If you’ve been paying attention to the world this past week, you’ll know that in response to a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States President Donald Trump blamed violence on both the white supremacists and neo-Nazis as well as those who opposed them, stating, “you had a group on one side that was bad, and you had a group on the other side that was also very violent.”
The problem here is that we are automatically chalking up violence as inherently “bad”, as Trump compared them. However, if you look at the reality of the situation, the so called alt-right were chanting Nazi phrases and white supremacist rhetoric, and used violence to spread a message of hate, whereas Trump’s “alt-left” used violence as a defensive measure and to show that hate founded on nothing but weak ego and the necessity of a scapegoat for America’s problems is not a value to be tolerated or condoned by not only citizens of America, but the people of this world.
When we act as though the people fighting against Nazis and white supremacists are just as bad because they use violence, we are allowing hateful rhetoric to fester in our country. We make it out like a person can only be good if they use intellect and peace to make their point, but people spewing hate shove peace to the side, they laugh at the notion. If hateful people can use the argument that the other side was being violent too to excuse their actions, and people will accept it, we can no longer kid ourselves that America is a safe haven, a land of the free. We are a land of hate, resentment, and hypocrisy, we have been for a long time, and when we open our eyes to recognize this fact, we can do something to change it. We can make the world a better place, we can truly become a land that supports everyone. Too many people refuse to acknowledge the reality of the situation. People are allowed to hate those who want them dead, and using violence to defend oneself should not be seen in a negative light.
Tell me, give me one solid, factual argument, why in the 1940s, a time when segregation was still legal and enforced in America and Jewish refugees weren’t even allowed into the country, to fight Nazis, to beat and kill them, was not only celebrated but was the height of patriotism, but now, in 2017, when we are supposed to be a “progressed”, “first world” country, to fight Nazis is condemned by our president. Tell me why Americans loathe to acknowledge the fact that our country is a list of human rights violations a mile long, yet we so vehemently fight problems that aren’t ours in countries that never asked for our help. Tell me why violence is only acceptable when it is off our soil — when it is used to destroy the things we don’t like.
I’ll tell you something, violence to destroy rather than to protect is a coward’s way out. Showing force and influence by killing or expressing the ability to kill totally innocent people is disgusting, horrible cowardice towards the fact that things change, the fact that who we are is not who the world is. This planet is full of strange, wonderful, unique people who are so different in so many beautiful ways, who worship their god because they love him, who celebrate their ethnic background and culture because it’s empowering, and who do so to find joy in life.
If everyone in the world were exactly like you, if no one was any different, there would be no life, no joy on the planet. No wonderment to learn about cultures unlike yours, no enthralling curiosity to participate in something new because nothing will ever be new. The world is not meant to harbor one brand of person, humans are not meant to be worth more than other humans, than other creatures on this earth. Life is too short to spend it trying to tear people down to make yourself feel better. Explore, create, learn, make yourself a better person, follow your passions, and do so to make yourself happy, not to ruin the lives of people who have done nothing to deserve your anger.
