The tragic death of Santiago Gangotena has brought to light once again the baseness of a part of our society, one that, through irony, hatred or vulgarity, has covered the networks of insulting and painful comments.
I also feel far from some of his approaches and, nevertheless, I must acknowledge the commendable work he put into motion and fairly value that faded life. In the face of death and pain, regardless of justified or ridiculous gaps, only empathy and respect can operate. Everything else is scoundrel.
We usually justify that group of savages with a lack of education. The truth is that, despite the shortcomings, there are comments of this caliber from people who are perfectly literate and even intellectual but unable to abandon the tribal crumbs of their religion or ideology to embrace a more generous and free spirit, even with the enemy. Our main crisis is not educational -which is also- but ethical.
Regardless of the degree of study, a culture of hate has been normalized, resentment is a very overused word for my taste. Hating has become a ridiculous way of affirming one’s identity, as if despising the other reaffirms my worth or defends myself from my own failure. There is in this attitude a collective adolescence and a victimhood that represent the heaviest anchor in our stagnant system of miseries.
And what is worse, it reflects the extent to which extremism has prevented many from valuing the enemy as an adversary and equal and ending up reducing him to a bug or vermin. Remember that you have to choose and treat your enemies with height because they are a reflection of ourselves.
There is no healthy democracy that can function with that zero-sum game, no market, no society, no family, even. The death of that attitude would make me happy.