The “Hate Speech” We Need to Stop for Elections

Do you remember how, for the first months of the war, anyone who raised the idea that, given the worst failure in Israeli history, we should go to elections was met with the response: “Elections? During a war?? Do you want people fighting over politics in the tank? Elections increase hatred and division too much for them to happen during war.”

Of course, there were some who warned that if that is the case, we may just find ourselves in a forever war. Almost three years later, still mired in wars on multiple fronts, it might be a good time for anyone who mocked and scoffed at those people to apologize. But even more critically, as we find ourselves finally, unbelievably, weeks before this government successfully completes its mandated tenure, we need to reassess the assumptions that lead to the conclusion that elections = hatred.

There are two causal errors at work here, on either side of the word “hatred.” The first is to think that disputes cause hatred, and the second is to think that hatred causes dispute. The first mistake is less serious, but extremely hard to fix. The second error is much more damaging, but luckily, it’s also much easier to handle. Of course, the best time to talk about this is during Parashat Korach. Jewish tradition has much to offer to help us deal with the first error, but actually, it can trip us up when it comes to the second one, so we need to tread carefully.

Is it correct to see dispute as the cause of hatred? This seems to be an incontrovertible empirical fact, especially in this day and age of algorithmically-enhanced polarization. But if there is one thing that the Talmudic tradition comes to teach us, it is that this doesn’t need to be the case, and it shouldn’t be the case. The ideal that the Talmud presents for us to strive towards is the relationship between the house of Hillel and the house of Shammai, who argued about the most serious and the most basic things, and nevertheless, they practiced “love and friendship with one another” (Tractate Yebamot 14b).

How did they do it? It definitely wasn’t easy, and it’s important to temper this idyllic image with the comforting knowledge that it didn’t always work. The Jerusalem Talmud tells a horrifying story of a tragic moment when the students of Shamai’s school were so dead set on winning the majority that they stood at the entrance of the study hall with swords and killed (!) any students of Hillel who tried to enter (Shabbat 1:4). How did it work when it did work? Buried in the lesser quoted sections of the above discussion in Yebamot, there are a number of interesting suggestions having to do with open communication and trust. They deserve more attention than they get. Most often, when you hear speeches about what went right with the famous disputes of Hillel and Shamai, people will quote the distinction found in the Mishna between their argument, which was for the sake of heaven, as opposed to the argument of Korach, which was not. While this is a true and important distinction, it also has the tendency to lead us to our second error, the idea that hatred causes dispute. How so?

It’s very easy for each person to know about themselves that when they argue, it is always with the purest of intentions, for the sake of heaven. But this just makes it all the more tempting to assume that the person who argues with me is not motivated by similarly pure intentions. After all, if my argument is so compelling, and I know that I have the best intentions, how can anyone possibly disagree? It must be that they have a hidden agenda. It must be that they are like Korach, fighting for reasons of ego or other ulterior motives. It must be that the only reason they argue with me is because they simply hate X (fill in the blank. In Israeli politics, some of the favorite choices are: Netanyahu, the Haredim, “Settlers”, secular Israelis, Liberals). It can’t be topical. It must be personal. Their hatred causes the dispute.

This error of attribution – attributing hatred as the reason for a person’s opinion – is the “hate speech” that we need to really work on during the upcoming election season. Of course, no one should speak hatefully against anyone else. But just as critically, we should not assign hatred as the motive whenever anyone disagrees with us or voices criticism. We need to stop telling people who they hate.

As opposed to the mistake of resenting the people with whom we disagree, which is a life-long project demanding real work on ourselves, this second error has an easy fix. All it takes is a decision not to jump to conclusions, to be a little more humble about what we know about others, and what we know ourselves, and a little more curious. All it takes is replacing some groundless exclamation marks with some more honest question marks. Is this person motivated by hatred? Do I know that for sure? Maybe, just maybe, they actually have a really good reason for the things they’re saying? Maybe, just maybe, they’re not motivated by hatred at all? Maybe they see something I don’t, or they’re giving a different weight to certain values?

Actually, this curiosity and humility are the necessary first step to solving the first error as well. If I assume that the person who disagrees with me is motivated by hatred, I will tend to hate them for it. On the other hand, if I stubbornly insist that the argument is for the sake of heaven, that it has authentic and pure motivations on all sides, then I can welcome the arguments of election season as a critical opportunity for us to clarify our values and commitments, and a critical tool to further the healing this country so desperately needs.