Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Hate

I was horrified this morning when I learned that a hate group picked our local high school for one of their demonstrations. When my daughter dropped her kids off at school this morning there was a group of people exercising their freedom of speech by carrying hateful signs. My grandchildren and all the other kids were greeted with signs that were horrid. They said things like;

"God hates you" "God hates Obama" "God hates fags" "America is doomed" "God loves dead soldiers" and “God hates football, the devil's sport.”

These signs were carried by some crazies from Kansas who were inspired to pick our school after a young football player collapsed and died while running during an off-season workout. This was apparently a punishment from God because football is evil.

I felt contaminated just knowing these hate mongers were present in my town. I know hate groups exist, but this is the closest they have been to me. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center there were 926 active hate groups in the US in 2009, 13 of them are in my own state of Maryland. Most of them are some sort of white supremest group, a few are black supremest and a few are Islamic supremest group. The group that demonstrated at our high school was listed as a general hatred group.

The police kept the demonstrators and all others apart. There were no major incidents and the hatemongers left shortly after school started.

How do people get so filled with hate? Is there any way to teach love and tolerance to these folks? I just don't understand. Is there anything we can or should do that would lessen the hatred?

“God is Love.”

7 comments:

Sling said...

now I feel like I need to take a shower.
I wish I could tell you where these people come from,and how they got that way,but it's beyond my ability to understand.

Maureen said...

I take comfort in the fact that I don't understand them. God does not hate but I'm sure they made him sad.

Linda said...

I had no idea. It makes me queasy to think they were so close.

I had a yoga teacher that had us send love to the infamous sniper here a few years ago. At first it seemed insane... til she explained that the only thing to conquer hate is love. So now, I will protect myself by sending love.. becoming an instrument of peace, however small.

Let's pray they find what they need, not what they are looking for.

Random Thinker said...

"general hate group" Wow. What a concept, just generally hating everything. I don't get it. Sorry your grandkids were exposed to it.

rosemary said...

I'm with sling...not actually in the shower, but figuratively....makes me feel icky to read about stuff like this. Our part of North Idaho was known for harboring hate groups and they finally are looking to move....sadly no one wants them either.

Miss Healthypants said...

Wow, that's terrible! I'm sorry to hear about this...but I agree with YoLinna--I think the only way to conquer hate is to love. We have to send love and pray for these people, our enemies--as Jesus said we should.

Their behavior is revolting, though. We just have to keep praying that they will wake up and realize how very wrong they are.

Middle Child said...

My mum used to say when I asked her over and over why some people do rotten things...she'd say they were just ignorant...and to ignore them ...that was her way...I was a less peaceful person...