How Not To Hate Hateful People (Pt 2)

Transforming our resentment into something redemptive

Photo by Uday Mittal on Unsplash

Yesterday we talked about the way our natural anger and grief can grow toxic and become resentment toward people we believe are doing harm in the world, though their actions or their vote or their advocacy or their political and religious affiliations.

Today, I want to suggest a way to reframe the adversarial people in our lives in a way that might help us transform or diffuse that resentment and it isn’t going to be easy.

I’m going to ask you to start with a working assumption that may be challenging.

The working assumption I want you to start with, is that most people are essentially decent; that they are (generally speaking) goodhearted people who don’t want to intentionally harm others, that in the story in their heads they’re trying to do the right thing—even if we disagree vehemently on what the right thing is.

Now, I know the assumption that people are basically decent can be a difficult assumption because we all know… well, people—people who seem to openly challenge that assumption every single day. However, if we can embrace it, then we can see their harmful position, belief, words, actions, politics, or theology­ as something that is hiding or impairing or getting in the way of that goodness. It is an obstacle to that goodness being revealed.

This is isn’t going to mean we excuse or allow or tolerate hateful, discriminatory, violent beliefs or actions—but it means we see these as symptoms, as the ugly side effects of the story they’ve walked through.

For example, imagine a person you know has hostility toward migrants crossing the border that gets expressed in their words or political alignment or legislation they support that you feel are dangerous or offensive or perpetuate stereotypes.

If the person in front of you is essentially good, their harmful position is the result of a lack of some kind.
It’s either the result of intellectual ignorance (a lack of information or knowledge).
It might be the result of a believed lie (a lack of accurate truth).
It could be the result an irrational fear (a lack of emotional security).
It could be the result of an inherited bias or blind spot (a lack of wise people around them).

So, whether that person is in need of information or they’ve believed a lie or they are irrationally fearful or they’ve been taught incorrectly—are any of these realities of their lack punishable?
In other words, are we right to feel punitive toward them or can we feel a measure of sorrow for them.
Are these lacks in their understanding or these deficits in their upbringing grounds for the kind of retribution that resentment often calls for?

Again, I’m not saying any of the people you disagree with’s thoughts or words or actions or beliefs are acceptable, but if we can assume their inherent goodness we can see them firstly as casualties of a bad story.

The issue in resentment isn’t whether or not I agree with someone. That’s almost irrelevant. The question for people of empathy is, how do I express that disagreement and what does it do in my heart toward those I disagree with? Does it yield more kindness?

And here’s the bottom line: if we can agree to the assumption that people are inherently good, then we should honestly want to show them the suffering that they are causing, we should want to inform them of the damage, to reveal to them a blind spot they can’t see, and give their humanity a chance to surface.

So, if a person’s position is based on a lack of information—we do our best to give them information. If their position is based on an irrational fear, we try to assuage that fear. If their position is based on believing a big lie, we want to show them the truth.

An important caveat to this resentment stuff: this obviously doesn’t mean staying in proximity to emotional or physical damage, or remaining in a relationship that is abusive or dangerous. You are never required to endure that for any reason. At that point the disconnection is an act of self-care, self-empathy.

And as difficult as this letting go of resentment stuff is, I’m not asking you to go to a place of forgiveness, either. That is a few steps down the road. This isn’t forgiving (as important and emotionally emancipating as that can be) this is the gateway to that forgiveness, which is recognizing how complex people are, believing that they are essentially decent, and seeing the beliefs or theology or political views that may be causing this conflict between you as barriers to them embracing or reflecting that deeper goodness—and those barriers are about a lack they are experiencing somehwere. Lucky for you, you’ve seen what you’ve seen and know what you know.

If you believe the person you’re in conflict with is at their core a decent human being who is being negatively impacted by a bad story or wrong information, maybe you can let go of the resentment that wants to make them pay and develop some mercy that wants to make them understand.

Like I said, this isn’t easy or painless, but it’s probably necessary.


If you missed part one, check it out here: