The Anatomy of Hate

The Anatomy of Hate is a documentary film by Mike Ramsdell about the culture, politics, and complexity of the emotion known as hate. The movie documents several hate groups and interviews intellectuals, hate group members, and others. Ramsdell focuses thoroughly throughout the movie on how the groups seem to think their hatred is normal. He interviews neo-nazis, Westboro Baptist Church members , Palestinians, Israelis, and American soldiers just to name a few. The entire time I was watching the movie I was not shocked by the words and thoughts people had as much as their ignorance. The people interviewed in the film seemed to truly believe that they were not doing or saying anything wrong. I was amazed to hear people say such hateful , terrible , and insensitive things and not even bat an eyelash. Mike explains in the film though that people's hate is taught via enculturation into small children early on. The film explains that children from the age of 1-7 are most absorbent of information. It's during these moments that humans learn their defining views. He puts emphasis on the children of the perpetrators featured throughout. The Anatomy of Hate does a great job exploring a giant problem. What causes hate? The film answers "fear." Fear is a dynamic that plays into several groups hating others. The fear is based on things that vary from power,to land, and even religion. It seems that the hate groups in the film were all basing their fear on the forced change of their comfort or culture. The cultures that they were indoctrinated in were being "defended" by these hate groups. I thought myself that most of the hate groups seemed to be on the offensive against nothing. The targets often seemed to be over exaggerated threats and apparitions of danger. The groups such as the US Army, Israeli citizens, and Palestinian citizens that were highlighted were portrayed unbiased by Ramsdell. These groups were represented in a way that exposed their internal struggles with hate of their opposition more so. I thought this film was a wonderful detail of something that should be explored more for a solution.