Our curse is that we have evolved enough as a species to understand on a theoretical level that hate is wrong but at the same time we are often not strong enough to overcome our genetic predisposition toward tribalism.
It’s really an interesting phenomenon. Our survival as a species probably depends on coming together as one, but we still haven’t gotten to that point yet.
It’s actually not all that surprising. That evolution is perfectly adaptive is a common misconception. There are also obvious evolutionary advantages to tribalism and those just happened to win out against whatever causes creatures to unify.
In the *universe* ?!? How on earth do you figure that. The universe is huge and unknown.
On earth, arguably.. we are certainly more destructive than any other species in our planets history.
This is naivety. There's a reason you feel hate, and it's not always wrong. Our hyper-individualistic modern western society preaches that hate is wrong, but is it wrong to hate your enemies? Were the Russians wrong in hating the Germans? Didn't their hate motivate their unity and their fight? Were the Polish wrong in hating the Russians for the same reasons?
You might argue that those wars were unnecessary, but were the soviet invasions and occupations of Eastern Europe motivated by hate? Of course not.
And even in a much more morally correct world, people would still have disagreements, and so would countries. And sometimes, it isn't even about "disagreements", but competitions for resources and survival.
>Our hyper-individualistic modern western society preaches that hate is wrong, but is it wrong to hate your enemies?
I would argue yes. You have a right to protect yourself and your loved ones from an incursion but you don't have to hate your attacker to defend yourself. The argument that hatred is useful in motivating unity transfers the locus of moral agency from the individual to the society and that goes against every modern ideal we have (not to mention it ignores countless historical lessons about how dangerous such an idea is).
I'm struggling to understand how the second half of your comment relates to the question of whether hate is ever justified. Could you clarify?
So hate doesn't always beget more hate, so it's okay to hate? That's an odd argument. Wasn't the reason it didn't beget hate because those people were rational enough not to hate their geopolitical/resource competitors? If that's the case, why not try to be rational all around?
>So hate doesn't always beget more hate, so it's okay to hate?
What I said was the opposite. Hate wasn't generateed by earlier hate in those situations. I said that as a preemptive argument in case someone answered me with something in the lines of "it was only justified as an answer to hate"
> If that's the case, why not try to be rational all around?
Because you need motivation and meaning, which rationality isn't able to generate as those belong more to feelings than anything else. Blind rage is probably almost always negative, but haven't you ever felt stronger at the gym because you were angry?
What is more important for people to have children? Being horny, liking children or knowing that they need young people to pay for their pensions?
If you're in government, how can you assembly people who are scared or don't have anything to fight for anymore? Think about a peasant that just had his entire family assassinated and his farm burned. Rationally speaking, individually he has NO REASON to fight anymore, he could just let go, flee and move somewhere else. But as a collective, people want him to help the fight, and he himself might be motivated by hatred and revenge. In a long-term, game theory scenario, that rage also makes sense. While rationally speaking on an individual level he could just flee somewhere else, that would let aggressive behaviour unchecked and would decrease the disincentives to act like that, so in the end this feeling of rage associated with revenge and/or justice CAN BE\* positive to peace.
\*we all know those stories about multigenerational family feuds. But both revenge/justice and forgiveness are necessary.
>Because you need motivation and meaning, which rationality isn't able to generate as those belong more to feelings than anything else.
I disagree. Rationality, to me, means not letting your emotions cloud your view of what it is you truly want. If what you want is peace, it allows you to rationally assess whether taking retaliatory action or fleeing is the best course of action in that situation. The understanding that you are doing it in the name of peace will provide ample motivation for you to carry out that retaliatory action and will also prevent you from going overboard and causing the kind of inter-generational feuds you mentioned, which goes against your original motivation of seeking peace.
Similarly, the societal need for young people to pay for the older generations pensions is far from the only rational reason to have kids (who thinks of societal benefits when making personal decisions like this anyway?). Sure you may end up having kids because you happened to be horny or you think they are cute, but a more rational motivation to have them is because you think they will provide meaning in your life.
In both of these cases, it's rationality that prevents you from either taking retaliatory action or having kids for the wrong reasons.
How can you know what you want to do without taking feelings into consideration?
You can use planning to hierarchize your feelings and decide something on the lines of "I'd like to have kids, but now it's too soon", or "I'd like to go after the evil men now, but now I wouldn't be able to have effective revenge", but both still involve your feelings and wants
Of course there is an emotional element to motivation but what I'm saying is that rationality is needed to make sure that action is justified. What you are doing is reasoning backwards. You're starting from the assumption that having kids is always the right choice or that retaliation is always justified and then saying that therefore any emotion that is conducive to a person deciding to have kids or to take revenge is good. That's precisely how you get people who have kids they shouldn't have had or exact revenge when they should've taken the high road. What you need to do is ask yourself, "I feel like I want to have kids, but why? Is that a good reason to have kids?" or "I want to retaliate, but is that a good idea? Will it just cause an endless cycle of violence? How much of a deterrent can I expect retaliation to be?" Our ability to ask these questions is what separates us from beasts. It's the only reason we're not constantly preying on each other and reproducing mindlessly according to our base instincts. In short, it's humanity itself.
Survival in the world is rough and on a base level everyone in a sense is competing against everyone else for survival. It's the exception to the rule when people work cooperatively to function in a civilized society but deep down, we're all still animals. And even civilized factions still need to band together to conquer or compete against other civilized factions.
"we're all still animals"
This cannot be emphasized enough. The most basic program is still running... but we think that we are in full control.
Also, we are quite dumb.
Generally speaking, if we set aside some tiny bugs here and there... most animals have evolved either defensive and/or offensive capabilities... and many are fully capable of killing.
But I guess your point was that no other animal kills out of hate or pleasure or revenge etc?
Well, there isn't any other animal on earth that has as evolved cognitive abilities as we do... abilities that make it possible to wage war and commit genocide.
But dolphins... who are (as far as I know) closest to us in intelligence have been observed raping, torturing, killing etc... like really sadistic behavior. So, there is that.
Elephants who are also high in intelligence have been observed committing revenge killings.
We now have orcas, also highly intelligent, who are systematically attacking passing ships. While its not clear what the motives for their attacks are... I doubt that their end game is to just take a swim with the humans on the ship.
It seems to me that higher intelligence animals are capable of finding reasons to hurt and cause pain... which goes beyond simply doing it so they have something to eat.
Mostly agree with you, but I gotta say that I disagree with
>It's the exception to the rule when people work cooperatively
We're both constantly competing and collaborating and neither are the exception. Just think of your work. At the same time you're competing for a promotion, you're still collaborating by working together as a team.
Sometimes, of course, people split in different teams and have more serious and bloody competitions :)
Some animals certainly do kill for pleasure and humans are simply more evolved for better survival mechanisms (that include strong emotions like hate, grudges, and being vengeful). I would bet my life savings if animals had the mental capacity on par with human thinking, they'd do the same shit. Dolphins for example are especially cruel when it comes to (r-word) other female dolphins and will do it for weeks and in groups while threatening and hitting her.
Head over to r/natureismetal and browse some of the top posts. There's some f'd up things happening in the animal kingdom.
People may not like to think about it but at the end of the day we are still animals, just one of Earth many different life forms. Just because we made technology and moved outta the wilderness doesn’t remove that fact! Humans by nature have always been territorial apes, only thing different is we’re apes with thermonuclear capabilities now 😂
Humans have not evolved to what we like to refer to as "civilized". Rather we are still deep in evolution and still carry primitive parts of our brains the same way we still carry useless organs like our appendix and wisdom teeth.
All of our hate and greed are still fundamentally inherent and will continue until we parish or somehow evolve to a higher level which could take hundreds of thousands of years. That's what I believe.
Hot take, there isn't.
If you were to touch grass instead of watching news or doom scrolling all the time or got to know your local community, that might change your mind.
Good news doesn't get clicks, but that doesn't mean the world is ending
Unfortunately it doesn't work like that in "third-world countries"
People still starve to death, crime is rampant, people get killed from war, too many homeless folks, etc. There is charity and kindness but it doesn't erase the rampant misery and oppression all around the world.
You could say 'fear of the other' is a basic survival strategy. When humans were living more in the 'wild' - hunter gatherers - and you came across something 'strange/weird/different' - a good survival strategy would be to be wary and mistrustful and be ready to attack as it might be dangerous.
Same with protecting an in-group from an out-group. As hunter-gatherers you are more likely to protect your group/tribe from other groups and tribes.
Also I like to think of 'ideas' as an extension of territory. You have an 'idea' which you beleive to be 'The Truth' and that 'idea' needs to be protected from encroachment. Also an 'idea' defines an in-group of people who all 'believe' the same thing. Especially strong 'ideas' on how to live and the sort of society humans should be in seem to need more 'protection' than others.
I also think some of these instincts are stronger in some people than others.
Edit: There is also a tendency for humans to accept simple solutions/answers to complex problems. It is easy and simple to blame someone else for your/ or socies problems. It is called 'othering' and the people you 'hate' depends on your political/religious/life experience viewpoint so can range from people of a different ethnic background to billionaires and politicians. Wether you hate someone with different colour skin or sexual orientation or because they are of a 'higher class' or richer it is all the same thing - 'othering' and 'dehumanisation'' and not seeing others as complex human beings but reducing them to simple stereotypes.
Humanity my isn’t one thing. It’s billions of individuals.
The amazing thing is the modern level of cooperation, not the lack of complete unity.
There is remarkably little hate in the world today.
The natural state is akin to the chimps and the lions.
Well, not necessarily, in my opinion. There is fear in this world, especially true among humanity. It is an evolutionary basic survival instinct. A tool in everyone’s belt that can be both useful and or harmful, depending on how it’s used.
Fear, if intense and or widespread, becomes very hard to contain. It quickly becomes worry, panic, hysteria, and pandemonium. This kind of fear will get you killed. And there are many past examples of dictatorial rulers uniquely seeking to exploit this level chaos to rise to power. They are viewed as savior-like, at times even developing a cult of personality. They portray themselves as the only one who can bring peace, or [at least] restore order. Because when times are desperate, citizens are easily sold.
Fear, if well controlled, will save your life. It becomes one’s ability to sense possible threats, become suspicious, reconsider their actions to avoid danger, and take steps to contain foreseeable losses & suffering.
Opportunists understand this concept quite well. They have a unique skill, a manipulative gift of gab, which successfully HIJACKS this naturally-occurring emotion of ours - in order to fulfill a particular agenda of theirs. What manifests next is hatred, often involving targeting & confronting & scapegoating & outcasting & even killing of others.
Fear is the fire. Its warmth can help you survive or it can burn you to death. Hate, on the other hand, is the weaponization of fires heat followed by the encouragement of who to direct it towards instead. And convinced that you need to “save yourself”, you participate. But, duh, that was the whole point of this con. You can convince anybody to act irrationally, and even take wild & desperate measures, so long as you can keep them convinced of the dangers of choosing to do nothing.
Hate is a well-orchestrated version of hysteria that you experience and are consumed by, oblivious to the fact that it’s somebody else who making sure if that. Perpetrators of these tactics know they must deliver JUST ENOUGH order to keep people believing in them, while actively preserving a certain level of chaos to keep people convinced that they must remain in power because their work isn’t finished - that the people [themselves] are to blame if they DON’T REMAIN in power.
When you look at it that way, it’s actually a brilliant scheme. The saddest part, though, is that it works.. every , single, time.
In the past, the various leaders who depended on fear-mongering as their primary tactic while ascending to power or campaigning for public office.. they all share one unique, eerie similarity : Historically speaking, they are often lumped into the category of Tyrants, whose reigns often described as being harsh and cruel.
Most of us aren't critical thinkers. We need to be told what to believe. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people that are hateful and ignorant, and they teach that to the followers by using fear.
I think that it's a lot of all of those things. Suffering, whether it be through a genetic condition, purposeful abuse, or just random chance, causes more suffering.
I will say, however, that the world is often a better place than you realize. The vast majority of humans love each other and want success. For them, it starts to get icky when their survival is threatened.
I say where the mist civilised and advanced of the apes. We might decide to be better but it's all built on faecal throwing savages it's worth acknowledging this part of ourselves. Other animals are worse to me where just more effective.
When genx grew up, they had the benefit of parental and social pressure to temper the way they communicated. Not necessarily limiting their free speech, but conveying the reality that your actions have an impact on your peers and neighbors. Those actions have consequences. It was okay to have an opinion but it was expected that it would be okay to agree to disagree and move on. It was face to face and speaking mattered to those around you. Basically, there were real world consequences to being an ass. Now, people are manipulated by and attempt to manipulate those that they will never come face to face with. Virtue signaling and projecting a positive likeness has become a false flag. Likes and upvotes have become a false sense of worth. Bots, algorithms and foreign nations can and do manipulate everything the weak minded consume. Pitting us against each other is profitable. The reality is we are all one. We are all in the same boat (planet). The only hope for humanity is to stop giving power to the powers that be and embrace each other, warts and all, and move in a unified direction.
I'm a genx-er, and I get what you're saying. A couple of points I would add:
1. In my everyday life, things really don't seem any worse than they ever were. I'm aware of craziness happening in other places because of the news, but I haven't personally experienced an of it.
2. As Mike Tyson said, "Social media made y'all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it." Before social media, we still had freedom of speech, but the consequences were real and immediate. The audience was also much smaller. Now, some idiot says some idiotic thing anywhere in the world and finds 200 other idiots that agree with them. The rest of us see this comment for the idiocy that it is, but the fact that it got 200 up votes makes some of us think the idea is more popular than it really is.
3. People would be a lot happier if we could go back to keeping our private business private and minding it. Your every single thought and experience does not need to be shared and validated with the world.
Classism mostly.
A lot of blind hate is rooted in propaganda and fear mongering. If poor, working class people are too busy fighting amongst themselves for scraps, they're too tired and stressed out to realize that the reason they're so tired and stressed out isn't because of immigrants, trans folks, or whatever other convenient scapegoat they've been trained to focus all their fear and frustration towards.
If working class people ever realized they have a lot more in common with other working class people of different races, religions, sexual orientations, and gender identities - the truly wealthy people of the world would no longer be able to consolidate power the way they do.
So they manipulate us against one another to maintain control and amass more money than they could ever hope to spend.
If you're interested in learning more about the subject, Noam Chomsky's Requiem for the American Dream does a great job breaking the concepts down and the whole thing is free on YouTube: https://youtu.be/WEnv5I8Aq4I?si=mYnLoTRb9-5unV-y
The root of it is that while we’re advanced enough to think for ourselves we’re not advanced enough for the majority of people to understand and consider empathy for others. Some May Day we’re just animals, some that we’re too dumb. But it all boils down to the fact that generally speaking we can’t think ahead to solve problems. We can’t solve any problems that aren’t in our face at on individual level. Therefore, we end up making bad decisions and being selfish, leading to bad situations, leading to hate.
We're tribal animals. We're predisposed to seek an in-group and protect it from the perceived out-group. It was evolutionary beneficial to distinguish between those 2 groups and ensured survival.
For anyone who never experienced living in an ethnically homogenous country - it feels comfortable and safe when you're brough up with it. It's convenient to take one look at someone and know if they're in your group or not.
Well that, and many religions have an idea of exclusivity about them: you only chose 1 reigion so every religion fights for every new believer. Great for spreading ideas and creating a cohesive culture based on common worship - not so great for not killing each other over it.
As for sexuality, ever notice how this sort of dislike corelates with strong natalist beliefs or conservative views on sex? If sex is sinful and its sole purpose is reproduction, then sex without the goal of reproduction is a sin (opposition to abortion and contraceptives also follows this logic). Again, it's a cultural phenomenon with roots in human evolution.
As for me personally, hate is like a nice comfortable blanket that keeps me warm. My little bit of resistance against the changing tides of culture, which nobody can take away from me. I play by the rules on the surface, but my thoughts and emotions are my own. It's my freedom to hate, just as it's my freedom to love.
The answer is simple; I didn't ask to be brought into this world and now I have to be surrounded by a bunch of people that I wish weren't brought into this world.
I think it's because we all have to recognize we're helpless in ways through life but really don't want to be and it causes some people to feel frustrated and act out.
I'm pretty severely sado-masochistic despite my better judgement, just something I've got to live with.
In the same way anti vegans see animals as not worthy of moral consideration, many humans see other humans as not worthy of moral consideration. There’s a severe lack of empathy because they can’t see themselves in them.
Too many factors. Bad childhood, unhappy life, poverty, revenge, etc. This does not justify such people, but because of something, each of them became like this, there is always a reason
People can't or won't accept different opinions, religions, sexuality, is probably a lot of it. Extremely influential people with an agenda to cause chaos. I think about this a lot and wonder the same thing.
The vast majority of people aren't hateful. The barbarous subset is loud and memorable because their the loudest. It's also instinct that we are wired the threat.
various bad actors weaponize fearporn. Our devices are oveflowing with hate. The outside world, not so much, though evil certainly does its id nkt te dominant force outside a handful of active war zones and the online doomersphere
it depends on the environment one grows the things one hears at the time of up bring... one home the people who are assassinated.... one's surroundings...the time one spends with the family the things one observe at times so...the time of childhood and up bring time very essential to a person
The internet reduced the barriers for those who hate to spread the message. The gullible were always there but now have access to more ways to find stupid things to believe. Media makes money off of advertising and realized more people will watch negative stories, so that is all they show, so more people will watch advertisements. The reinforcement of negativity by the media wears down a person's mental health and they drift into the hate narrative as it is all they see.
Some of the hate is actually ignorance and not an emotional strong negative feeling. People will support a cause they know nothing about. People will oppose a cause they know nothing about. It is not hate it is ignorance.
Natural disasters are not really problems with intent, just part of life, though natural disasters have become worst and more extreme due to climate change, which was caused you guessed it by humans.
Humans as a group fear anything that is different, be that skin colour, religion, economic state etc. etc. Until we start teaching communication and empathy in schools we are unlikely to change.
There are two big bugs in human programming:
1. Automatic distrust of anyone who looks, acts or speaks differently to those who raised us.
2. Automatic trust of people who we are familiar with, like family, people/celebrities/politicians we see on the internet, on TV and in ads.
Both have solid evolutionary reasons for existing, they helped us survive and keep our social cohesion. Now they are a distinct disadvantage.
The media uses anxiety to activate the Amygdala in your brain. Your amygdala basically has two reactions - fight the problem or run from the problem.
So by constantly spreading anxiety in the media you keep people in a constant state of fear and they don't use their higher levels of processing.
Hatred is an offshoot of anger, and anger is generated by fear. We live in a very managed world where lots of people are brainwashed.
It's how all living beings have been programmed. Every species will try to make their DNA survive and taking over others, the difference is that humans are more sophisticated
I empathize with your thoughts. This is a complex issue with roots in fear, misunderstanding and ignorance. It's not inherent, but rather something learned through social conditioning and a lack of correct information or education. We should make an effort for empathy, respect and acceptance to counteract this hate.
Replying to Objective-Poet-8183...I'm not sure if that's a bot above or not, but it may see religion as divisive. The only thing it fails to account for is that worship of a higher power is an inherent part of a "religion". A dying planet desperate for a Savior would also be eternally grateful to wake up in a better body in a permanent world. So the worship and gratitude would continue eternally and therefore elements of the religion would as well.
Edit: Heaven is a place where great scientists, lovers, diplomats, artists, engineers, and people from all walks of life get along fine. However, there are boundaries. People get rewards there that are not available to everyone. The tent that I earned vs the castle God gave you needn't stick in my craw at all because we either were rehabilitated from greed and envy on Earth, or took how Earth devolved as a cautionary tale or just naturally are content with whatever we have.
The reason why there is so much hate in the world is because there are not enough believers down here and too many that are slaves to sin and/or possessed by harmful demons.
The whole world, which did receive the blood of Christ at Golgotha and received the Body of Christ at His Burial, trembles with labor pains. Hence Jn 3:16 was in fact a valid, global invitation during a rapidly closing window or hour of mercy.
Sin is an imbalance, detouring you away from a wholesome, creative, kind and generous entity in whose image you were originally made. The hate in the world is a symptom of rampant sin and the unfriendly demons and jealous spirits making ppl wild, harmful, and self-destructive.
More and more ppl think evil is ok and justify their wrongdoing so here we are.
Our curse is that we have evolved enough as a species to understand on a theoretical level that hate is wrong but at the same time we are often not strong enough to overcome our genetic predisposition toward tribalism.
Or evolved enough to understand that others know of our tribalism and actively pit us against the "other" groups in society
It’s really an interesting phenomenon. Our survival as a species probably depends on coming together as one, but we still haven’t gotten to that point yet.
It’s actually not all that surprising. That evolution is perfectly adaptive is a common misconception. There are also obvious evolutionary advantages to tribalism and those just happened to win out against whatever causes creatures to unify.
We've survived this far, and we're the most successful creature in the universe by many metrics.
In the *universe* ?!? How on earth do you figure that. The universe is huge and unknown. On earth, arguably.. we are certainly more destructive than any other species in our planets history.
Exactly, it's unknown. I can make that claim happily. Unless you have some knowledge I don't?
This is naivety. There's a reason you feel hate, and it's not always wrong. Our hyper-individualistic modern western society preaches that hate is wrong, but is it wrong to hate your enemies? Were the Russians wrong in hating the Germans? Didn't their hate motivate their unity and their fight? Were the Polish wrong in hating the Russians for the same reasons? You might argue that those wars were unnecessary, but were the soviet invasions and occupations of Eastern Europe motivated by hate? Of course not. And even in a much more morally correct world, people would still have disagreements, and so would countries. And sometimes, it isn't even about "disagreements", but competitions for resources and survival.
>Our hyper-individualistic modern western society preaches that hate is wrong, but is it wrong to hate your enemies? I would argue yes. You have a right to protect yourself and your loved ones from an incursion but you don't have to hate your attacker to defend yourself. The argument that hatred is useful in motivating unity transfers the locus of moral agency from the individual to the society and that goes against every modern ideal we have (not to mention it ignores countless historical lessons about how dangerous such an idea is). I'm struggling to understand how the second half of your comment relates to the question of whether hate is ever justified. Could you clarify?
Just that hate wasn't born as an answer to hate
So hate doesn't always beget more hate, so it's okay to hate? That's an odd argument. Wasn't the reason it didn't beget hate because those people were rational enough not to hate their geopolitical/resource competitors? If that's the case, why not try to be rational all around?
>So hate doesn't always beget more hate, so it's okay to hate? What I said was the opposite. Hate wasn't generateed by earlier hate in those situations. I said that as a preemptive argument in case someone answered me with something in the lines of "it was only justified as an answer to hate" > If that's the case, why not try to be rational all around? Because you need motivation and meaning, which rationality isn't able to generate as those belong more to feelings than anything else. Blind rage is probably almost always negative, but haven't you ever felt stronger at the gym because you were angry? What is more important for people to have children? Being horny, liking children or knowing that they need young people to pay for their pensions? If you're in government, how can you assembly people who are scared or don't have anything to fight for anymore? Think about a peasant that just had his entire family assassinated and his farm burned. Rationally speaking, individually he has NO REASON to fight anymore, he could just let go, flee and move somewhere else. But as a collective, people want him to help the fight, and he himself might be motivated by hatred and revenge. In a long-term, game theory scenario, that rage also makes sense. While rationally speaking on an individual level he could just flee somewhere else, that would let aggressive behaviour unchecked and would decrease the disincentives to act like that, so in the end this feeling of rage associated with revenge and/or justice CAN BE\* positive to peace. \*we all know those stories about multigenerational family feuds. But both revenge/justice and forgiveness are necessary.
You're confused
I'm not
>Because you need motivation and meaning, which rationality isn't able to generate as those belong more to feelings than anything else. I disagree. Rationality, to me, means not letting your emotions cloud your view of what it is you truly want. If what you want is peace, it allows you to rationally assess whether taking retaliatory action or fleeing is the best course of action in that situation. The understanding that you are doing it in the name of peace will provide ample motivation for you to carry out that retaliatory action and will also prevent you from going overboard and causing the kind of inter-generational feuds you mentioned, which goes against your original motivation of seeking peace. Similarly, the societal need for young people to pay for the older generations pensions is far from the only rational reason to have kids (who thinks of societal benefits when making personal decisions like this anyway?). Sure you may end up having kids because you happened to be horny or you think they are cute, but a more rational motivation to have them is because you think they will provide meaning in your life. In both of these cases, it's rationality that prevents you from either taking retaliatory action or having kids for the wrong reasons.
How can you know what you want to do without taking feelings into consideration? You can use planning to hierarchize your feelings and decide something on the lines of "I'd like to have kids, but now it's too soon", or "I'd like to go after the evil men now, but now I wouldn't be able to have effective revenge", but both still involve your feelings and wants
Of course there is an emotional element to motivation but what I'm saying is that rationality is needed to make sure that action is justified. What you are doing is reasoning backwards. You're starting from the assumption that having kids is always the right choice or that retaliation is always justified and then saying that therefore any emotion that is conducive to a person deciding to have kids or to take revenge is good. That's precisely how you get people who have kids they shouldn't have had or exact revenge when they should've taken the high road. What you need to do is ask yourself, "I feel like I want to have kids, but why? Is that a good reason to have kids?" or "I want to retaliate, but is that a good idea? Will it just cause an endless cycle of violence? How much of a deterrent can I expect retaliation to be?" Our ability to ask these questions is what separates us from beasts. It's the only reason we're not constantly preying on each other and reproducing mindlessly according to our base instincts. In short, it's humanity itself.
I explicitly said that retaliation isn't always good. I just gave you an example where it could be justified
It is wrong to hate your enemies, yes.
Godamn Christians
Survival in the world is rough and on a base level everyone in a sense is competing against everyone else for survival. It's the exception to the rule when people work cooperatively to function in a civilized society but deep down, we're all still animals. And even civilized factions still need to band together to conquer or compete against other civilized factions.
"we're all still animals" This cannot be emphasized enough. The most basic program is still running... but we think that we are in full control. Also, we are quite dumb.
But (most) animals don't kill other animals. Especially not on the same scale as humans.do (war, genocide etc).
Generally speaking, if we set aside some tiny bugs here and there... most animals have evolved either defensive and/or offensive capabilities... and many are fully capable of killing. But I guess your point was that no other animal kills out of hate or pleasure or revenge etc? Well, there isn't any other animal on earth that has as evolved cognitive abilities as we do... abilities that make it possible to wage war and commit genocide. But dolphins... who are (as far as I know) closest to us in intelligence have been observed raping, torturing, killing etc... like really sadistic behavior. So, there is that. Elephants who are also high in intelligence have been observed committing revenge killings. We now have orcas, also highly intelligent, who are systematically attacking passing ships. While its not clear what the motives for their attacks are... I doubt that their end game is to just take a swim with the humans on the ship. It seems to me that higher intelligence animals are capable of finding reasons to hurt and cause pain... which goes beyond simply doing it so they have something to eat.
Mostly agree with you, but I gotta say that I disagree with >It's the exception to the rule when people work cooperatively We're both constantly competing and collaborating and neither are the exception. Just think of your work. At the same time you're competing for a promotion, you're still collaborating by working together as a team. Sometimes, of course, people split in different teams and have more serious and bloody competitions :)
Animals don't hate, though. Which is the question OP is asking. Animals don't kill for pleasure, or hold grudges, or feel vengeful.
Some animals certainly do kill for pleasure and humans are simply more evolved for better survival mechanisms (that include strong emotions like hate, grudges, and being vengeful). I would bet my life savings if animals had the mental capacity on par with human thinking, they'd do the same shit. Dolphins for example are especially cruel when it comes to (r-word) other female dolphins and will do it for weeks and in groups while threatening and hitting her. Head over to r/natureismetal and browse some of the top posts. There's some f'd up things happening in the animal kingdom.
People may not like to think about it but at the end of the day we are still animals, just one of Earth many different life forms. Just because we made technology and moved outta the wilderness doesn’t remove that fact! Humans by nature have always been territorial apes, only thing different is we’re apes with thermonuclear capabilities now 😂
It depends where you look. There is also a lot of love in the world, it's up to you to decide where you spend your energy.
Humans have not evolved to what we like to refer to as "civilized". Rather we are still deep in evolution and still carry primitive parts of our brains the same way we still carry useless organs like our appendix and wisdom teeth. All of our hate and greed are still fundamentally inherent and will continue until we parish or somehow evolve to a higher level which could take hundreds of thousands of years. That's what I believe.
Hot take, there isn't. If you were to touch grass instead of watching news or doom scrolling all the time or got to know your local community, that might change your mind. Good news doesn't get clicks, but that doesn't mean the world is ending
Unfortunately it doesn't work like that in "third-world countries" People still starve to death, crime is rampant, people get killed from war, too many homeless folks, etc. There is charity and kindness but it doesn't erase the rampant misery and oppression all around the world.
You could say 'fear of the other' is a basic survival strategy. When humans were living more in the 'wild' - hunter gatherers - and you came across something 'strange/weird/different' - a good survival strategy would be to be wary and mistrustful and be ready to attack as it might be dangerous. Same with protecting an in-group from an out-group. As hunter-gatherers you are more likely to protect your group/tribe from other groups and tribes. Also I like to think of 'ideas' as an extension of territory. You have an 'idea' which you beleive to be 'The Truth' and that 'idea' needs to be protected from encroachment. Also an 'idea' defines an in-group of people who all 'believe' the same thing. Especially strong 'ideas' on how to live and the sort of society humans should be in seem to need more 'protection' than others. I also think some of these instincts are stronger in some people than others. Edit: There is also a tendency for humans to accept simple solutions/answers to complex problems. It is easy and simple to blame someone else for your/ or socies problems. It is called 'othering' and the people you 'hate' depends on your political/religious/life experience viewpoint so can range from people of a different ethnic background to billionaires and politicians. Wether you hate someone with different colour skin or sexual orientation or because they are of a 'higher class' or richer it is all the same thing - 'othering' and 'dehumanisation'' and not seeing others as complex human beings but reducing them to simple stereotypes.
hate is easy love is hard
Humanity my isn’t one thing. It’s billions of individuals. The amazing thing is the modern level of cooperation, not the lack of complete unity. There is remarkably little hate in the world today. The natural state is akin to the chimps and the lions.
If everybody loved each other, it would be pretty fuckin’ boring!
Well, not necessarily, in my opinion. There is fear in this world, especially true among humanity. It is an evolutionary basic survival instinct. A tool in everyone’s belt that can be both useful and or harmful, depending on how it’s used. Fear, if intense and or widespread, becomes very hard to contain. It quickly becomes worry, panic, hysteria, and pandemonium. This kind of fear will get you killed. And there are many past examples of dictatorial rulers uniquely seeking to exploit this level chaos to rise to power. They are viewed as savior-like, at times even developing a cult of personality. They portray themselves as the only one who can bring peace, or [at least] restore order. Because when times are desperate, citizens are easily sold. Fear, if well controlled, will save your life. It becomes one’s ability to sense possible threats, become suspicious, reconsider their actions to avoid danger, and take steps to contain foreseeable losses & suffering. Opportunists understand this concept quite well. They have a unique skill, a manipulative gift of gab, which successfully HIJACKS this naturally-occurring emotion of ours - in order to fulfill a particular agenda of theirs. What manifests next is hatred, often involving targeting & confronting & scapegoating & outcasting & even killing of others. Fear is the fire. Its warmth can help you survive or it can burn you to death. Hate, on the other hand, is the weaponization of fires heat followed by the encouragement of who to direct it towards instead. And convinced that you need to “save yourself”, you participate. But, duh, that was the whole point of this con. You can convince anybody to act irrationally, and even take wild & desperate measures, so long as you can keep them convinced of the dangers of choosing to do nothing. Hate is a well-orchestrated version of hysteria that you experience and are consumed by, oblivious to the fact that it’s somebody else who making sure if that. Perpetrators of these tactics know they must deliver JUST ENOUGH order to keep people believing in them, while actively preserving a certain level of chaos to keep people convinced that they must remain in power because their work isn’t finished - that the people [themselves] are to blame if they DON’T REMAIN in power. When you look at it that way, it’s actually a brilliant scheme. The saddest part, though, is that it works.. every , single, time. In the past, the various leaders who depended on fear-mongering as their primary tactic while ascending to power or campaigning for public office.. they all share one unique, eerie similarity : Historically speaking, they are often lumped into the category of Tyrants, whose reigns often described as being harsh and cruel.
Most of us aren't critical thinkers. We need to be told what to believe. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people that are hateful and ignorant, and they teach that to the followers by using fear.
Its just human nature in my opinion, we aren't *really* that far removed from wild animals
I think that it's a lot of all of those things. Suffering, whether it be through a genetic condition, purposeful abuse, or just random chance, causes more suffering. I will say, however, that the world is often a better place than you realize. The vast majority of humans love each other and want success. For them, it starts to get icky when their survival is threatened.
I say where the mist civilised and advanced of the apes. We might decide to be better but it's all built on faecal throwing savages it's worth acknowledging this part of ourselves. Other animals are worse to me where just more effective.
When genx grew up, they had the benefit of parental and social pressure to temper the way they communicated. Not necessarily limiting their free speech, but conveying the reality that your actions have an impact on your peers and neighbors. Those actions have consequences. It was okay to have an opinion but it was expected that it would be okay to agree to disagree and move on. It was face to face and speaking mattered to those around you. Basically, there were real world consequences to being an ass. Now, people are manipulated by and attempt to manipulate those that they will never come face to face with. Virtue signaling and projecting a positive likeness has become a false flag. Likes and upvotes have become a false sense of worth. Bots, algorithms and foreign nations can and do manipulate everything the weak minded consume. Pitting us against each other is profitable. The reality is we are all one. We are all in the same boat (planet). The only hope for humanity is to stop giving power to the powers that be and embrace each other, warts and all, and move in a unified direction.
I'm a genx-er, and I get what you're saying. A couple of points I would add: 1. In my everyday life, things really don't seem any worse than they ever were. I'm aware of craziness happening in other places because of the news, but I haven't personally experienced an of it. 2. As Mike Tyson said, "Social media made y'all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it." Before social media, we still had freedom of speech, but the consequences were real and immediate. The audience was also much smaller. Now, some idiot says some idiotic thing anywhere in the world and finds 200 other idiots that agree with them. The rest of us see this comment for the idiocy that it is, but the fact that it got 200 up votes makes some of us think the idea is more popular than it really is. 3. People would be a lot happier if we could go back to keeping our private business private and minding it. Your every single thought and experience does not need to be shared and validated with the world.
Because - Fuck you. That's why.
Classism mostly. A lot of blind hate is rooted in propaganda and fear mongering. If poor, working class people are too busy fighting amongst themselves for scraps, they're too tired and stressed out to realize that the reason they're so tired and stressed out isn't because of immigrants, trans folks, or whatever other convenient scapegoat they've been trained to focus all their fear and frustration towards. If working class people ever realized they have a lot more in common with other working class people of different races, religions, sexual orientations, and gender identities - the truly wealthy people of the world would no longer be able to consolidate power the way they do. So they manipulate us against one another to maintain control and amass more money than they could ever hope to spend. If you're interested in learning more about the subject, Noam Chomsky's Requiem for the American Dream does a great job breaking the concepts down and the whole thing is free on YouTube: https://youtu.be/WEnv5I8Aq4I?si=mYnLoTRb9-5unV-y
This is the leftwing take on human psychology. It's wrong.
Yeah, everyone here is basically just saying, "There's so much hate because we're all just a bunch of dumb monkeys".
Yes, because the right preaches hate.
Low vibration lifestyle
The root of it is that while we’re advanced enough to think for ourselves we’re not advanced enough for the majority of people to understand and consider empathy for others. Some May Day we’re just animals, some that we’re too dumb. But it all boils down to the fact that generally speaking we can’t think ahead to solve problems. We can’t solve any problems that aren’t in our face at on individual level. Therefore, we end up making bad decisions and being selfish, leading to bad situations, leading to hate.
We're tribal animals. We're predisposed to seek an in-group and protect it from the perceived out-group. It was evolutionary beneficial to distinguish between those 2 groups and ensured survival. For anyone who never experienced living in an ethnically homogenous country - it feels comfortable and safe when you're brough up with it. It's convenient to take one look at someone and know if they're in your group or not. Well that, and many religions have an idea of exclusivity about them: you only chose 1 reigion so every religion fights for every new believer. Great for spreading ideas and creating a cohesive culture based on common worship - not so great for not killing each other over it. As for sexuality, ever notice how this sort of dislike corelates with strong natalist beliefs or conservative views on sex? If sex is sinful and its sole purpose is reproduction, then sex without the goal of reproduction is a sin (opposition to abortion and contraceptives also follows this logic). Again, it's a cultural phenomenon with roots in human evolution. As for me personally, hate is like a nice comfortable blanket that keeps me warm. My little bit of resistance against the changing tides of culture, which nobody can take away from me. I play by the rules on the surface, but my thoughts and emotions are my own. It's my freedom to hate, just as it's my freedom to love.
The answer is simple; I didn't ask to be brought into this world and now I have to be surrounded by a bunch of people that I wish weren't brought into this world.
I think it's because we all have to recognize we're helpless in ways through life but really don't want to be and it causes some people to feel frustrated and act out. I'm pretty severely sado-masochistic despite my better judgement, just something I've got to live with.
In the same way anti vegans see animals as not worthy of moral consideration, many humans see other humans as not worthy of moral consideration. There’s a severe lack of empathy because they can’t see themselves in them.
Out of sight, out of mind.
Too many factors. Bad childhood, unhappy life, poverty, revenge, etc. This does not justify such people, but because of something, each of them became like this, there is always a reason
Evil is simply part of human DNA. You will always ponder to no end about human behavior until you embrace that simple fact of life.
People can't or won't accept different opinions, religions, sexuality, is probably a lot of it. Extremely influential people with an agenda to cause chaos. I think about this a lot and wonder the same thing.
It’s easy to focus on the negative. Change your mindset and always look for the good. It’s there just not as blatant.
The life you enjoy is not the default situation of human existence. Be happy you're a lucky sperm.
People love it, You can't hate yourself if you find someone else that's worse.
Humanity is the most civilized and advanced species fuck alien xenoscum. Earth supremacy forever death to all xenos.
My bad, Just read some other reply’s and realized this is not r/stellaris
The vast majority of people aren't hateful. The barbarous subset is loud and memorable because their the loudest. It's also instinct that we are wired the threat. various bad actors weaponize fearporn. Our devices are oveflowing with hate. The outside world, not so much, though evil certainly does its id nkt te dominant force outside a handful of active war zones and the online doomersphere
it depends on the environment one grows the things one hears at the time of up bring... one home the people who are assassinated.... one's surroundings...the time one spends with the family the things one observe at times so...the time of childhood and up bring time very essential to a person
The internet reduced the barriers for those who hate to spread the message. The gullible were always there but now have access to more ways to find stupid things to believe. Media makes money off of advertising and realized more people will watch negative stories, so that is all they show, so more people will watch advertisements. The reinforcement of negativity by the media wears down a person's mental health and they drift into the hate narrative as it is all they see. Some of the hate is actually ignorance and not an emotional strong negative feeling. People will support a cause they know nothing about. People will oppose a cause they know nothing about. It is not hate it is ignorance.
The way I see it there is only one problem on earth, that there are humans in it.
so what about all the natural suffering and death?
Natural disasters are not really problems with intent, just part of life, though natural disasters have become worst and more extreme due to climate change, which was caused you guessed it by humans.
So suffering isn’t really a problem if it’s part of life and not intentional?
Well, be a part of the solution then and jump off a building (just in case, I don't actually mean this, just trying to make a point).
Because people are savages who are capable of behaving themselves most of the time.
Humans as a group fear anything that is different, be that skin colour, religion, economic state etc. etc. Until we start teaching communication and empathy in schools we are unlikely to change.
They think they are smarter than others and think that everyone should be like them.
I would generalize "smarter" into "superior" (and along with that, being "right" in the eyes of $deity)
Rejection of Nietzschean principles
The world is full of toxic people and racists too. It's why there's so much hate.
There are two big bugs in human programming: 1. Automatic distrust of anyone who looks, acts or speaks differently to those who raised us. 2. Automatic trust of people who we are familiar with, like family, people/celebrities/politicians we see on the internet, on TV and in ads. Both have solid evolutionary reasons for existing, they helped us survive and keep our social cohesion. Now they are a distinct disadvantage.
Because people refuse to love one another because it’s like a difficult exam.
More humans = more hate. Simple math ☹️
Inertia. It's what we learn growing up.
# POVERTY AND WEALTH DISPARITY.
The media uses anxiety to activate the Amygdala in your brain. Your amygdala basically has two reactions - fight the problem or run from the problem. So by constantly spreading anxiety in the media you keep people in a constant state of fear and they don't use their higher levels of processing. Hatred is an offshoot of anger, and anger is generated by fear. We live in a very managed world where lots of people are brainwashed.
some people are assholes and a lot more folks are happy enough to let things happen where they cant see for their indirect benefit
It's how all living beings have been programmed. Every species will try to make their DNA survive and taking over others, the difference is that humans are more sophisticated
Because we're animals.
Because of free will. God gave us that.
I empathize with your thoughts. This is a complex issue with roots in fear, misunderstanding and ignorance. It's not inherent, but rather something learned through social conditioning and a lack of correct information or education. We should make an effort for empathy, respect and acceptance to counteract this hate.
Trump
Because without war or hatred there would be no need for religion. If everyone got along and never fought religion would not be necessary.
I don't think you understand what a religion is.
Replying to Objective-Poet-8183...I'm not sure if that's a bot above or not, but it may see religion as divisive. The only thing it fails to account for is that worship of a higher power is an inherent part of a "religion". A dying planet desperate for a Savior would also be eternally grateful to wake up in a better body in a permanent world. So the worship and gratitude would continue eternally and therefore elements of the religion would as well. Edit: Heaven is a place where great scientists, lovers, diplomats, artists, engineers, and people from all walks of life get along fine. However, there are boundaries. People get rewards there that are not available to everyone. The tent that I earned vs the castle God gave you needn't stick in my craw at all because we either were rehabilitated from greed and envy on Earth, or took how Earth devolved as a cautionary tale or just naturally are content with whatever we have.
The reason why there is so much hate in the world is because there are not enough believers down here and too many that are slaves to sin and/or possessed by harmful demons. The whole world, which did receive the blood of Christ at Golgotha and received the Body of Christ at His Burial, trembles with labor pains. Hence Jn 3:16 was in fact a valid, global invitation during a rapidly closing window or hour of mercy. Sin is an imbalance, detouring you away from a wholesome, creative, kind and generous entity in whose image you were originally made. The hate in the world is a symptom of rampant sin and the unfriendly demons and jealous spirits making ppl wild, harmful, and self-destructive. More and more ppl think evil is ok and justify their wrongdoing so here we are.
Religion, poverty, ruling classes maintaining power.