Love Or Hate, Which Is The Stronger Unifier?
Which emotion has more power over us, Hate or Love? What unifies us, Hate or Love?
Is hatred a bigger unifier than love?
A story about Kabir comes to mind.
Being exasperated by the heterodoxy that Kabir propounded, both Hindu and Muslim orthodox pundits complained to the Emperor.
Kabir was ordered to attend the court of the Emperor at a specific time.
On arrival, Kabir found all the complainants, staunch Hindus, and Muslims, standing in the same platform enclosure designated for the complainant.
Noticing the warring factions together standing on the same platform, waiting for him to be punished by the Emperor, Kabir was elated. Kabir smiled and, addressing the Emperor, said his objective was to unite Hindus and Muslims. If hatred towards him has unified them so they stand together on the same platform, so be it. He continued, “Imagine, if the realm of your limited power can unite the religions divided by orthodoxy, what can happen in God's court?”
I don’t know the authenticity of the story. But the story raises a very significant aspect of human nature and society. So, the question in my mind is, which is a more significant unifying force in our lives? Love or hate?
So many times, we have seen this in our lives. We have seen that people are more easily united in a negative cause than in something positive. History shows how people love to hate and how hatred toward others can unite people forgetting their differences.
A recent interesting news report in a national newspaper caught my eye. The report says that in Canada’s largest-ever gold and money heist Indian-origin men are involved1. The news intrigued me. On closer reading, I found an interesting fact. If one goes only by the names of the persons involved, it is evident that they or their ancestors are from the Indian subcontinent. The men involved in the heist are not only of Indian origin, but they are true representatives of the Indian heterogeneous religious and cultural diversity. A cursory glance at the list of names of men involved in the heist will prove my point. Amit Jalota, Ammad Chaudhary, Prasath Paramalingam, Simran Preet Panesar, Archit Grover, Arsalan Chaudhary, and Ali Raza are the names of the persons allegedly involved in the heist. Authorities have already arrested a few and are looking for the rest.
This could have been a thrilling crime story suitable for OTT platforms. But there are some intriguing facts hidden in the story. We know how society in India is divided into various factions despite coexisting for millenniums. We are separated by religion, caste, ethnicity, language, culture, and regionalism. Despite the efforts of well-meaning social reformers and leaders, there always seem to be forces that divide us more than unite us. But this might not be an anomaly as we like to think. After all, India as a country consists of so many different nations. India is a political experiment to form one democratic country despite overwhelming diversity.
These men cut across all the religious and regional cultural boundaries and differences to form a team to commit a high-decibel crime. They were all united for a cause where their religious cultural, and regional differences were overlooked to create a cohesive team to accomplish a goal. This is unification not by or for love but for crime.
There is no reason to believe these men are united in hate to carry out this heist. The point I want to make here is that these men, and a vast majority like them, would not have been united for a noble cause requiring love for someone or something.
Hate is a powerful and complex emotion, sometimes stronger than love, and politicians are well aware of it. It is no wonder that politicians, all over the world, in the past and very much at present, pander to hate in public life to unite gullible people for their vested interests.
Hatred is a complex emotion that stems from deep-seated feelings of powerlessness, mistreatment, and vulnerability. When people feel powerless and vulnerable, it is easy to mould them and make them dance to the tune of those with a vested interest.
But the pertinent question here should be, why would men feel powerless and vulnerable?
The sense of vulnerability comes from frequent economic instability that has been the hallmark of our financial conditions since independence. Successive governments consistently failed to provide the necessities to the citizens. Education, healthcare, and job opportunities are systematically ignored. A sense of deprivation is fostered in society to hide the deliberate and systematic robbing of the commonwealth of the citizens. It has been a practice by the politicians to hammer in the thoughts that enough is not available for all because of a class of people who seem to gobble up all the resources. A lie repeated frequently will be considered to be true. This myth of scarce resources is perpetuated among the people so many times that most of us have started to believe it.
In this atmosphere, it is easy for politicians to manipulate the emotions of unsuspecting people and direct them to hate each other. Politicians have fostered hatred among us by creating divisions within our community. We remain united in hate. We have ceased to ask why we are busy hating others. We do not ask why there are not enough job opportunities for us to live a life of dignity. After seventy-seven years of independence, we do not ask why there aren’t good schools in every village and neighbourhood. We do not ask why there is so much inequality in society. We do not ask why people still beg in the streets. We do not ask why children still go to bed hungry. We do not ask why we persecute women in the name of family honour.
Yet we are all united in hating fellow citizens because we are being programmed to hate.
As I write this article, the 18th Lok Sabha election is taking place all over India in seven phases with much pomp and show. It is like a country-wide tamasha, where we all are players, however small and insignificant our role may be. Politicians of all hues and colours representing all the political parties are assaulting us with a barrage of their speeches. None of the speeches made any call for unity for the sake of our nation. None of the speeches talks about the miserable economic condition we are in. They do not mention the high cost of living forcing the middle class to slide down the economic ladder. They do not discuss why a few are getting richer by the day while most are getting poorer. Most speeches focus on fear-mongering rather than presenting positive ideas. Most speeches want us to get united in hating others. None talk about the need to build the future of our nation.
I like to end with the same question I began with in this article. Is hatred a bigger unifier than love?
I do not have any answer.