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Rod Dreher's avatar

A friend says The Bon Op reminds him of the Doctor's speech here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJP9o4BEziI&ab_channel=DoctorWho

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CroneEver's avatar

The trouble with hatred is that it's like resentment: it's drinking poison and believing the other person will die. Plus it doesn't convert anyone who doesn't already have a low boiling point and is looking for someone / something new to rail against. Nobody who needs it has ever been converted or changed by someone yelling at them that they're evil globohomo bugmen (or the equivalent). I have volunteered at the pen for years, and I can guarantee that the one thing that will not work with hardened criminals is to yell at them about what miserable sinners and horrible people they are: they already know that. What they want to hear is that there is still, somehow, some kind of hope, and how to make that happen.

What works is love. "Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use and persecute you." (Matt. 5:43-44) Highly unpopular among a certain set today (such as "The Bon Op" author) but that's the rules - if you believe that Jesus knew what He was talking about and really meant us to do what He said. And it's hard, oh, is it hard. But it's the only thing that works. Not always, and often not in the person's lifetime (see St. Boniface). But that's irrelevant. As long as we're walking the Way, we're doing something worthwhile.

PS - "What happens when all the bugmen have been exterminated, so to speak?" Well, then there will be a new war, with new purges (generally starting with the earliest sign-ons, who have slacked off), because once you start on a hate-fueled quest to purify the world... well, you find out that no society and no one is ever pure enough. Except for the leader. For a while. Because sooner or later, even Robespierre isn't pure enough... Societies built on hate and anger always dead end.

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