compassion
Feb. 6th, 2005 07:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threeplusfireThe one thing I struggle with more than anything else in my life is remembering compassion for all people. Even those people who are hateful, self righteous monsters.
There are more than 600 comments on Cate's post. The number of people sharing their stories is amazing, as are the number of people who want to share her words with support groups and communities. So many people have been touched by one LJ post out of millions. Her message is so powerful that it is rippling out into the world, inspiring other posts and words and providing comfort out in the wide blue world. Here I am, writing a post.
I will never forget when the redneck kids busted out the windows of Casey's van when he wrote an editorial on tolerance. It never made any sense to me.
With anything that gets passed around on LJ, there are a few trolls. Given the subject being discussed, I'm surprised there aren't more trolls. I thought about listing their names here, but I suppose I really shouldn't court a flame war in the journals. The first one just made me laugh, because it was shouting "I don't believe this could happen cause it sounds unbelievable to me, I don't like the way you write therefore you must be an attention whore!" It was so absurd.
The next one was one of those pathetic creatures who claims to be "saved" and wants to tell us what awful people we are. I have an enormous difficulty taking people seriously when they profess to follow Christian teachings and then spout bigotry and hate out of the other side of their mouth. I hardly think such shameful two-faced behaviour can be considered Christian. Christ taught love and he gave his love to everyone, from his mother to Mary Magdalene. To see narrow minded people pervert his teachings and use them to justify some of the most incredible examples of hatred is just mind boggling.
Then there was the person who said, "I wish you had aborted your son." Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? First off, who thinks saying something like this is ever a good idea? Are there truly people out there who are so hateful and disgusting that they would rather see you dead than gay? Why yes, Virginia, sadly they do exist.
Here is my struggle. I wish I had some unlimited reserves of Christ-like compassion for all people. I wish I could be that generous. But I'm not. I am only human, and full of human frailty. I struggle not to hate these people, I struggle to remember that somewhere deep down in their twisted core that they too are human beings. It is so hard for me. I want to push them into a hole and put bullets in their skulls so the hate doesn't have a chance to breed and spread. I want to make sure they don't get the chance to poison their children with their corrupt hearts. I want to ship them all into the sun, so their evil can't continue. God help me, I would shoot them all if I thought I could make a difference. But then would the evil be in me, for not seeing them as human? In viewing them as monsters to be destroyed, do I make the same mistake that they do? I don't know. It's that puzzle about using the weapons of the enemy.
I try to consider them somewhat human. I try. I do not always succeed. I am not always a good person. I make the effort though, for what it is worth.
There are more than 600 comments on Cate's post. The number of people sharing their stories is amazing, as are the number of people who want to share her words with support groups and communities. So many people have been touched by one LJ post out of millions. Her message is so powerful that it is rippling out into the world, inspiring other posts and words and providing comfort out in the wide blue world. Here I am, writing a post.
I will never forget when the redneck kids busted out the windows of Casey's van when he wrote an editorial on tolerance. It never made any sense to me.
With anything that gets passed around on LJ, there are a few trolls. Given the subject being discussed, I'm surprised there aren't more trolls. I thought about listing their names here, but I suppose I really shouldn't court a flame war in the journals. The first one just made me laugh, because it was shouting "I don't believe this could happen cause it sounds unbelievable to me, I don't like the way you write therefore you must be an attention whore!" It was so absurd.
The next one was one of those pathetic creatures who claims to be "saved" and wants to tell us what awful people we are. I have an enormous difficulty taking people seriously when they profess to follow Christian teachings and then spout bigotry and hate out of the other side of their mouth. I hardly think such shameful two-faced behaviour can be considered Christian. Christ taught love and he gave his love to everyone, from his mother to Mary Magdalene. To see narrow minded people pervert his teachings and use them to justify some of the most incredible examples of hatred is just mind boggling.
Then there was the person who said, "I wish you had aborted your son." Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? First off, who thinks saying something like this is ever a good idea? Are there truly people out there who are so hateful and disgusting that they would rather see you dead than gay? Why yes, Virginia, sadly they do exist.
Here is my struggle. I wish I had some unlimited reserves of Christ-like compassion for all people. I wish I could be that generous. But I'm not. I am only human, and full of human frailty. I struggle not to hate these people, I struggle to remember that somewhere deep down in their twisted core that they too are human beings. It is so hard for me. I want to push them into a hole and put bullets in their skulls so the hate doesn't have a chance to breed and spread. I want to make sure they don't get the chance to poison their children with their corrupt hearts. I want to ship them all into the sun, so their evil can't continue. God help me, I would shoot them all if I thought I could make a difference. But then would the evil be in me, for not seeing them as human? In viewing them as monsters to be destroyed, do I make the same mistake that they do? I don't know. It's that puzzle about using the weapons of the enemy.
I try to consider them somewhat human. I try. I do not always succeed. I am not always a good person. I make the effort though, for what it is worth.
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no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:16 pm (UTC)What a horrible, horrible thing to say to someone who's only trying to love their child.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:33 pm (UTC)Still, it's frustrating that they can't just keep their idiotic opinioins to themselves.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:40 pm (UTC)I would dearly love to crack those people with a baseball bat so they couldn't be asses in her journal. Argh.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:36 pm (UTC)And I--and this isn't bragging, just fact-stating--used to try a lot harder at doing that, and I simply don't anymore. It's a war now, one that they started, and my compassion tank is running on empty.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 05:41 pm (UTC)Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 06:20 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 06:23 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 06:34 pm (UTC)And I'd be up for a state to co-mingle, preferably somewhere with good ventilation so both factions can be comfortable. How about Arizona? :P
Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 06:44 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 07:04 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 07:07 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 07:16 pm (UTC)Can I also have all the band boys and Britain?
Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 08:34 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-06 08:40 pm (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-07 11:35 am (UTC)Re: Heh
Date: 2005-02-07 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 06:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 08:37 pm (UTC)I thank you, very much.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-07 09:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 07:24 pm (UTC)i wish there was a way to stop the poison of hate. i guess the only thing we can really try to do is to try to save our own hearts from it.
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 08:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 11:20 pm (UTC)Even as I try to crank out a 45-minute-long electroinc piece-cum-indictment of the hypocrisy and inconsistency of belief systems gone amok, I wonder how much I become one of the people I see as less-human... If by creating an aural commentary on the prison-like blinded view some people adopt as their "religion" I haven't myself put on blinders...
no subject
Date: 2005-02-07 06:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-07 09:10 am (UTC)***"I have an enormous difficulty taking people seriously when they profess to follow Christian teachings and then spout bigotry and hate out of the other side of their mouth. I hardly think such shameful two-faced behaviour can be considered Christian."***
I really try not to be to cynical but the flock only learned for the shepherds; the church has skewed the concepts that Jesus supposedly preached. It started as early as only a few years after his death and will sadly continue on.
Thanks for linking her LJ… I will have to read more.