{"id":400731,"date":"2026-04-19T21:43:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T21:43:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/400731\/"},"modified":"2026-04-19T21:43:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T21:43:10","slug":"the-blogs-hate-hurts-wendy-kalman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/400731\/","title":{"rendered":"The Blogs: Hate hurts | Wendy Kalman"},"content":{"rendered":"

This was written after reading Hen Mazzig\u2019s Facebook post<\/a> about a fourth synagogue in London bombed within the space of one month. He pleaded for readers to see and understand how making and excusing hateful speech directly connects to the acts of hate we are seeing. I agree with his call \u2013 but am also asking every one of us to understand the ramifications of hate and to begin to treat everyone we meet differently.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tScreenshot of Hen Mazzig\u2019s important plea<\/p>\n

Being hated hurts. Anyone can tell you that.\n<\/p>\n

Hate also hurts society, that is, people who see it being normalized, do nothing, say nothing, think nothing of it\u2026or are persuaded by it to think or act differently \u2013 they are harmed too.\n<\/p>\n

And those who do act on hate, who foment hate, who hold hate in their hearts \u2013 they too are actually hurting themselves, denying themselves the opportunity to build bridges and to see the world differently.<\/p>\n

My fix? Start by always speaking to and treating others as you would want yourself and those you love to be spoken to and treated. It is not all that difficult. Just think before you speak\u2026and especially before you type online, where you expose others to venom.<\/p>\n

If you hold mean thoughts, ask yourself why. I can\u2019t help but think about the very first blog I wrote, after the hate-filled\u00a0 2017 Charlottesville, VA \u201cUnite the Right\u201d rally too place. Called, \u201cI read the news. And my heart hurts.<\/a>\u201d it begins with theories of mine as to why people hate.<\/p>\n

The bottom line, though, is that we each need to spend time looking inwards \u2013 and this is true no matter where you are on any political spectrum \u2013 and begin to address our own absence of compassion. What does spending time and energy on spreading animosity and hatred benefit anybody?<\/p>\n

Our world has enough meanness. We need kindness and compassion. One act at a time.<\/p>\n

For a recent milestone birthday, I asked my friends to perform at least one act of kindness, and I put together these lists of suggestions of how to do good for friends, family, community the world.<\/p>\n

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\t\"\"
\n\t\tThe list I put together for my milestone birthday<\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/p>\n

These are all good things, but the hatred we are seeing \u2013 like Hen pointed, out, when people actually try to justify targeting houses of worship \u2013 this requires more than an act of kindness. It requires deep thinking about what is hurting in one\u2019s heart to allow for justifying violence and contributing to this growing atmosphere of hate.<\/p>\n

We each need to create and live in spaces large enough and welcome enough to hold us all and to show us all how things could be, ought to be. Don\u2019t just, as Hen requests, admit that hate speech encourages hateful acts. It does, but please don\u2019t stop there.<\/p>\n

I am asking for everyone to not give a voice to the kind of intolerant speech which produces harm. And please don\u2019t tolerate hateful speech or acts in spaces where you witness it. Call it out and instead, model the compassionate and thoughtful behavior we all need to see.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tWendy Kalman, MPA, MA, serves as Director of Education and Advocacy Resources for Hadassah The Women’s Zionist Organization of America, Inc. Previous roles include senior academic researcher for an Israel education nonprofit, knowledge manager at a large multinational as well as roles in marketing and publishing in the US and in Israel. She has presented papers at political science and communications conferences and has participated as a scholar-in-residence at an academic workshop on antisemitism. Wendy lived in Israel for over a decade and is a dual citizen, fluent in Hebrew.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This was written after reading Hen Mazzig\u2019s Facebook post about a fourth synagogue in London bombed within the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,631,85,46,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-400731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-antisemitism","9":"tag-community","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=400731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}