How I hate thee? Let me count the ways...

"Where do we go from here? I have no clue. I do know this. Most of us right now feel like we need a shower every night, even though we took one in the morning."

Many of us remember from our school days, learning the very famous Sonnet 43 by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, How do I love thee? Actually, most remember it by the first two sentences of that sonnet, How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. It was a gushy and heartfelt poem, penned during the Victorian Era. In high school, if you really wanted to impress and or woo your date, you just needed to quote a bit of Sonnet 43 to her.

Today however, is a different story. Love seems to be in short supply, forgiveness is unavailable, and compromise is the longest four letter word in our lexicon. We have forgotten all the teachings we had in confirmation on how bad "hate" is, and now freely throw that word around with great abandon. 

How did we get from Sonnet 43 to the visceral hatred which comes out of the mouths of Maxine Waters, Alex Jones, and "Whoops" Goldberg? When my girls were growing up, I would frequently counsel them on escalation. Never let an discussion turn into an argument and then escalate from there. Once the escalation starts, it is almost impossible to de-escalate without damage being done to a relationship. Today however, it is who can yell the loudest. Who and swear and use the most foul of language. Who can hate with abandon, and feel good about it afterwards. 

This is not just Red vs. Blue issue. Oh no. It was at one time, but we passed that marker miles ago. Now it is hatred within the same political party. I have seen it. I have felt it. And it does not feel good. To make matters worse, nobody seems to know what to do about it. Except hate even deeper.

I really did not think our country could be more divided after Obama. I really didn't. I thought we were at the bottom of the well. But the hatred I see towards this President (and many who support him), is an order of magnitude more than anyone who hated on Obama and his minions. I just read the other day, that people are taking their Trump bumper stickers off their cars. Why? They don't want to get "keyed". So much for the First Amendment.

Our goal right now, is to make life as uncomfortable as possible for our fellow citizens. Harass them at work, drive them out of restaurants, swear at them in public, hassle their kids, damage their property, try to get them fired from their jobs, and so on. This is how our political disagreements have escalated. Turning the other cheek has morphed into hitting them back even harder.

Where do we go from here? I have no clue. I do know this. Most of us right now feel like we need a shower every night, even though we took one in the morning. We can only be exposed to so much hatred every day, before we can feel the stench of it all over ourselves. Sadly, even a shower does not help us feel any better.