The Policies of Hate

Hiding behind the virtual world

There seems to be an endless battle being played out in the world today. Well there are, actually, real wars, across the nations, images and sounds that have been horrific and heart-breaking. We have seen and we have heard enough especially this past year.

We don’t have to travel far to know and hear of mindless violence or even the threat of it. Every country and every region in the world today carries with it a sense of unease. Like the wispy threads of mists on a foggy morning, the tentacles of fear, of violence, hovers silently, somewhere within the shadows. I do not believe any other time or era would have witnessed such acts of violence than the one we live in today.

But the one I’m talking about? It’s the one that does not involve bombs and guns and bullets. To some it might seem harmless even, since all it involves are words; words typed across a white screen, on the various social media posts that flood our online world.

Not so very long ago, and gosh, saying that makes me feel infinitesimally ancient, people aired their grievances the old fashioned way, face to face. If you didn’t like what was said, you said so right in front of them. It wasn’t pretty I can give you that and sometimes it ended up with a fist fight or two but more often than not, the matter ended there.

Nowadays it is a whole different ball game altogether. Somehow the white screen gives rise to impudence and the security of not having to actually face a person, a greater boldness to be downright vicious, spiteful and malicious.

In reality if someone actually said what they wrote, the matter would probably not end in just a fist fight. As they say, there will be blood. But blood there is, not in the person writing the vitriol but in the person who is being targeted.

Too often we read of people, mostly young children who have ended their lives tragically because they just could not take it anymore. The endless spewing of hatred and loathing and just plain evil from that one and often times many, that spill out on to one hapless person is sheer in its blatant disregard. Devoid of compassion, of any form of civility these words reflect truly the person within, a bestial sub human at its worst.

Sadly though, the recipient sees otherwise, feels otherwise. And it is the victim that suffers rather than the perpetrator. But the world as we know it has changed. What is good is deemed weak. Foolish even. And the evil? It is given prime time coverage, more soundbites than needed, importance when none should be given.

But there is still hope. Not the fluffy wispy kind. One that perseveres in the midst of trial, in the face of bigotry and hate. It is evident in the words and many like me who write..

So even though my poem may seem resigned, defeated even, I believe in better, I believe in the good and in the human, the humane.

More later… :)
 

#35 Of Words That Bite..

They say that dogs

When they go mad

Do froth at mouth

The snarl, finality of death

And that every object

Doth inspire fear

The shadows grim

All around like vapid air

And so they must

Be put to sleep

Before they can

Do harm to those they seek

But what of men

That are already so

Stained with, within

The rabid flow

A bite so fierce

Their words, cutting deep

The soul it does rip

Asunder; Pain a sharpened sting!

And so they must

Be put to sleep

Alas! Too late!

He’s cut me deep…

                                                                        ~ Judith Vaddi