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Authors Kay Whitlock (left), co-editor of Criminal InJustice, and Michael Bronski (right) have published a new book “Considering Hate” that is required reading. This is a transformative text that not only presents us with provocative questions about who we have been and who we are as a civilization, but also how we can rise above simplistic dichotomies of “Us” v. “Them” in our own everyday activism (whether on a micro or macro scale). The bottom-line is that we are no better than our so-called “enemies” when we embrace this dichotomous thinking which only serves to perpetuate division and destructive behaviors. As Whitlock and Bronkski argue, we are interdependent beings and must endeavor to find more constructive ways forward on all fronts.

From Beacon Press:

Over the centuries American society has been plagued by brutality fueled by disregard for the humanity of others: systemic violence against Native peoples, black people, and immigrants. More recent examples include the Steubenville rape case and the murders of Matthew Shepard, Jennifer Daugherty, Marcelo Lucero, and Trayvon Martin. Most Americans see such acts as driven by hate. But is this right? Longtime activists and political theorists Kay Whitlock and Michael Bronski boldly assert that American society’s reliance on the framework of hate to explain these acts is wrongheaded, misleading, and ultimately harmful.

Truthout has an in-depth and insightful interview up with both authors:

As Kay Whitlock and Michael Bronski outline in their brilliant new book, Considering Hate, we are all much more likely to view hate as residing elsewhere – not within ourselves, but within inferior others, whom we can disdain and distance ourselves from. Our political realities become determined by whom we are against.

In their book, Whitlock and Bronski dedicate themselves to both interrogating the hate frame – digging into its history, its construction, its uses, its tactics – and moving beyond it. They ask: “What would it look like to disentangle hate from justice, and replace the language of hate with that of goodness?” What does the language of goodness even look like, and how do we imagine our way there? In the following interview, Whitlock and Bronski illuminate the anatomy of hate – and show how a transformative imagination, built on compassion and an acknowledgement of interdependence, can guide our way forward.

Full interview here.

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