Hatred is the lowest place we can take ourselves toward others. Whatever mask it wears belief, politics, race, fear it is always the same descent. Hatred diminishes before it destroys. It corrodes the one who carries it before it wounds the one it targets. And yet hatred today is not something hidden, whispered, or shameful. It has become ordinary currency in our politics, our media, and our everyday speech.
Across the UK, Europe, America, and beyond, hatred is spoken aloud, without embarrassment. It is justified, dressed up as freedom, or framed as “saying it like it is.” In some places, it is cheered on openly. In others, it circulates in coded speech, in jokes, in offhand remarks that are meant to cut but also to normalize. The more it circulates, the less it shocks. The less it shocks, the more it grows.
Lies as Fuel
In the UK, one of the most striking recent lies came when Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK, declared before a U.S. congressional committee that Britain had become “like North Korea” in its approach to free speech. It was not a statement made in fear or confusion, but a deliberate exaggeration designed for outrage. And yet, the irony was sharp: he was free to say it in the first place. Would he have dared to say such a thing in North Korea? Of course not. There, such words would mean disappearance. Here, they meant headlines, retweets, and another round of outrage theatre.
And what happened next? Nothing. No lawsuit, no sanction, no accountability. The lie simply entered circulation, another drop of poison in an already contaminated well. And there are some who believe him.
Lies like this are not innocent errors. They are calculated tools. They exaggerate oppression in order to diminish the very real suffering of others. They position relatively minor inconveniences mask mandates, inclusive language, equality policies as though they were the chains of dictatorship. By doing so, they trivialize the lives of those who actually live under authoritarian regimes, those who are genuinely imprisoned for speaking, those who are silenced with violence.
And yet, such lies flourish because they tap into something deeper: the desire for grievance. Lies become fuel for hatred. They give permission to despise others, to blame, to reject. If we are “like North Korea,” then those who resist me are tyrants. If I am a victim of censorship, then my hatred is self-defense. Lies clear the ground for hatred to be seeded and grown.
This is not unique to the UK. In the United States, lies about stolen elections and shadow conspiracies have driven people to violence. In Europe, lies about migrants “flooding” borders, “taking over” cities, or “destroying culture” dominate headlines and shape entire political campaigns. The lies differ in content but not in function: they are scaffolding for hatred.
There is something chilling in how ordinary hatred has become. Once, hatred wore a hood or hid in shadows. Now it wears suits, appears on television, and is retweeted by millions. It is presented as patriotism. It is framed as common sense. It is excused as humour.
Hatred today is not always about shouting slurs. It is about the slow normalization of contempt. It is about the subtle suggestion that some people do not belong, that they are dangerous, that they are “too many.” It is about everyday language that frames neighbours as threats, colleagues as enemies, strangers as invaders.
This ordinariness is its power. When hatred becomes banal, it no longer alarms us. We scroll past it, we shake our heads, we sigh, we carry on. And so it spreads, not through spectacular moments of violence alone, but through repetition, through tolerance of the intolerable, through small lies left unchallenged.
What Is Truth in 2025?
We are told we live in a “post-truth” era. But perhaps that is too neat. It is not that truth has disappeared, but that truth itself has become contested terrain. To claim something as “true” today is not only to make a statement about facts; it is to enter a battlefield of politics, identity, and power.
Whose truths are recognized? Whose truths are discredited? Consider Palestinians who tell their stories of occupation, dispossession, and loss, only to be dismissed as fabricators or agitators. Consider Black Britons who speak of racism, only to be told that racism is an American import. Consider women who testify to harassment, only to have their words framed as overreaction.
Truth has always been about power. Facts do not float freely in the air. They are mediated by institutions, by governments, by the press, by platforms that decide what to amplify and what to bury. In 2025, this feels sharper than ever: truth is not just what is said, but who is permitted to say it, and who is believed when they do.
The danger is not only that lies circulate but that truths are disqualified. Some truths are rendered “biased,” “emotional,” “exaggerated,” while lies are given the status of “opinion.” This inversion destabilizes public trust. If every truth is called a lie, and every lie is defended as perspective, then what grounds remain for shared life?
Global Mirrors
The erosion of truth and the normalization of hatred are not confined to one place. They mirror each other across borders.
In Israel and Palestine, truth itself has become weaponized. Each side accuses the other of fabricating, of manipulating, of erasing. But the asymmetry is clear: one side’s truth is broadcast by powerful allies, while the other side’s truth is often silenced, deplatformed, or censored. Here we see how truth is not just about accuracy but about who controls the megaphone.
In the United States, truth fractures along partisan lines. A fact on one news channel is dismissed as propaganda on another. “Truth” has become less about evidence than about loyalty to a camp. In this landscape, lies about migrants, about gender, about elections, thrive. They are not believed because they are credible; they are believed because they are useful.
Across Europe, far-right parties gain momentum by promising to restore “truth” against “wokeness.” Their truth is framed as common sense: that there are too many migrants, that nations are under siege, that tradition is under threat. These narratives feed on fear, nostalgia, and resentment. They rebrand exclusion as realism, and hatred as honesty.
And in the UK, culture wars dominate headlines. Migrants, trans people, environmental activists, “lefties,” “centrists” anyone who challenges the status quo becomes a target. Lies circulate about boats, about pronouns, about cancel culture. Each lie becomes a spark, igniting hatred that is framed not as cruelty but as “truth-telling.”
Philosophical Reflection: The Weight of Hatred
Hatred is not only a political force; it is a moral and existential one. To hate is to diminish oneself. It narrows vision, it hardens the heart, it reduces the complexity of the other into a caricature. It feeds on lies because lies make hatred easier. Lies simplify the world into good and evil, us and them, victim and oppressor.
But hatred also has a seduction. It gives a sense of clarity in a confusing world. It offers belonging to those who feel lost. It provides an illusion of strength to those who feel powerless. In this sense, hatred thrives not only because of lies told from above but because of the fears and insecurities that lie beneath.
The question is: what becomes of truth in such a world? Truth is harder work than hatred. Truth requires nuance, patience, listening. Truth resists simplicity. It insists that people are more than their labels, that suffering cannot be explained away, that justice requires complexity.
In 2025, to hold onto truth is to resist the seduction of hatred. It is to refuse the ease of lies. It is to insist that solidarity matters more than grievance, that compassion is stronger than contempt.
Hatred is the lowest place we can take ourselves toward others. Whatever excuse we clothe it in politics, religion, race, or fear it drags us down before it harms anyone else. In this moment, across continents, hatred feels ascendant. Lies multiply, truths are silenced, and the very meaning of reality is contested.
And yet, truth is not gone. It persists in the voices of those who refuse silence. It persists in the solidarity of those who choose compassion over contempt. It persists in every act that resists the seduction of hatred and insists on the dignity of others.
The question of 2025 is not whether truth exists, but whether we are willing to defend it whether we are willing to name lies as lies, to resist hatred in its banal forms, to hold on to the fragile but vital possibility of shared life.
Because hatred will always offer us a low place. The challenge is whether we can choose not to descend.
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