Hatred-a public health issue

摘要

Hatred may be defined as a 'negative emotion that motivates and may lead to negative behaviours with severe consequences'(Halperin 2008).Though these sentiments might accompany it, hatred is not synonymous with extreme dislike, aversion, resentment, anger, or rage. Hatred includes an intense and chronic feeling, a judgment (of its object as'bad, immoral, dangerous'(Navarro, Marchena, and Inmaculada 2013)), and a tendency, desire, or intention to be violent, often to the extreme of destroying its object. Most alarmingly, hatred involves the dehumanisation of the other (Halperin 2008; Harris and Fiske 2009; Sternberg 2005), which serves as a gateway through which moral barriers can be removed and violence can be perpetrated. From a peace studies point of view, hatred might be seen as a prime and extreme, enabler of direct, structural and cultural violence. As such, when contextualised within conflict, hatred may manifest as massive violence, mass murder, and genocide. Whether it engenders widespread physical, psychological, or political violence, each will result inevitably, in equally widespread health consequences. Many of the current violent civil or civil-military conflicts across the globe are either based on, or fuelled by, hatred. Hatred self-perpetuates, usually through cycles of hatred and counter-hatred, violence and counter-violence (sometimes as revenge) (Figure 1).