Concept Of Hate In The Novel The Hiding Place By Corrie Ten Boom

In the novel The Hiding Place, by Corrie ten Boom there are examples of how hate grows and how it can be stopped. Hate is an intense and/or passionate dislike for someone or something; it can grow in size. It cannot grow into more hatred because if you hate something you already dislike it as much as you can. An example of this is if someone hates something and more people are starting to hate the same thing that, that someone hates. You cannot hate something and hate it more; there is no term for it and it is impossible. Hate grows when something or someone does something that a lot of people don’t like; and it can only be stopped when stereotypes are denied and when people stop violence, prejudice attitudes, prejudice acts, and discrimination.

Hate starts to grow when people agree that they dislike something. The Pyramid of hate shows that violence such as “Threats, assault, murder, terrorism, and cyber terrorism”(Pyramid of Hate). These are all things that are a part of hate and things that cause hate. These things are also becoming more often this shows that hate grows. “Before I could recover, he slapped me again, then again, and again, stinging blows that jerked my head backward”(ten Boom 144). This shows that violence is a sign of hate because Corrie did not have a chance to recover before the guy hit her again. This is one way that hate can grow.

Hate can start to grow when people are prejudiced about something. This is shown by “Scapegoating, accepting stereotypes, antisemitism”(Pyramid of Hate). This shows what kinds of prejudice can cause hate to grow. Once, one stereotype is accepted more people are going to accept it. “The papers were so good and Annaliese looked so unlike the Nazi stereotype of a Jew, that she went freely in and out of the house, shopping and helping out at the school, giving herself out to be a friend of the family whose husband had died in the bombing of Rotterdam”(ten Boom 93). This shows that people accepted stereotypes about the Jews. This is another way that hate can grow. Hate can be stopped when people stop violence and act with kindness. “And then incredibly, Betsie began to pray for the Germans”(ten Boom 79). This shows that Betsie stopped her hatred towards the Germans. “Social avoidance”(Pyramid of Hate). This shows that social avoidance does not help stop hate, but social engagement can stop hate. When you avoid something that means that you dislike it because you are not interacting with it. These are examples of ways that hate can be stopped.

Even though hate can never be fully stopped, we can come close to stopping hate. When we accept stereotypes and have social avoidance that can cause hate to grow. When hate grows, it becomes harder to stop. Hate is a bad thing, but we can get rid of most of it. I believe that if we stop doing bad things to people then hate can be stopped. I am Jacob Rowe and this is my essay on how hate can grow and how it can be stopped.