"You hate most in others what you see in yourself."

[DireStrike]

The right wing sure loves to hate.

They hate whiny liberals, and yet they supply 90% of the whining.
They hate deviant gays, and yet many of them are socially or sexually deviant.
They hate dishonesty in leadership, and... well... I don't even need to say it.


This is also a useful thought for self reflection. I find myself facing a dilemma. I hate their intolerance. I hate their hatred of everything that is not them. I hate them for putting me and my loved ones in danger because they insist on being bigoted and uncritical of themselves.

Is there such a thing as being tolerant of intolerance? I don't think so, but I can't help wondering. I know I am guilty of lumping them into one monolithic group, but everytime I try to find something good in one of them, they continue to surprise me with unabashed hatred, ignorance, and decision making based on broken logic or trivial issues.

[lonestarnot]

1. First steps to apartied

[undergroundpanther]

12. Well

It's good to look at projections it gives you alot of self awareness..
I have some hideous angry fantasies when I am really hurt or pissed off and can't say what I wanted to say. I keep the fantasies in my head and I don't need to share them,they fade away as I calm myself and get perspective if I don't feed it...Those fantasies are just my anger being made into displaced anger.
And I ain't gonna displace it on bystanders.I am responsible for how I express myself in this world and conducting myself well matters to me...Having anger is no excuse to act it out and hurt someone who is NOT hurting me,or someone else ~ ever.

I have found I have to choose my words and battles wisely.It takes self awareness,self knowledge, and self control to be able to recognize a projection in yourself before you do something stupid.
My anger is mine alone and because I know it is wrong to dump my anger into others because *I* am furious I realize I must keep control over myself internally.It is not always easy to do this.But I got to try if I want to live up to my own standards of conduct..

Projection is like an excuse for lack of self knowledge,about an ugly or disowned part of yourself.. it's not a remedy for lack of control in your life even though it might feel that way as the projection is happening...So if I can express my feelings clearly and assertively right away,safely,I do..Otherwise I put my own anger in a direction that causes no harm, I walk away,I go home, I pound a pillow,climb trees or whatever if I feel I can't tell someone off safely. It's my responsibility how I conduct myself.

I do this way because I have an internal "moral" limit on what I will allow myself to do or not do.Like an internal policeman(superego?).An internal policeman ensures your conduct with others and how you relate to them is not disordered.A healthy internal limit is not a projective self censoring control freak, inside.There is a BIG a difference between these internal mechanisms and knowing your own limits and having ethics you understand and a sense of empathy for self AND others is what makes that difference clear.I have inside myself a bunch of off limit behaviors that are reinforced by my bad experiences ..
I will not do certain behaviors.. I hate it and I cannot excuse it in others or in myself because it is that repugnant to me.I have chosen to not identify my behavior in my conduct with shit behaviors like these:.
Torture,dehumanization,harassment, rape.

I find these (and others)behaviors to be so repugnant I would never want to do them,and thinking of it makes me sick and feel sick.I think my own death would be better than ever deliberately raping torturing or hurting somebody.
I would not do these things because I have been subjected to others who did these things to me and I know how it ruins your heart and mind and life for years.I do not want to make someone else go through what I went through-literally.I have decided nothing is worth spreading that kind of suffering. I can say this because I have consciously refused to identify myself with the abusers and their behaviors that hurt me..Deliberate cruel sadistic behavior against kids or vulnerable people or non consenting people is an evil choice I can choose NOT to make..
Maybe because I am aware of how easy it would be to make such a choice,and project my anger on others in this world where cruelty is blamed on the victim. So,I ain't gonna go there.

Power ain't worth doing to others what I despise .
Ego ain't worth it,survival ain't worth it.
Nothing is worth becoming an abuser.

A conscious choice is not the same thing as projection/reaction.Sometimes on the outside it is difficult to see when emotions run high.My gauge is how harmful is it,really,Torture rape and dehumanization is a blight upon humanity it violates consent and it is abuse..Homosexuality is just another flavor of human sexuality that respects consent like healthy hetero sex.

But if you fear and project and don't confront the ugly side inside yourself,than something innocent becomes dangerous and something evil and very dangerous is denied or minimized because that something evil is the real desire suppressed,causing the projection onto the innocent made into a danger.

It is interesting to observe how projection makes Right wingers get upset at gay marriage..As Abu Gharib was just a "prank" to them..
Maybe it's that way because they are people who would like to indulge in torture because they have conduct disorders.
Their internal control mechanism is controlled eternally or not functioning due to a refusal to introspect..So Gays are a means to that end for conduct disordered people to excuse what they really want(to torture people they don't like who do not excuse abusers) because of what they hate(gays).They can't hate torture people and get away with getting off on it so they displace that into hatred at being not allowed to torture Into homophobia because their more sensitized side is what says no don't.. When their conduct disorder kicks in and wants to act out and disown their own anger and fantasies on others and get away with it...

Just my 2 cents.

..

[FrankBooth]

13. Good post

recognizing projections is not a panacea ... awareness of your projections does not necessarily stop you from projecting, or acting on your projections, but it does give you awareness and a little distance from what was previously a mostly unconscious act. Recognizing your projections is the act of someone who is trying to understand themselves, and that can't be bad.

[juliagoolia]

2. Only one way to do that.

Is there such a thing as being tolerant of intolerance? I don't think so, but I can't help wondering

Just the season for it too..

Father forgive them for they know not what they do.

From Jesus

[DireStrike]

8. I wish it were that easy for me.

It's a nice thought though.

[TalkingDog]

3. No, you hate most in others what you FEAR in yourself.

There is a very insightful book on this very subject (and the title unfortunately escapes me). Post-Jungian (and a little to New Age Lavender for me to love it) but the gist of it is when you have a visceral reaction to someone you are merely projecting the thing you fear you have in yourself.


The best exercise in the book suggest that when you find yourself reacting to someone in this manner, simply say the thing you are feeling about them- i.e. That person is ignorant, hateful, illogical and shallow.

Then say to yourself: I am ignorant, hateful, illogical and shallow. And mean it. Say it til you are totally wracked with the idea. Then accept that you are ignorant, hateful, illogical and shallow. Once you truly accept those things in yourself, the other person's ignorant, hateful, illogical and shallow tendencies will no longer bother you in the least.

You will still see that they have those tendencies, but you won't feel the need to judge them or "other" them in order to protect your own ego.

A friend gave me the book and I rolled my eyes at the simplistic nature of it until I actually tried it on someone who burned my ass every time I had any encounters with her. It actually works. But only if you own it. Truly.

[DireStrike]

9. Fascinating... I'll add that to my knowledge of humanity

And I'll try it sometime.

[susanna]

17. I'll second that, TalkingDog.

I've used the same process myself. I didn't read the book you're talking about, but another that had a similar idea. Can't remember the name right now (something about the Shadow).

It is very liberating, and it certainly can't hurt that we become more aware of ourselves and our own projections. I had a boss that drove me nuts. Using these techniques, I was able to handle it. Now we are pretty good friends, believe it or not.

[pitt71]

4. You actually hate...

...maybe five percent of the Republican Party. And that five percent of the Republican Party hates about five percent of the Democratic Party. The other ninety-five percent of the people, in both parties, are not that far apart on most important everyday issues.

Note: this is my opinion and cannot therefore be Googled.

[DireStrike]

6. "Note: this is my opinion and cannot therefore be Googled."

Hah, love it. Love the opinion too. Thanks.

[Willy Lee]

21. Wow, that is SO TRUE.

I think our hope lies in the 95%.

[Shadowen]

5. Reminds me of a character in A Song of Ice and Fire...

...a book series by George R.R. Martin and the BEST. FANTASY. NOVELS. EVER. (Martin was very disappointed by the outcome of the electin. Go blue, baby!) I must warn you not to read any more of this post if you plan on reading the series or are and haven't finished A Storm of Swords, as this contains massive spoilage for that book.

One of the characters, Tywin Lannister, has a dwarf son. (Note that this being the PiC medieval of a fictional universe, that's simply the term used.) Tyrion (the dwarf), according to his father, "has a certain low cunning, but the plain truth is talks too much". Also, being a dwarf in a society where the men must be tall and muscular to be considered handsome, his brains don't avail him of any pretty maidens, so he has to turn to prostitutes--which his father also doesn't approve of.

Tywin ends up doing himself in when, his son convicted of a capital crime, he takes his son's favorite whore, one he'd come to love rather deeply, to bed. Escaping prison, Tyrion confronts him about it...and when Tyrion warns him not to speak or he'll kill him, Tywin says one word too many.

So what did him in? Falling prey to his the very weaknesses he ascribed to his son.

END SPOILERS. SPOILER-ALLERGIC DUERS CAN READ AGAIN NOW.

Hypocrisy lays low the great and the small...but mostly, I find, the great.

[DireStrike]

7. Can't wait for Feast of Crows!

Readers in the fiction section also recommend Robin Hobb, if you like GRRM. I haven't read any of his stuff personally yet, though.

[maxudargo]

10. I have had very similar thoughts.

One thing I've learned in my life is people really do "project" a lot. It is something I've observed so consistently and repeatedly in people of all ages that I often now assume if someone complains a great deal about the dishonesty of others, then they are a dishonest person. If they constantly complain about the selfishness of others, that must mean they are selfish. If they see others as arrogant, they are probably arrogant themselves. Anytime you find somebody whose complaints about others seems to have a theme, you've probably learned something about that person.

So, given this rule, does that mean anytime you are critical of others, or see a pattern of behavior that offends you in another group of people, that you are projecting your own faults onto those people? Hm.

[FrankBooth]

11. Jung would say "Projecting Your Shadow"

It is interesting to see what each side, liberal and conservative, project on each other.

Liberals say the conservatives are racist, stupid, uncompassionate. (All things they fear about themselves.)

Conservatives say liberals are weak, morally lax, ineffectual, elitist. 'Nuff said.

[NightTrain]

14. You're right. I just hate balding fat guys!

;)

[independent_mind]

15. interesting,

interesting,

[New Earth]

16. not as interesting as you

:hi:

[newyawker99]

19. Hi independent_mind!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[hoi polloi]

18. We know we are right -

And we are right.
They know they are right, but they are wrong since we are right.
I'm not sure we hate others because of what we see in ourselves although it can sometimes be true. If it were always true, we should have nothing to say against them for going to war, lowering taxes, stealing elections, etc, and Randy Rhoades and Mike Molloy should calm themselves.
We have legitimate reasons to complain if we think we are right.
When people do wrong things you don't necessarily hate them because you see such in yourself.
Maybe I misunderstood, but I don't believe: ""You hate most in others what you see in yourself.""
It just isn't always true.

[marc_the_dem]

20. further qualified

I think its should be further qualified... we hate in others what we see as shortcomings in ourselves...