I have come to take issue with the phrase, "hate speech," these last few days. It isn't accurate, as it's far too incendiary and shuts down any chance for the kind of conversation our country desperately needs to have. I prefer the term, "fear speech," if it must be given a name.
On one side, it's fear of something which is different, which isn't understood, and which motivates otherwise rational people to justify terrible things. On the other, it's the fear of marginalization, of being forced outside when the basest of human instincts is to seek to acceptance. Regardless of the source of the fear, it is fear far more often than hate. Hate is easy, is simple. Fear is much more insidious.
And it doesn't just apply to this Chik-fil-a kerfuffle, but to politics, religion and all the other things polarizing this great nation so that we're unable to enact the kind of change necessary to keep it going.
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