Love. It is an intense feeling of deep affection.

Something all humans feel whether it’s toward a

friend, family members, significant other, even a pet. Animals too can feel the emotion of love in their
own way. But as the law of the universe states, everything has an opposite whether it is good or bad. Up
has down, right has left, in has out, creation has destruction. Then, there is love; it is one of the best, yet
worst things a human can experience. One can only know what love means if they
know what it feels like to hate an idea, thing, or person. It is a word that is not so easily described. It is a
feeling that rushes over you; adrenaline is through the roof, muscles all feel ten times stronger, the grip
of the cup your holding gets tighter, there is no other objective than to get rid of the thing that is in front
of you. The question is, what is it?

The thing about love is that it varies from liking someone to adoring them. Liking in simpler
terms is having a crush on a girl (or guy) you see at school. How they look physically is appealing. Maybe
it’s the dress, maybe it’s the new hair color of brown that complements their skin, but despite how
physically appearing, you still nonetheless don’t know who they are. Adoring, on the other hand, you
want to know them in and out. You want to know what their passions are. This does not always apply to
a significant other. It can also apply to family. When parents have a child they only want to see their
little ones grow into something beautiful. This philosophy of love can also be between the two who
starts the family: the husband and the wife. Even so, this does not always mean the love is mutual. Love
like the nature of things can evaporate if it is not true and if there is no effort put into it. One side may
always be trying harder than the other; thus,
the foundation built just crumbles. The harsh thing about the real world is that not everyone is always
going to support you or be by your side; This is why as regain.us states you have to, “put yourself first”.

To continue, it is not said that breakups and losing feelings aren’t normal situations. What’s not
‘normal’ is the fact that when two couples know (subliminally) that things are different, the couples
continue to ‘love’ each other. This is displayed between Sethe and her husband (Henry) in Beloved
where on page.31 the reader is given a perspective on how the marriage was; where Sethe and Henry
only ever saw other in full daylight on one, single day. As if every other day with each other was taken
for granted. Feeling as numb towards each other as “(speaking and touching or eating) in darkness.”
Where if they and other failing marriages were truly in love, they’d love every second of every minute
being able to look at each other in the eyes that told each other ‘I do’ admiring one another. This is not
loving and it is not hate: this is emptiness. Something Toni Morrison displays beautifully through Sethe’s
character. Then there is abusive love: when one is too protective over their significant other, where one
is filled with jealousy of any little thing, and where the love they display is physically/emotionally violent.
A loving relationship should be based on equality and respect and revolve around “power and control”
(as loveisrespect. Org states). This is an enormous problem in today’s society. One would think that as
humans, we’d improve on the things we struggle with, yet, there is still slavery around hidden in
different forms such as human trafficking something from hundreds of years ago much alive. Although it
is considered to have ‘ended’, there is still a fragment left enough to keep the memory in the history of
the world: racism. This evokes a fear I have about love because if there are abusive relationships that
will ‘eventually end’, what is left in the scraps of all the chaos? What I see is agony which is severe
especially in teenagers. It is a problem that has “rose significantly” states mailman.columbia.edu.
Although it is treatable,
it is becoming too common. So another question arises: are people depressed due to the hatred of the
world or because of the love the world has to offer?

Moving forward, there are some who try their best to love. Avoiding at all costs to become the
one who hurts their loves. But we all get hurt if we truly care. Otherwise, like a lover being a complete
stranger, we can care less about what one has to say. So, what is justifiable in love? Can you go through
pain for your lover and call this right? Is it justice if you let them learn the hard way in order to
understand certain things like why they can’t go to the park or why you had to lie to them as a
parent? When are things too much? Not only is this concept of what’s right in love presented in
Beloved, but it is also represented in other books, movies, and tv shows such as YOU where a
protagonist is a man who fell in love with a girl trying to better her life through force by getting rid of
people, threatening those who intended wrong upon her, stalking her making sure she’s okay every
second. How does this connect to Beloved and love? It brings up what can be justified because of things
done out of love. As Beloved takes the real story of a mother who killed her child in order to prevent her
from experiencing slavery, the show YOU takes a man who does not want his quote and quotes
girlfriend to suffer. So to what extent is doing anything for someone right? Is the Margaret Garner case a
good point in how far one is willing for the ones they care for? It all depends on what one believes in
morally. Who can say it’s right to kill someone, so they won’t live a life of torture.
After all, as Sethe has stated, she was only trying to outhurt the hurter,

Let’s change topics for a second, love is great and all but what about hate? Is it a good thing to
have hate? Well, is it a positive thing to be negative? The obvious answer is of course not, but we need
the bad things in life to grow. We need to experience the downsides of life to be able to have ups. Other
we’d go insane being happy all the time knowing there are things one should not smile about. But this
does not make hatred any lighter. It is a symbol that weighs heavy on the heart. It devil in disguise. It is
an unending storm of words that are the sharpest like a knife, yet the thinnest thing like a single hair
strand. It spreads like wildfire and like slavery, it is not at all dead. Hitler used Jewish as a scapegoat and
caused many to hate them while German Nazi’s were adored in the eyes of others who hated the
Jewish. America’s president (Donald Trump) used hate speech on minorities (specifically Mexicans) to
build his follower gain as a politician. Bullies and bystanders build hate which leads to school shooters.
Hate is evil in its purest form. That is why when someone states “that is too strong of a word”, hate is
not the right way to describe disliking someone or being jealous of someone. Hate is wanting to see
someone or something suffer a thousand times over and over until they say stop, and it still continues.
The scary part of hate is the fact that it grows in social media which results in “hate-driven murders”
states snopes.com. Beloved also display this during the scene of the four horsemen coming to Sethe.
When Schoolteacher sees what happened (the murder of a child) he feels no remorse and the only thing
he can think of is “she was the one who pressed my collars the way I like it.” School Teacher has no hate
it’s more or less disappointment, but the one filled with hate who wished for slavery to be a thing of the
imagination are the former slaves. But even they feel numb because the hate of the white man was
greater.

Consequently, love isn’t always a good thing and hate is simply never good. So where does the
line drawn for the difference between love and hate? It is a grey line, blurred by the worlds' depiction on
what is considered right by society. The theme of good versus evil derives from the idea of love against
hate constantly bashing one another for the upper hand. Even in children's movies like Cinderella or
Snow White depict a woman needing a man to the rescue. A lover in a suit of armor but how true is this?
In Pinocchio, his nose grows for lying, but what about trying to protect someone? Would lying still be
bad? What about this idea of finding a soul mate? Does it mean a lover? Dog? Friend? Children? God?
What if someone who considers hate is truly displaying their form of love in the purest version? Is it
considered evil? Perspectives is the answer for all of these questions because depending on where
you're from, how you grew up, what traits you have, no answer is wrong. What’s right to you can be
wrong to someone else and what’s wrong to you can be right to someone else.

Growing up I had an okay family. I mean they always fed me, kept me well dressed, loved and
taken care of me, and I love them for wanting me in their lives. They are more than okay. They’re great!
We’re not perfect, and we have our issues but doesn’t every family? Yet, even if we were perfect, I still
felt something missing, and I do to this day. What is it? I don’t know. I can’t tell for sure. All I know is
that I want to love from someone outside of my family. I want to find a young beautiful woman who
would want me as much as I’d want them or is it the fact that I want a best friend like my father and
mother have. Or do I want to experience the unconditional love of an animal to a human? I wish I knew.
The only thing I can honestly reflect on about love is the fact that in every relationship I have and have
been in, I am completely unbiased in the sense of the things I could have done better. I could have been
a little less jealous, I could have been more front about my emotions, and I could have been more
sincere about my intentions as a boyfriend, brother, son, and friend. I’m young, and I have many more
relationships to build and learn from, I just hope I don’t lose my way in the hatred of the world.

MLA Citations

Morrison, Toni, et al. ​Beloved.​ 10-18, 2015.

Palma, Bethania. “'The Ladder Down to Hell': How Social Media Breeds Hate Speech.” ​Snopes.com​, 19
Mar. 2019, ​www.snopes.com/news/2019/03/21/anti-muslim-hate-speech-rising/.

School of Public Health. “Depression Is on the Rise in the U.S., Especially Among Young Teens.” ​Search
the Website​, 30 Oct. 2017,
www.mailman.columbia.edu/public-health-now/news/depression-rise-us-especially-among-young-teen
s.

“The Importance Of Family Love For Emotional Well-Being.” ​Regain​, 4 Sept. 2018,
www.regain.us/advice/love/the-importance-of-family-love-for-emotional-well-being/.

“Why People Abuse.” ​Loveisrespect.org​, Health Care Service Company, 9 May 2016,
www.loveisrespect.org/is-this-abuse/why-people-abuse/.