The Prophets of Hate

What seemed improbable, if not laughably unlikely, to this life-long New York Mets fan happened. The Mets, in a spectacular week of baseball following a superb performance in the latter two-thirds of the season, not only made it to the postseason, they did so in a Hurricane Helene-delayed doubleheader against the (much-hated) Atlanta Braves, then defeated the (increasingly hated) Milwaukee Brewers and the (even-more-hated) Philadelphia Phillies to reach the National League Championship Series. While it would be wonderful to see them go all the way, I will consider the season a massive success even if they don't win another game.

I bring this up because the playoffs have put me in an unfamiliar space: watching live television.

This means I'm seeing television commercials - something that I rarely see thanks to my near-total transition to streaming content.

One commercial has popped up several times. Titled "Time Out Against Hate," it is the brainchild of New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, and it puts forth a positive message.

My cynicism made me ponder whether there were ulterior motives or hypocrisy or equivocation behind the ad, but it looks, to my pleasant surprise, to be just what it appears to be.

I contrast this with the years (decades, really) of gaslighting about hate in our society by our Best-and-Brightest, gaslighting that has actually taught people to distrust, to isolate ourselves into tribal silos, and to actually hate our fellow humans. The recent kerfuffle at CBS News over the interviewing of race propagandizer Ta-Nehisi Coates served to highlight the stark difference between a message of tolerance and comity and an agenda that masks overt intolerance with proclamations that only by parroting a particular narrative can one be deemed tolerant.

The race-essentialism all star team, which includes not only Coates, but other such dubiously feted sorts as Robin DiAngelo, Richard Delgado, and Ibram X. Kendi, has joined forces with luminaries like Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Presley, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Jamaal Bowman, and other members of "The Squad" to peddle a toxic message. That message, as Noah Rothman at National Review notes, is dogmatic in nature. It is catechism, as in "a series of fixed questions, answers, or precepts used for instruction in other situations," rather than argument or fact-based logic chain.

This makes that all-star team a gaggle of prophets and oracles rather than a round-table of deep thinkers. They aren't to be questioned or doubted, and if you do question or doubt, you earn the pitchforks of the angry mob. That they are so fundamentally wrong is of no matter, either. Post-modernism is all about "their" truths, and woe betide anyone who tries to argue reality rather than relativism.

Much as it has become cliche to cite Orwell nowadays, it remains that he was so right about the societal threat from people who would tell us what to think and how to behave, even when their way clashes with obvious realities. His coining of the term "doublethink," or the ability to simultaneously hold (and believe) two contradictory ideas, is as relevant today as it was 75 years ago, when 1984 was published. We have people whose primary product is hatred of all those who don't agree with, obey, and bend the knee claiming to be combatting hate. Worse, that they are the only ones who have the magic anti-hate formula - a formula so magic that we mere mortals who cannot fathom how you get past racism by being racist should just trust them, do as they say, and give them power over our lives.

This falls into special revelation territory, and their disciples are the sort who regurgitate slogans, catchphrases, neologisms, and inscrutable oracular divinations without actually pondering that which they repeat.

When the biggest peddlers of hate tell us they oppose hate, we are justified in raising an eyebrow.