Hate is a negatively consuming sentiment that is easier to initiate but difficult to erase. A base instinct that is the opposite of affection and blocks fairness, tilts balance the wrong way and with it mutes a good part of humanity too. It normally sits deeper in the dark recesses of mind and heart and scrapes relentlessly at the shiny vases of tolerance and forgiveness with its sharp claws disfiguring them badly. As one might appreciate hatred is triggered by either a sense of inadequacy, envy, jealousy, hurt or amazement, or a combination thereof. You may ask why amazement? Amazement at the other’s performance or prowess is the first step towards an eventual feeling of inadequacy if not steered towards emulation, self-improvement and appreciation. There is a variety of forms in which hate appears which could be personal, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious, sectarian, geographical, political, class or even allergic. Allergic is mostly irrational but caused by a definite mental trigger. However, hatred is like glazing over a surface that prevents the permeation of logic, empathy and understanding into the mind and hydroplanes a person into a more damaging mode than the ordinary. We may by now agree that it is quite counterproductive. Now let’s see the way it affects or rather infects our societies, communities and nations. This hideous human emotion has become a tool of exploitation in the hands of ideologues, politicians, writers and the clergy for keeping their evil flocks together, creating exclusivity and retaining their influence and power. What started as securing one’s local turf has now become an international art of mass manipulation and menace both. Iranian Revolution, Salafism, Daesh, Hindutva, US interventionism and South Africa’s extinct apartheid are but a few recent examples. Since it first germinates in the perpetrator’s mind therefore notions like a dark continent, third world, Islamic terrorism, fundamentalism and Afghan mind’s Pakistan hatred are fully and equally deplorable. All these toxic notions, when gaining currency, become divisive forces, create animosity, lead to conflicts, bloodshed and destruction. None of the mainstream political parties is truly national, supports any visionary agenda or is led by superior leadership. Closer home, we have a bagful of such distractions, which could easily qualify to be a textbook case for research and reference. Take a look at our steaming potpourri and how despicable it is. To begin with our uncharitable view of Bengalis, mainly, resulted in the violent birth of Bangladesh. A wave of revulsion is being set up among Pushtoons towards Punjabis and certain politicians are playing the dangerous game of Sindhi persecution by Punjab and KPK, merely to perpetuate their hold over lucrative provincial power. Like a monkey with the razor blade, they are also widening the wedge between local Sindhis and Urdu speaking Sindhis in that province thereby stoking the fires of the urban-rural divide. A class struggle is also being drummed up between the armed forces and civil society. Similarly, rebellion against established social and family values and distrust of judiciary is also being deliberately fanned for personal and political advantages. Agreed, there are flaws in the above-mentioned walks of life and state institutions but that does not mean outright condemnation or rejection. All it requires is purposeful fixing and refurbishing, not demolition as being proposed. Issues like river waters, allocation of budget, natural resource distribution and size and speed of development in various regions of the country are quickly made into us versus them matters of friction and acrimony among provinces, the centre and ethnicities. Then, we have an obnoxious and very nettlesome subset of our society in our sectarian wilderness. Although broad sectarian divisions had existed in Muslim Indian society for centuries, they were fairly amicably coexisting. After independence, we inherited our part of the sectarian baggage, which began to flex its muscle in the hope of becoming a predominant force in the politico-social arrangements of the newly formed country that these very elements were trying to paint as a theological state. The state accommodated some of their charters but both the people and the state have never fully trusted them with the power to rule. KPK made the mistake of voting them into power more than a decade ago and saw the rise of unprecedented sectarian terrorism. That province is again shuffling towards the same mistake as seen from the recent local bodies elections. The regret is going to be theirs. However, in the wake of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and the US-Saudi push to launch a ‘jihadist’ armed resistance from Pakistan against the same provided sectarian forces space and state acceptability to operate and sell their sectarian wares in our country with impunity. This was erroneous patronage and was restricted to mostly the Deobandi Sunnis who have had a pre-partition history of armed insurgencies in FATA and adjoining areas. Shia factions were excluded by default and due to a simultaneous but very aggressive Khomenite revolution in Iran. They could not be inducted into Afghan jihad sponsored materially and financially by the US and KSA. This bent of mind was to have far-reaching strategic implications for peace in Afghanistan decades later. The governance mess and serious dissonance among Pushtoon and non Pushtoon Afghanis that we see in Afghanistan today is directly the result of that cherry-picking. Panjsheris seeking Iranian and Indian intervention in Taliban led Afghanistan has roots firmly in the exercise of such selectivity. It can also be seen that thereafter this sectarian menace could never be contained and has proliferated in our country, the latest being the Barelvi TLP locust. We have our plate full and overflowing with this spiky parallel society of tight turbans, dense beards and guttural voices of well-fed, self-righteous and ferocious-looking men baying for their opponent’s blood at the drop of a hat. You just have to listen to their Jumma sermons from the pulpit to realize the extent of poison being injected into our society. The sad part is that our so-called educated class is also buying their vile wares albeit slowly. Finally, our royal political enclave is equally filthy, fungus ridden and full of rotten materials. This is the main engine of discord and free-floating hatred among provinces, ethnicities and various parts of our society. None of the mainstream political parties is truly national and supports any visionary agenda or is led by superior leadership. Decades of misuse and disappointment with the electoral system by the masses has brought forth a class of thugs and plunderers who have been repeatedly voted into power by the leftover scum of the nation. These vain men, in league with unentitled partners in power like the mullah, the feudal, ambitious military men, loan gobbling businessmen and lastly the shallow but greedy media moguls together made it a point to destroy the country’s gasping middle class and never to let it expand or take root. Because that was the only force that could challenge their recklessness and loot. Unfortunately, our academia and very small intellectual islet simply held their breath and generally acquiesced. What we see today in our country facing an acute shortage of sensible and visionary leadership that should be trustworthy and of sound mind. Right now what we have is a highly toxic witch’s brew of which each one of these terminators can singlehandedly lead the nation to the deepest ditch in the neighbourhood in the shortest possible time if you like. The writer can be reached at clay.potter@hotmail.com