There is a remarkable phenomenon I’ve been noticing intermittently for much of my adult life – one which is doubtless well known to serious students of sociology and anthropology but still baffles me.
The vast majority of us, I would think, are good people. Give me five minutes to talk with a small group of people whose language I can speak, and I will likely emerge from it having found a great deal of common ground, and quite possibly with a new Facebook friend or two into the bargain. However, all manner of ills appear to come from larger societal institutions.
I think this is why it is often possible for a person to hate on Republicans or Mormons or Texans, but it is much harder to hate a random Republican or Mormon or Texan should you happen to find yourself in conversation with them.
So why does this happen? This isn’t my usual rhetorical question, the opening for an internal Socratic monologue, but an actual plea for deep and considered insight from my readership.
Why is it that we can get swept up into such giddying whorls of baseless hatred, if we’re all good people?
That Other Blog, Way Over There 