Is hate becoming a societal problem?

Question

Yesterday a man walked into a church in Tennessee and killed two people, even shooting at children, because he had become obsessed with hatred of liberals. Do we as a society promote hate to the point that it is becoming a problem throughout society (not saying that certain kinds of hate were problems prior to this)

Answer 1

It only got really bad 8 years ago; when a large group of Americans spewed absolute hate toward the elected President. Now both sides promote it; turn around is fair play, I guess.

Answer 2

Yes, definitely.

Answer 3

Yes, I see it in Yahoo Answers, a microcosm of the attitude of the world.  Half of the answers begin with "I hate".  Women against men, black against white, muslim against christian against atheist, g*y against homophobes, parents against children.  Hate, hate, hate...if we invest half as much into trying to find some common ground and into loving each other, we could change the world.  Instead, hatred becomes the definition of who we are.

Answer 4

Absolutely.  There are lots of causes for this, but I believe first and foremost people are raising their children to follow their inner voices instead of enforcing traditional values.  Kids are being taught there is no right or wrong, only what they are feeling inside.  Basically, if it feels good then do it.  I think we are training our children to hate others by disrespecting people in front of our children.  It does no good to tell Junior not to curse when every other word from our own mouths is foul.  How can we expect our kids to respect others when we are so quick to flip the bird at the guy who cut us off in traffic this morning?

Granted, not every child who curses will grow into a shooter, and there's really no way to know for sure who will and who won't become violent.  The point is that when we treat others with respect, we are sending a message to others to do the same.  Hate breeds hate, and when the world is full of hate, what then?