I hate ignorant people. I don't hate many things, but I just discovered how much I hate ignorant people. I never understood the depth of my feelings until recently. Many of you know how I feel about jealousy and about my "No Tolerance" policy. I feel stronger about this. Two things provided the catalyst for this new discovery. The first was partly as a result of my recent trip to Yemen where two specific images stand out in my mind.
The first is an eight-year old boy standing daily at the intersection trying to survive by selling packets of tissues to people waiting in their cars; despite his hardship, lack of real shoes and tattered clothing, he has a smile that lights up your life. The second is seeing two boys, brothers I believe, watching traffic on a busy street waiting to cross. They were there hand-in-hand, the older boy probably five or six, the younger one only four and nobody else was around to help them, but their confidence, determination, and independence was phenomenal.
Having these experiences and then coming back to the States and talking to a relatively new friend describe how difficult her life was when comparatively it wasn't, made me think she needed to get out into the world to gain some perspective. The second catalyst is a book I'm reading, "the sewing circles of Herat: a memoir of Afghanistan," that describes firsthand accounts of the people and places in Afghanistan prior to the Taliban rule and the results of their ignorance, the destruction of history and culture, and the violent submission of a people in the name of a religion most members of the Taliban aren't even educated enough to understand.
Ignorance of other people makes us forget our problems are small, ignorance of the world makes us think we have the only correct principles on which to shape our lives. I hate ignorance.
