Why would person deliberately cause unnecessary pain?

To The Daily Sun,

A recent letter in the Sun, denying the Holocaust and expressing concern for the loss of white supremacy, had me running the gamut of emotions. Anger. Sadness. Confusion. Horror. Disgust.

Over the course of the following days I composed countless responses that reflected those feelings, but only in my head. I was heartened to see that others took up the call and wrote their own. And the editorial in the Sun, explaining the importance of “sunlight as a disinfectant” was also appropriate. And for a while I believed that a response from me was unnecessary. I was even able to dismiss the writer and put him in the same company as the Flat-Earth Society, the Creationists and the Elvis-spotters.

But there remains the one nagging question: Why? Why publish ideas that are guaranteed to evoke a negative response? It is not to educate, to persuade, to inform readers of new evidence of research or in any way to promote a dialogue to exchange different points of view on an issue. No, the sole purpose was to hurt. But what kind of person deliberately causes unnecessary pain? And why? It is one thing to hurt someone in order to deliver bad news. And children certainly feel bad when they are being disciplined. And it does sometimes hurt at the dentist’s. But to cause hurt for no good purpose is nothing short of sadistic. Bullying in a pseudo-intellectual way.

And that writer has plans to run for public office. Does anyone really want to be represented by a person who purposefully causes hurt to others? One who traffics in conspiracy theories and denial? Would the candidate represent only those people who agree with his sadistic tendencies? Perhaps, in a perverted way, it is a good thing that he wrote that hurtful letter and his ideas are now in the sunlight so voters can know who he is and what he truly stands for. Let’s not assume for a moment that his beliefs exist only among a fringe group of deniers. One need only remember the Tree of Life Synagogue and see reports of yet another shooting at a synagogue this past weekend to understand the consequences of the writer’s words and profession of his beliefs. We all need to stand against him.

Dorothy Piquado

Gilford