Becoming What We Hate
Dear Diary,
Was just reading this.. thought it was very good.
From this site Romeo’s Bleeding.
http://www.obgyn.net/displayarticle.asp?page=/yw/articles/Romeopart6
Nobel Peace Prize recipient Elie Wiesel tells a wonderfully haunting story of how he almost became what he hated. He spent part of his adolescence growing up in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz. One night, he was telling an old rabbi about his greatest desire.
He was relating a series of extremely violent fantasies to the rabbi, which were elaborately detailed images of exactly what tortures he would inflict upon their Gestapo guards—if he “ever had the chance.” The tortures were all those that he had seen inflicted upon his fellow inmates.
He went on talking to the rabbi for quite a long time and, the longer he talked, the more his voice filled with cold-blooded rage and hate toward the Gestapo. Finally, he was so emotionally choked with hatred that he simply could not speak.
There was a long silence.
Then the rabbi steadily looked the young boy in the eye and simply said, “Oh. I see. Youâve become them.”
Wiesel describes this as a major turning point in his life regarding his understanding of hate. Hatred, itself, can transform one into that which is hated. It is a realization vital to remember whenever someone who has been under a Controllerâs “spell” decides to break that spell. Once counter-control springs into action, it must be tempered with restraint, because a desire for revenge can turn you into the very thing you most scorn.