My teacher, Joel Feinberg, once wrote that, "Every philosophical paper must begin with an unproved assumption." Argument, in other words, must start somewhere, preferably with a proposition that is widely accepted. The unproved assumption of this column is that hatred is bad. The Oxford English Dictionary (2d ed.) defines "hatred" as "The condition or state of relations in which one person hates another, the emotion or feeling of hate; active dislike, detestation, enmity, ill-will, malevolence." To hate is "To hold in very strong dislike; to detest; to bear malice to. The opposite of to love." Each of us knows firsthand whether,...
