Hatred

Now that I am  much older  that I realize how naive and stupid I am.
Growing up I learned about slavery, and how bad it was. I learned about intolerance, and how bad it is. I was learned about murder, torture, harassment, and all kinds of things like that. And I knew that all  those things were bad.
To me, it seemed as though this must have been new information for us all. For most of the adults I knew were very prejudiced against black people. They did not go by the name African-American at that time. There was also tremendous intolerance for gay people. They were called "queers" when I was young. Faggot was a term used for guys, and Dyke was for gals. I was guilty of using all the nasty words. Everybody was using them, so it only seemed right. Everybody, that is, except the people on the receiving end of those insults.
I came to realize it was all wrong. I have always had gay and lesbian friends. I didn't always know it. But you see I don't really care about that aspect of my friends' lives. They're my friends. What else do they need to be?
But I believed that people were finally "getting it", and that all of this hatred was fading away. Mine would be the generation to finally end racial hatred. As it turns out my generation is more guilty of the crimes than any generation which has gone before. I say this because my generation has had all of the previous generations to look at and learn from. But we learned the wrong lessons.
I have seen prime examples  of racial hatred. Gender hatred. Hatred against class. Hatred against gays and lesbians. I have seen all of these things which before, I failed to see.
It is exhausting to realize how many people just plain hate people who are different. This is whether the difference is skin color, body size, faith, gender, sexual preference, class, or country. But we can't give up trying to put a stop to the hatred. I wish we would all just stop hating each other. So many of the world's problems would just go away if we stopped.