What’s the difference between man and “beast”?
Our folklore is rife with tales of monsters, demons and scary myths.
Beau of the Fifth Column had an interesting post on Halloween, on his YouTube channel. He asked what monster typically highlights “the Beast”. He says it’s the Werewolf.
Greek and Nordic myths reference the idea of a werewolf but in the beginning, it was thought to have originated as a punishment. When someone did something bad, they were turned into a werewolf, half human, half animal.
It was a way of rationalizing why a human would do something that could only be attributed to an inhuman, animal-like act. They are not human so let’s make them half animal, the logic went.
Later, that turned into the reason they did horrible things, because they were half animal. The werewolf became the scapegoat.
“Beastliness” is supposedly what separates humans from animals, what makes us ‘higher’ and them ‘lower’.
When you look at things that are happening around the world, often times the rhetoric contains beastly ideas towards those they want to ‘other’. In an attempt to justify beastly actions, they describe the “other” as “animals”, subhuman.
When people are trying to get other people to go along with beastly actions, they use the rhetoric of “they’re animals” in order to justify bombing the hell out of them.
It’s sort of a perfect example of projection, a typical characteristic of a life-taking energy.
Which goes back to the idea of treating people like animals as punishment.
As Beau states it perfectly:
“Those who throw out that rhetoric, those who have the desire to dehumanize others and to other others; those are the ones who end up responsible for the most beastly acts that can be attributed to humanity, and it’s been there since the beginning.
“There’s an evolution. Of course, you have to wonder if those original myths, if they really meant the person was actually turned into an animal or if they were just viewed as one as punishment to other them, to separate them from the rest of the good humans. And you have to ask whether or not the good humans would allow things that are so inhumane to continually occur.”
“Most people aren’t crazy.”
David Doel, The Rational National, takes the Israel/Palestine issue a bit further in a video entitled, One Side is Clearly Wrong.
As he says it, “…it is becoming incredibly tough to both follow and cover this conflict without losing my mind, seeing the amount of people in power… people that have actual power to do something, not even acknowledge that a ceasefire would be a good thing. It’s maddening… there are people all around the world standing up protesting in the streets calling for a ceasefire, calling for the end of the occupation… at least gives me hope that most people aren’t crazy.”
David talks about the “out of whack numbers” when it comes to the death toll in Isreal and Gaza. Half are children.
He talks about slide after slide of before and after pictures of neighborhood after neighborhood completely demolished as the Israeli incursion continues.
According to Save the Children, 3,195 children have been killed in the last three weeks. That more than surpasses annual numbers of children killed in conflict zones since 2019, in three weeks.
“I’m on the side of not bombing children.” David exclaims.
He posts a ‘tweet’ by Dr. Andreas Krieg: “There are no population in Gaza. There are 2.5 million terrorists.”
Israeli media posts a report against a colorful blue background: “Israel Wins, Special Coverage//Iron Swords War”.
On the bottom of the page are four boxes with statistics: +6,082 attacks on Gaza, +17,439 Palestinian wounded, +12,164 structures attacked, (and here’s the kicker) +7,546 terrorists we eliminated.
“That’s how they’re categorizing all civilian deaths, they’re all terrorists.” says David.
Hope
At one point he stops to make a clear distinction.
“It’s important not to conflate the Jewish people with the Israeli government… we can criticize because it is a government. We can criticize any government.
“This is a government that is doing this. This is not on Jewish people. Israel does not equal Jewish people; just like Hammas doesn’t mean Palestinians. So, it’s important to separate the two things because there is a lot of propaganda out there, a lot of misinformation about who represents what.
“It’s very important to note here, we are talking about the Israeli government committing these acts… you have many Jewish human rights groups standing up in support of a ceasefire. In addition to, of course, standing up to end the occupation that is being committed by the Israeli government. So here is an example of some of that hope that I was talking about earlier.”
Then he reads a tweet from ‘Democracy Now’:
“Celebrated Hunter College professor Rosalind Petchesky was arrested at a sit in organized by the Jewish American activists from @jpvlive (Jewish Voice for Peace) in New York City. “I am older than the state of Israel” she told Democracy Now, “that’s why we’re here, to say ‘not in our name’”
“Check this out…” David says. Then he plays the video of a large group sitting on the floor at Grand Central Station. They are all wearing black t-shirts that say ‘not in our name’.
“The Palestinians have been the victims of oppression for 75 years” the professor says to the person holding the Democracy Now mic, “and it has to stop. That’s why we’re here, to say not in our name. I am older than the state of Israel.”
The journalist leans down to tell her, “There are Jewish prayers in the background. The sun is going down and it’s the Jewish Sabbath.”
“It is” the professor replies, “and on Shabbot we have to pray… we have to recommit ourselves to justice. I believe that Judaism and Jewish ethics, this is how I grew up thinking, are about justice and about Rabbi H.’s statement, ‘If I am not for myself, who am I; and if I’m only for me, what am I doing here?’ I gloss over it a little bit. And if not now, when, now, peace now, ceasefire now. President Biden and Blinken, listen to what people are telling you, especially the young people, and lots of Jews.”
The crowd erupts in chants of ‘NOT IN OUR NAME!’
David reiterates that this is the Jewish Voice For Peace, “one of the many human rights groups standing up for a ceasefire and continuing to be against Israel’s occupation and ongoing apartheid of Palestinians.”
“It really shows you where the masses are” David continues, “you can pull random people on the street about this issue and it’s kind of 50/50 though it’s leaning more and more of understanding this conflict but when you see people who actually know what are going on, like human rights activists and politicians… there are many more human rights activists that are aware of these atrocities compared to the politicians in power who are also aware but not willing to challenge that power.”
David says there is so much to cover that he simply can’t keep up. But he wants to share one last story about people being fired for speaking up on social media in support of Palestine, like one woman, a journalist in Canada.
“That’s just one example. There are people who are afraid to speak their mind on this issue because their boss might see it.”
He makes one more very important point as he shares a tweet from @DavidKlion:
“I’m almost 40, unmistakably Jewish, and have experienced real antisemitism in America a single-digit number of times (none of which were since 10/7/23).
“Our govt is slaughtering Palestinian kids by the thousands. I think it would behoove us to focus on that.
“There are real antisemitic incidents in this country, from random Nazi graffiti to Tree of Life, but some insane share of what’s being described as antisemitism right now is literally just pro-Palestinian advocacy that many Jews have been taught to regard as inherently antisemitic.” (my bold)
David’s response is, “Of course I can’t speak to this. I did not grow up with this sort of worldview or in this sort of environment, but it would help to explain why it would seems like why people who are otherwise solid and in their right mind, have just completely lost their mind on this issue specifically and have no regard at all for Palestinian life.”
Lastly, he shares a tweet of a sign someone is holding up. It reads: “If you ever wondered what you’d have done during American slavery, the Holocaust, Canada’s genocide of indigenous peoples, and the civil rights movement, look at whatever you’re doing now for Gaza and Palestine.”
“It’s the indifference to life. It’s the power imbalance. It’s the pushing people out of where they live… It’s frustrating to see people that have the power… to put a stop to this, to just completely give in and not care. At the very least their legacies are going to be tarnished for history because of their position right now.”
Love Your Enemies
“…to treat an enemy with magnanimity is to blunt our hatred for him.”
Eric Hoffer
These two videos were posted on Halloween. Then, in a book I am currently reading, The True Believer, Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, but Eric Hoffer, I read this just this morning:
“Self-contempt produces in man ‘the most unjust and criminal passions imaginable, for he conceives a mortal hatred against that truth which blames him and convinces him of his faults’.
“That hatred springs more from self-contempt than from a legitimate grievance is seen in the intimate connection between hatred and a guilty conscience.
“There is perhaps no surer way of infecting ourselves with virulent hatred toward a person than by doing him a grave injustice. That others have a just grievance against us is a more potent reason for hating them than that we have a just grievance against them. We do not make people humble and meek when we show them their guilt and cause them to be ashamed of themselves. We are more likely to stir their arrogance and rouse in them a reckless aggressiveness. Self-righteousness is a loud din raised to drown the voice of guilt within us.
“To wrong those we hate is to add fuel to our hatred. Conversely, to treat an enemy with magnanimity is to blunt our hatred for him.”
“The most effective way to silence our guilty conscience is to convince ourselves and others that those we have sinned against are indeed depraved creatures, deserving every punishment, even extermination. We cannot pity those we have wronged, nor can we be indifferent toward them. We must hate and persecute them or else leave the door open to self-contempt.”
So, we come back to the excuse of viewing ‘the other’ as less than to justify atrocities against them.
~ ~ ~
Here’s an idea that was promoted by a very well-known spiritual teacher: Love Your Enemies. Do good to those who would harm you.
I wonder if there would be such a worldwide antisemitic reaction if the Israeli government would have just grieved their losses and asked for answers and support from the world for the horrible atrocity committed against them, rather than immediately seek revenge and genocide.
Multiplying the atrocity toward your aggressor does not make anyone safer, in the short run or the long run. It doesn’t solve anything; it only insures the madness will continue.
If ever there was a time to just Love Everyone, regardless of the beastliness of their actions, that time is NOW.
Aloha is the Spirit of Unconditional Love. Unconditional. That’s Love. All else is not.