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LINK Why We Hurt Each Other: Tolstoy’s Letters to Gandhi on Love, Violence, and the Truth of the Human Spirit – Brain Pickings

Tolstoy’s letters issue a clarion call for nonviolent resistance — he admonishes against false ideologies, both religious and pseudo-scientific, that promote violence, an act he sees as unnatural for the human spirit, and advocates for a return to our most natural, basic state, which is the law of love. Evil, Tolstoy argues with passionate conviction, is restrained not with violence but with love — something Maya Angelou would come to echo beautifully decades later.

HippieChick58 9 Aug 5
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It is amazing that someone who could write about violence so well had such a grasp on the nonviolent resistance.

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I wonder what would have happened if the Allies would have fought Hitler with love.

There are times force is needed, but other times, we need to use a tad more caution.

@HippieChick58 Right, but "evil" isn't something you can negotiate with or fight with love really. Hitler was hellbent on what he wanted and it was his destiny he thought. You can't fight "evil" with love. You can deal with sensible people though.

@Piece2YourPuzzle So what if everyone responded to Hitler with love.for all humanity? And this means we don't kill our brothers and sisters, If everyone on both sides just put down the weapons and said "no more" who would be left to carry out the madness? Love could wipe out evil,,,but we will never believe that something as simple as love is far more powerful then our WMD..we are much too macho for that! I get it folks. We can't turn the other cheek at this point..nor can any other country w/o losing all support, Just thinking that there had to be a better way..didn't we discover it yet?

@Sharlee What do you mean responded to Hitler with love for all humanity? Fighting Hitler and starting other wars are two different things with different circumstances etc. Reason with Pol Pot? Mussolini? Duterte? Etc. I believe most people who start wars and do those "evil" things are far on the sliding scale of psychopaths already. Try reasoning with or loving psycho serial killers or someone who feels something is their destiny. It will not get you far. Look at all the pictures and videos of all those Jews being thrown in pits and murdered and tortured and tell me you can reason with the perpetrators. Everyone putting down their weapons is a very complex issue. It involves deprogramming tons of propaganda and brainwashing of entire generations. It's a very long process. I'm not saying it shouldn't be started, but it's almost impossible. In the moment when Hitler is invading country after country and rounding up people to be killed, there isn't time to "love" him. Also, sometimes people are just bat shit crazy.

you forget socialists aren't interested in love, only power
Why else would they love oppression, taxation, war?

@moxy Huh? Just who do you think was a socialist? Not Hitler I hope. You sure you're not describing right wing authoritarian sociopaths? Probably the only half accurate thing you mentioned pertaining to socialists is them wanting taxation.

@moxy I vote for the president in the U.S. that I will think is the kindest and wisest and most-level headed. I am not a "pure" socialist. I am a socialist in my policy and dealing with others. I cannot vote socialist when there is no good choice or way in the voting system for a socialist to win a presidency. "Social" also is the root of sharing and caring. I know many people that are socialist and love means everything, and power means nothing to them. There are also socialist jerks too. You may be thinking of what Stalin did to socialism when he perverted it for his own gain.

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Stalin killed Tolstoy in my opinion killed what the Soviet could have become

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This paragraph speaks as much for our time as Tolstoy's:

What is now happening to the people of the East as of the West is like what happens to every individual when he passes from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. He loses what had hitherto guided his life and lives without direction, not having found a new standard suitable to his age, and so he invents all sorts of occupations, cares, distractions, and stupefactions to divert his attention from the misery and senselessness of his life. Such a condition may last a long time.

This is manifest in my own country, Ireland, which is starting to live in a post-religious era.

the Irish still have socialism, the other great religion in Europe besides alcohol

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