Violence and Hatred

So I've been following the reaction to the anti-Muslim film/attack in Libya - not religiously - just reading the occasional article as it pops up in my Yahoo feed. I got to this article and had to stop reading it halfway through.

It wasn't because I was angry at the protesters. It wasn't because I found the violence particularly shocking. It was because all I could think was, How sad.

How sad that hatred governs the actions of so many people - and not just in the Middle East, not by any stretch of the imagination. I think it is deplorable that anyone would create a film with the express intent of denigrating a religious figure. Dislike of a faith does not give you the right to disparage it. To disparage a religion is to disparage the very foundation of a people's morality.

How sad that so many people feel the need to resort to violence. Maybe I am sheltered and misguided, but violence does not, to me, mean that something is wrong in a person's soul. It means that something is lacking - that these people do not have an outlet for their anger; that they have no other voice; that they do not understand what damage violence will do to their world. And I say their world - because violence within their homes will damage their children far more than it will damage ours, an ocean away - but I say also the world at large. Violence is what we resort to when we believe that it is the fastest route to safety, or that there is no other route. But as long as violence exists, safety can be nothing more than a fleeting dream.

And as I was reading, I also thought, This is what we write stories about.

Cultural and religious conflict shape the backdrop of my book. All of my characters are influenced by it in some way. Ker, as the son of a foreign slave, was alienated as a child because of his mother's religious beliefs. Lux faces disdain and mild abuse as a slave and a male mage in a country where magic is women's work. Eri's entire life is shaped by cultural conflict - she was born of a marriage of state, a fragile, doomed peace, and as a result has spent most of her life bouncing between cultures, not knowing where she belongs. All three characters come from wildly different societies, and their story takes place across a canvas of intolerance and war.

But I do not write about violence because I enjoy violence. I do not write about hatred because I believe that hatred is a healthy way of life. I write these things to understand them, and to, in some small way, impose my will upon them - to say, I can see an ending to this. I can make this end.

Even in stories where there is no happy ending - and I will tell you right now, there is no way that Ker's story can end happily - I will write for compassion. Because if I do not understand you who do these things, understand why you must resort to violence and slander and hatred, I will not do any better than you do.

So I will not say: I am angry. I will not say: I hate. I will say: I am sad, so very sad for the world that still feels these things, and for how little is in my power to change. I will make change where I can - in my home, in my world - not with anger, not with righteousness (because righteousness is blind), but with as much understanding for the world around me as I can muster. And I can only hope that this change will grow outward, and that someday it might touch at least the edges of places where hatred still reigns.