers — if they happen to be Republicans.

And those two sides hate each other. The “pro-war” people and the “pro-peace” people both tend to be full of hate. There‘s something fundamentally wrong with that.

I detest Donald Trump. I had a strong disregard and disrespect for the man long before it was ever suggested that he run for president. He is a loathsome and dysfunctional liar and narcissist. His ego and his lack of political skills might be leading us into a war right now — a war which I don’t want.

But I do not hate Trump. I don’t hate the Iranian crowds who are chanting, “Death to America!”

Even if I detest the actions of people on both sides, I am making the difficult choice to love them — because hatred is what puts us where we are right now.

Very few people today seem interested in understanding those who disagree with them. The attitude seems to be that “those people” are obviously wrong and stupid and evil, no matter which side you’re on.

The truth is that intelligent and well-meaning people can disagree with one another, but if they don’t take the time to understand their differences, it’s easy to take the path toward dehumanization and hatred.

Tonight, I see a lot of hatred all around. A lot of conservatives are expressing hate for the Iranians and expressing the desire to “nuke ’em ’til they glow.” A lot of anti-war people are expressing hate for Trump and John Bolton and a whole host of characters who they blame for putting us where we are.

But if you want peace long term, it has to be about more than just being against something. It has to be about working for something positive. And as hard as this is to hear on a night with a lot of fear and anger in the air, that something positive is love.

If you’re a Christian, it’s wise to take Jesus seriously when he tells us to love our enemies. In the Sermon on the Mount, he was very clear about this.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy,’” Jesus said, according to the Book of Matthew. “But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.”

As far as I can tell, that applies to Trump and it applies to Iranians.

I don’t want a war. I don’t support or admire the politicians — from various administrations going back for a century, both Republican and Democratic — who have created this conflict. But I don’t hate any of them.

I want real peace — and real peace has to start with me. I have to love these people, whether I like them or agree with them or not.

I hope you will consider the idea that peace and love have to start with you.

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Something small just made me happy. The specifics don’t matter, but I found myself smiling and I felt a kind of warm joy filling my heart and mind. In that brief moment of ecstasy, I felt the irrational desire to talk with a particular person. It wasn’t a calculated thought or a rational want. It wasn’t even that I wanted to tell the person about this particular thing. I simply felt ecstatic joy — and I somehow connected that feeling to this person. I can’t explain it. If we’re wise, we’ll pay attention to such moments, because the instincts of our hearts and minds often know more truth than our conscious and rational brains do. The same thing can be true in moments of great pain and suffering. If we pay attention to who our hearts are drawn to in such moments — of extreme joy or extreme hurt — we learn something about ourselves. I don’t know why. I only know that our gut instincts sometimes understand deep truths about ourselves that our rational brains haven’t yet figured out.

It started out as a satirical joke, but some friends liked the idea, so now it’s a real Facebook profile picture frame. If you’ve never heard of Moms Against Virtue-Signaling, let me explain. One of the dumber elements of social media is that it allows people to publicly signal their goodness and virtue to others — without actually doing anything of substance. So you see photo frames around profile photos saying things such as, “Moms Against Racism,” as though they’re standing up against those evil moms who are in favor of racism. It’s meaningless virtue-signaling and it deserves to be mocked, so I made a frame and published it on Facebook’s frame system today. If you go to your own Facebook profile picture and add a frame, then search for Moms Against Virtue-Signaling, you can select it. About a dozen of my friends are using it so far. It’s just fun satire — at least until Facebook decides it “goes against our community standards.” Or something. It’s just a fun way of mocking something that deserves to be mocked.

When I first told you about the project that would become DavidMcElroy.TV, I thought it would launch by mid-May. Since today is the last day of May — and I’m still not close to launching a finished product — here’s a brief update. The graphic above is the latest rough mockup of the format, but it’s still subject to change. Even the logo isn’t yet set in stone. Motion graphics are really difficult when you’re starting from scratch. Sunday night, my camera stopped recording, so it has to be sent off for repair. I have an older camera that I’ll keep using for testing, but I can’t launch without the better one. The audio system developed a low buzz this weekend that has me puzzled. I’ll be taking all the equipment over to the home of a local audio engineer who’s volunteered to help me figure out what I’ve done wrong. On top of all that, my on-camera performance seems to get worse with each test I do. There are days when I think I’m crazy to be attempting this. And in truth, I probably am insane to do it, but being crazy has never stopped me before. I’m at least a month away from launch and it could be a few months. Thanks for being patient — and thanks for all the support and enthusiasm for the project that you’ve sent my way.

I received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine Monday — and I’m happy to report that I’m neither dead nor a zombie controlled by Bill Gates and Co. Eligibility was recently opened in Alabama to everyone who’s 16 or older, so I signed up for the Pfizer vaccine at a site run by a local university. I know this is a political issue for a lot of people, but that honestly baffles me. We can disagree about whether such a vaccine should be mandatory — which I’m against — but as a voluntary choice, it seems like an easy choice now that it’s been safely given to millions of people. Is it a perfect preventative? Of course not. But the decision seemed obvious to me when looking at the statistics and evidence. I haven’t had any of the side effects that some people have experienced, but that’s supposed to be more of an issue after the second dose, which I’ll get on May 3. In the meantime, I’ll let you know if I grow a third arm — or if the secret microchip kicks in and someone starts trying to control me remotely. All kidding aside, getting the vaccine seems like a rational voluntary choice to me.

I get a lot of email from readers. Some of it is fascinating and useful. Some of it is full of confessions that people want to share with a stranger. Some people write to ask advice. What’s really surprising, though, is the small percentage that seems to come from mentally unbalanced people. When I started using the metaphor about being an alien — the tagline at the top of each page here — it never occurred to me that I’d start hearing from people who took it seriously. But every few months, I get a strange email — such as the one above from a few months back — from someone who seems to think I’m claiming to be an actual alien. The first time it happened, I laughed. By the time it became a semi-regular thing, I was simply appalled. For the record, I can provide no proof that I’m an alien, because … well … it’s just a metaphor. I do feel like an alien among human beings, but as far as I know, I’m just as earthbound as you are. It’s just a metaphor. Honest. Or at least, that’s what my lizard-beast overlords told me to say.

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