5 ms·

Hate (like love) is not an emotion, but an act of will.

echelon 3y ago
> Hate (like love) is not an emotion, but an act of will. Like cheering for a football team. The memetic encoding of who our political friends and foes are is just like a football rivalry. It's self-reinforcing and thrives on conflict and escalation. Here's a mental picture of two different people: - blue haired, sex-positive, polyamorous, anti-capitalist trans activist - wife beater-wearing hillbilly wearing a cross; "don't tread on me" bumper stickers; gun owner If you formed an association with these two and painted one of them as "unpleasant", then the virus lives inside you. It's going to take a lot of hard work (and money) to climb out of this pit. And because of the difficulty, it's unlikely to change anytime soon. (I don't know if we can do it.)
- mbork_pl 3y ago
  I have no idea how this is relevant to my comment.
brabel 3y ago
So you think you can choose rationally who you love (or hate)?
- bt4u 3y ago
  [dead]
- mbork_pl 3y ago
  Well, of course I can! Isn't that obvious? That's how love (and hate) work. That said, I can also choose irrationally. But the point - that I can choose - still stands.
  - brabel 3y ago
    But you're so wrong. Emotions are the opposite of rational. You have much less control over your own actions than you realize, and definitely very little over your feelings. If that were not the case, depression would just not exist. Read up on neuroscience. It may open your eyes to the reality of being human. Some articles to get started: https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/unconscious-branding/202012/our-brains-make-our-minds-we-know-it https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/unconscious-brandi... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will
    - mbork_pl 3y ago
      > Emotions are the opposite of rational. Of course. (If not "the opposite", at least they are not rational.) But - again - neither love or hate are emotions. They are decisions. Of course, they may be made irrationally (like many others) or under the influence of emotions (like many others), and a lot of things other than emotions and rational analysis may influence these decisions (like many others) to some degree. But that is beside the point.
teo_zero 3y ago
You should find another word, then. Because "hate" is still an emotion in my dictionary.
- akomtu 3y ago
  GP is right, though. Love and hatred are the two manifestations of the will: the will to create and the will to destroy. When you see a scary spider near you, that first impulse is the will to destroy. By the time the pure will reaches your motor neurons, it creates a lot of secondary effects, such as emotions. That's why there's a saying that desire is a weak will.
  - teo_zero 3y ago
    You might be right. However I don't see anything wrong if I feel a will to destroy something and I resist it, so that no harm comes from my hatred. Hatred by itself is not necessarily something to condemn. Therefore "hate speech" is a poor approximation of its commonly intended meaning, that is "speech aimed at acting (violently) against the object of one's hatred".
    - mbork_pl 3y ago
      Mostly agreed. > I don't see anything wrong if I feel a will to destroy something and I resist it, so that no harm comes from my hatred. Agreed. One nitpick: "harm" may also be e.g. psychological self-harm. In my mother tongue, when you willingly sustain your hate, we say that you "feed hate" - it is a very wise intuition, I think. And in my dictionary, "hatred" is always something to condemn - but OTOH, there is a vast difference between "emotional impulse" and "conscious will"... In other words, the words "feel" and "will" don't go together. To paraphrase EWD, you can no more "feel the will" than a submarine can swim;-). (Not a 100% correct analogy, but I couldn't resist.) (For the sake of completeness: I'm not sure if I agree with the create/destroy distinction.)

> Hate (like love) is not an emotion, but an act of will. Like cheering for a football team. The memetic encoding of who our political friends and foes are is just like a football rivalry. It's self-reinforcing and thrives on conflict and escalation. Here's a mental picture of two different people: - blue haired, sex-positive, polyamorous, anti-capitalist trans activist - wife beater-wearing hillbilly wearing a cross; "don't tread on me" bumper stickers; gun owner If you formed an association with these two and painted one of them as "unpleasant", then the virus lives inside you. It's going to take a lot of hard work (and money) to climb out of this pit. And because of the difficulty, it's unlikely to change anytime soon. (I don't know if we can do it.)

mbork_pl 3y ago
I have no idea how this is relevant to my comment.

brabel 3y ago

So you think you can choose rationally who you love (or hate)?

bt4u 3y ago
[dead]
mbork_pl 3y ago
Well, of course I can! Isn't that obvious? That's how love (and hate) work. That said, I can also choose irrationally. But the point - that I can choose - still stands.
- brabel 3y ago
  But you're so wrong. Emotions are the opposite of rational. You have much less control over your own actions than you realize, and definitely very little over your feelings. If that were not the case, depression would just not exist. Read up on neuroscience. It may open your eyes to the reality of being human. Some articles to get started: https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/unconscious-branding/202012/our-brains-make-our-minds-we-know-it https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/unconscious-brandi... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will
  - mbork_pl 3y ago
    > Emotions are the opposite of rational. Of course. (If not "the opposite", at least they are not rational.) But - again - neither love or hate are emotions. They are decisions. Of course, they may be made irrationally (like many others) or under the influence of emotions (like many others), and a lot of things other than emotions and rational analysis may influence these decisions (like many others) to some degree. But that is beside the point.

teo_zero 3y ago

You should find another word, then. Because "hate" is still an emotion in my dictionary.

akomtu 3y ago
GP is right, though. Love and hatred are the two manifestations of the will: the will to create and the will to destroy. When you see a scary spider near you, that first impulse is the will to destroy. By the time the pure will reaches your motor neurons, it creates a lot of secondary effects, such as emotions. That's why there's a saying that desire is a weak will.
- teo_zero 3y ago
  You might be right. However I don't see anything wrong if I feel a will to destroy something and I resist it, so that no harm comes from my hatred. Hatred by itself is not necessarily something to condemn. Therefore "hate speech" is a poor approximation of its commonly intended meaning, that is "speech aimed at acting (violently) against the object of one's hatred".
  - mbork_pl 3y ago
    Mostly agreed. > I don't see anything wrong if I feel a will to destroy something and I resist it, so that no harm comes from my hatred. Agreed. One nitpick: "harm" may also be e.g. psychological self-harm. In my mother tongue, when you willingly sustain your hate, we say that you "feed hate" - it is a very wise intuition, I think. And in my dictionary, "hatred" is always something to condemn - but OTOH, there is a vast difference between "emotional impulse" and "conscious will"... In other words, the words "feel" and "will" don't go together. To paraphrase EWD, you can no more "feel the will" than a submarine can swim;-). (Not a 100% correct analogy, but I couldn't resist.) (For the sake of completeness: I'm not sure if I agree with the create/destroy distinction.)