0:00
Good evening. This is
Radio Free Beszel. I
0:04
am Alphonse. Tonight:
The Pandemic of Hate.
0:09
"a false, treacherous and
contemptible swine: this
0:12
was shameful Israel, the
wicked and disloyal who
0:15
hated good and loved everything
evil, who then
0:17
poisoned several rivers
and fountains so that
0:20
many lost their lives;
for whoever used them
0:23
died suddenly. Then every
Jew was destroyed,
0:26
some hanged, others burned, some
were drowned, others beheaded."
0:33
"under conditions like these,
there are people
0:35
who deliberately take
sides with the enemy
0:38
and must be treated
accordingly. In
0:41
times of war, such
people were shot."
0:44
"Treat them like the
plague-spreading lepers
0:47
that they are. You want
to be put in isolation
0:49
camps? That's where
this is headed, you
0:51
will have deserved it,
and I'm all for it."
0:56
The first quote I just read
was from Guillaume
0:59
de Machaut in 1349, during
the Black Death when
1:02
the people in the town
where he was decided
1:05
that the Jews were responsible
for the plague,
1:07
and murdered them. The second
quote was by Arūnas
1:11
Valinskas, a Lithuanian
public intellectual
1:14
and a former parliamentarian,
in September, 2021.
1:19
The third quote was from
a reddit discussion in
1:23
Canada, also in September
'21. The post was
1:26
highly - extraordinarily
highly - upvoted,
1:30
with many awards. I have
never seen hate like
1:33
this. I've never seen our
leaders encourage us
1:37
to divide and hate and
avoid one another, to
1:40
blame other people for
threatening our lives.
1:44
The closest I recall was
following 9/11 when
1:47
there was widespread blame
of Muslims. But this
1:51
this is much worse. And
the height of it is
1:54
the vaccine mandates, the
vaccine passports.
1:58
I'm vaccinated, by the
way, by choice before
2:02
all the madness began.
But I shouldn't have
2:04
to say that. Here's what
it's like for someone
2:08
who isn't, a Lithuanian
man, Gluboco Lietuva,
2:13
who joined Twitter specifically
to explain what
2:15
it was like for him and
his wife who declined
2:18
the vaccine passport in
his country. He says
2:21
they've been suspended from
their jobs. They can't
2:24
return - and they wouldn't
if they could, because
2:26
their co-workers are sending
death threats.
2:28
They can't get new jobs
in their fields. They
2:31
can't even enter the
supermarkets to buy groceries
2:34
because they're banned
without the passport.
2:36
They have to buy food from
stalls on the street.
2:39
They need to fix their
home but they
2:41
can't go into the
hardware store,
2:42
and they can't even hire someone
to do the repairs
2:46
for them. He writes, "Despite
hardship we decided
2:50
resistance is our moral
path. We want our kids
2:53
some day to feel pride towards
us, not disgust.
2:57
Freedom is fragile, and
we must defend it.
3:01
If not us, then who?
We do not stop you
3:04
earning a living, though
you stop us. We do
3:07
not ban you from buying
food and clothing,
3:10
though you ban us. We
do not hate you,
3:13
though you hate us. We
do not banish you,
3:17
though you banish us.
We do not wish death
3:19
upon you, though you
wish death upon us.
3:23
And when the time comes,
as it inevitably will,
3:26
when you too are banished
by the ever-increasing
3:29
arbitrary rules of the
new authoritarianism,
3:32
we will fight for your rights
just as we fight
3:34
now for ours. Because
we are all equal. We
3:38
all have equal right to
exist in society."
3:44
For me this recalls the famous
poem by Martin Niemöller:
3:48
"First they came for
the Communists, and
3:50
I didn't speak up,
because I wasn't a
3:52
Communist. Then they came
for the Jews, and
3:55
I didn't speak up, because
I wasn't a Jew.
3:58
Then they came for the
Catholics, and I
4:00
didn't speak up, because
I was a Protestant.
4:04
And they came for me,
and by that time
4:06
there was no one left
to speak up for me."
4:13
How have we come to
this? How have we
4:15
come to a time when
we're willing to
4:17
to to hate our fellow
citizens? And
4:20
say that's moral?
And celebrate it?
4:24
How have we come to the
point where we can wish
4:26
for the deaths of our fellow
citizens? Large
4:29
numbers of us? I've heard
hate from people I know.
4:32
When the vaccine passport
came in where I live,
4:35
it was only for non-essential
activities. You can
4:37
go to the library without
one. You can go to the
4:40
grocery store without one.
But you can't go to a
4:42
restaurant. And I spoke to
a friend and he thought
4:44
it was a good idea. And
I thought, oh well, you
4:46
know, because maybe it
can keep people safer.
4:48
But that's not what he said
- no, he said because
4:51
then the unvaccinated will
suffer. They will be
4:54
punished, and that will
encourage them to get the
4:57
shot. Such hate. I didn't
even know what to say.
5:03
There are a number
of interviews on
5:05
YouTube with a Dutch
psychologist
5:07
named Mattias Desmet,
D-E-S-M-E-T. If you search
5:10
for that and his theory
about "mass formation"
5:14
you can also find some
articles summarizing
5:17
it. You'll see what
he has to say.
5:20
He saw this coming before
it happened. He made
5:23
financial decisions in late
2019 because he felt
5:26
that the public was on
the verge of something
5:29
like this. The pandemic
was only the excuse.
5:34
What he explains with
his theory of mass
5:36
formation, which is in
a sense a theory of
5:38
how totalitarianism happens
from the bottom up, is
5:41
that there are four conditions
that lead to people
5:45
joining movements like
this. And these are
5:48
familiar if you listen
to my episodes on
5:51
totalitarianism, where
Hannah Arendt talks
5:54
about similar things, and
with my talk about
5:57
René Girard and scapegoats.
The first of these
6:00
conditions is social isolation,
which has been
6:04
increasing for a variety
of reasons in the
6:07
1990s, and then with social
media even more,
6:11
and now with lockdowns even
more still, to the
6:13
point where many people have
few friends or none.
6:18
The second, he says,
is a failure of
6:20
sense-making, a lack
of meaning in life.
6:24
And we see people expressing
that all the
6:27
time. The third is free-floating
anxiety.
6:30
Free-floating means it doesn't
have a target -
6:32
people are just anxious,
they feel that they're
6:34
precarious or something's
going to go wrong. And
6:37
that's certainly the case
in the economy and the
6:40
incredible competition,
which I've also talked
6:42
about in previous episodes
about the information
6:45
economy and elite
overproduction. And fourth
6:48
and finally there's a sense
of free-floating
6:51
aggression and anger. And
I think it's clear
6:55
that we saw this well
before the pandemic.
7:00
And what Desmet says
is that when all
7:03
of these conditions
are fulfilled,
7:05
that people are feeling
miserable
7:07
and they want to
find a way out.
7:12
If they're given a
target and told,
7:14
this is the source
of your troubles,
7:16
they may turn on that
target. And with a
7:19
feeling of self-sacrifice,
a feeling of elation,
7:22
of ecstasy - he says it's
almost like a hypnotic
7:24
state where people don't
even notice the things
7:27
that are lost. They don't
notice the costs of
7:29
their actions. They don't
notice other harms
7:31
that are happening in the
world, because they
7:33
just focused on that target
that they blame for
7:36
everything that's wrong.
And that's when they
7:38
become capable of great
atrocities, he says.
7:42
This parallels almost exactly
René Girard's theory
7:45
that I talked about in Contagion
and Scapegoat,
7:49
where the strife in society
and the distinctions
7:51
have broken down and people
are blaming each
7:54
other, but then all of a
sudden they turn as one
7:57
on a single target, a group
or an individual,
8:00
and they scapegoat and
destroy and expel
8:03
that target. And then
harmony is restored,
8:06
because they're all on the
same side again. Desmet
8:09
says though that not everybody
signs up for this.
8:13
He says that about 30 percent
join the ecstasy,
8:16
about 30 percent are effectively
hypnotized.
8:20
Another 40 percent go
along - they're not
8:23
ecstatic, but they follow
the lead of the few.
8:27
And the final 30 percent
are opposed. They see
8:30
what's happening and they
fight against it. He
8:33
says there's no pattern that
predicts who will be
8:36
in this group. They come
from all walks of life,
8:38
they come from all political
philosophical
8:41
and religious backgrounds,
but they unite
8:43
against the tragedy they
see unfolding before
8:47
them. And often they too
can become targets.
8:52
I know the people who hate
think they're justified.
8:57
They think they're
justified because
8:58
they think they're
right. They think
8:59
they have the truth -
and maybe they do,
9:01
but then the people during
the Black Death
9:04
also thought they had the
truth when they blamed
9:07
the Jews, and they were wrong.
Who are we to claim
9:10
that we uniquely have
the truth? Those who
9:13
are most confident are
often most in error.
9:18
But even if they do have
the truth, does
9:20
that justify these kinds
of behaviors?
9:23
If we look back in history,
is there any
9:26
time that jumps out as
being a good time
9:28
when it was the right
thing to do to
9:30
blame a few people for
what was wrong,
9:33
to expel a group from
society, to deny them
9:36
participation, to deny their
humanity, to describe
9:39
them as enemies and vermin?
Has that ever been
9:43
the right thing to do? I
can't think of a time.
9:48
The second argument that
they will make is
9:51
that this protects the
community. If we can
9:53
make those few people go
along, if we can all
9:55
get vaccinated, then it
will end the pandemic.
9:59
But even if that were true
- and despite all
10:02
the virtues of the vaccine
that persuaded me
10:04
to take it, it isn't - even
if that were true,
10:08
forcing people is not going
to persuade them to
10:11
come on-side. Some of them
will, but the cost
10:14
to protecting the community
is destroying it.
10:18
If you hate people like
this, if you treat
10:20
them as second-class citizens
and outsiders,
10:23
how do you expect to have
a community after
10:25
that? What happens next
time when you want
10:27
people on your side to
do the right thing?
10:30
They won't join because
you broke it. It's
10:33
better to persuade. It's
better to recognize that
10:36
people have the right to
make their own mistakes.
10:41
It's better to realize that
we as citizens are not
10:43
judge jury and executioner,
to go and decide who's
10:46
good and who's bad. It's
better to have a society
10:50
where we're all treated as
equals and we all have
10:54
access to due process.
But there's the third
10:58
reason, a third reason
that is seldom spoken:
11:03
which is that people hate
because it feels good.
11:07
Because they think they're
so angry that they
11:10
can't keep it in. "Who could
blame me for hating
11:13
people who put my family at
risk," they might say.
11:18
Well, I will. I will, even
though I've made the
11:21
mistakes so many times myself,
and I'm sure I'll
11:24
make it again. But hate is
not bound to targets.
11:28
It's like an energy that flows.
Once you have hate
11:33
it spreads. Other people
mirror it. Other
11:35
people echo it back to
you. It spreads, it
11:38
shifts from target to target.
Girard talks about
11:41
this - how the scapegoat
can first be one group,
11:45
and then another as different
scapegoats
11:47
attract more and more
people, until finally
11:50
the majority fixate on one
target. Desmet says
11:53
this too. He suggests that
maybe the solution
11:57
is to shift the target
- the target of fear,
12:00
the target of anxiety -
away from the pandemic,
12:02
away from the unvaccinated,
and towards
12:05
the rising totalitarianism
that we see.
12:09
Girard's solution is different.
His solution
12:12
in a word, although he doesn't
use it, is Love.
12:15
It is to say that we need
to understand that
12:20
the scapegoat is innocent.
And that's true too,
12:24
in the sense that we're
all flawed, we're all
12:27
guilty, and we're all innocent.
The most frequent
12:31
accusation I've seen thrown
at the unvaccinated
12:34
is that they're stupid. What
kind of society would
12:38
we be if that were really
true? If we would say
12:40
that some people are endowed
with intelligence,
12:42
some people are endowed
with stupidity,
12:45
and the stupid
should suffer.
12:49
Or maybe we're lying
about it. Maybe we
12:51
don't really mean that
they're stupid.
12:52
Maybe we mean something
else. But then why are
12:55
we saying the wrong thing?
And I think that's the
12:58
case. And I think it reveals
a guilty conscience.
13:01
We say they're stupid but
we mean something else.
13:05
But if we really said
something else we
13:07
might look bad, so we just
call them stupid.
13:11
The point is, we can't
afford hate.
13:13
Hate won't protect
us from the virus.
13:16
Hate won't sustain
the community that
13:18
we claim we're trying
to protect.
13:22
Hate will only produce
hate. Hate will only
13:24
produce division. Hate won't
solve the problems
13:27
that cause the anxiety,
the precariousness,
13:30
the misery, the isolation
that many people
13:33
live in today. As Desmet
says, those root
13:35
causes are the things
we need to address.
13:40
But some people don't want
those root causes to
13:42
go away, because they benefit.
And we probably
13:45
shouldn't hate them either,
for the same reasons,
13:47
but the fact is it's in
their interests to find
13:50
something else to distract
us with. Because then
13:53
we might look at the
skyrocketing inequality in
13:56
our society, then we might
look at the actual
13:59
meaninglessness of many
of our lives, then we
14:02
might look at the fact that
progress seems to be
14:05
failing. This is the theory
of John Michael Greer,
14:08
that all this insanity is
because originally God
14:11
died in the 19th century.
And then we replaced God
14:14
with a new God, the God
of Progress, the God of
14:17
Man. And now the God of Progress
is failing too.
14:22
But whatever the root
causes, right now
14:25
what we need to do is
to stop the hate.
14:29
Or I think there could
be atrocities.
14:31
That's not the only mention
that I have seen
14:34
of people calling for
concentration camps
14:37
for the unvaccinated,
concentration camps
14:41
for their neighbors. Desmet
says that it's only
14:44
30 percent that are basically
hypnotized that
14:48
are participating in
Girard's scapegoat
14:50
real ritual enthusiastically.
Another 40
14:53
are going along.
And the reason
14:55
the 40 are going
along is because
14:57
that first 30 are unified,
they have one story,
15:00
they have one project. And
the final 30 percent,
15:04
those who resist, those who
don't want to go along
15:07
with the consensus because
they're so different,
15:11
don't tell a single story.
And so they're
15:13
not as compelling for
those in the middle.
15:16
So those of us who want
to resist this must try
15:19
to at least get along enough
to stop this from
15:22
happening. Because the other
thing Desmet says is
15:25
that although you cannot
persuade the hypnotized,
15:29
you cannot reason with
them. Because if they
15:31
accepted your reasons, then
they would have to
15:33
go back into the hell world
of anxiety and anger
15:36
and a lack of meaning. They
don't want to do that.
15:40
And because they don't
want to do that, they
15:42
stick with the lie, they
stick with the hate.
15:46
But as long as there's
resistance they're
15:48
less likely to do something
terrible.
15:51
He says that mass formation,
the totalitarianism,
15:54
turns really bad. Then
the atrocities happen
15:57
when everybody goes along.
So as long as we resist
16:00
we can hopefully prevent
that from happening.
16:05
Maybe you think I'm
exaggerating. Maybe you
16:08
think I'm panicking. Maybe
you think this time
16:11
what we're doing is justified:
it's a crisis, and
16:14
besides totalitarianism is
about radical ideology.
16:18
What's radical about protecting
the health of the community?
16:24
Totalitarianism isn't about
ideology. There have
16:27
been totalitarians of the
left under Stalin,
16:30
and of the right. The Nazis,
the fascists in
16:34
Italy, the wartime Japanese.
Totalitarianism is
16:38
not about a particular set
of beliefs. It's about
16:42
how we treat people. Do we
respect their dignity,
16:46
their independence,
their rights and
16:48
their responsibilities
and their freedoms
16:50
as individuals? Or do we
treat society as an
16:53
organism, or a machine,
and every person is
16:57
a part of that machine -
a gear in the machine.
17:00
And if the gear doesn't work,
we discard it. Even
17:03
if you were to build such
a machine for a good
17:05
purpose, to protect the health
of the community,
17:10
the machine would then
follow its logic. We
17:12
would have built the
totalitarian mechanisms
17:15
needed to treat us
into parts. Even
17:17
though it was built
for a good purpose,
17:20
that's not how it would stay.
Because that's not
17:23
what it is. The machine
is amoral. The machine
17:25
doesn't care about us. The
machine uses us, and
17:29
if it doesn't have a use
for us it destroys us.
17:33
We have said for generations
now, Never
17:37
Again. I grew up under
the idea Never Again.
17:42
But in order for it
to never happen
17:44
again, we also have
always known
17:47
that it could happen here,
and it could happen now.
17:53
How much evidence do we need? If
we wait until it's conclusive,
17:57
all we will be able to
say is, yes, it did
18:00
happen. We let it happen.
We didn't stop it.
18:05
And then our descendants
a century hence will
18:09
be apologizing for the crimes
that we committed.
18:14
If we want to stop it
happening we have to
18:17
stop it before the crimes.
We have to stop
18:19
it when it's not obvious.
"Treat them like
18:22
the plague-spreading lepers
that they are."
18:27
If it were to happen
here, if it were to
18:30
happen now, wouldn't
it look like this?
18:36
This is Alphonse
for Radio Free
18:39
Beszel. www.beszel.ca.
Good night.
