Independent Journalist Revati Laul talks to SheThePeople.TV on her new project, The Anatomy of Hate, why it's important to understand what/ who makes up a mob, and how in unpeeling the layers, she discovers an inconvenient truth -- it could easily be you or me. So what turns someone into a perpetrator of mob violence? Is what she wants to examine in this project.
Well aware that the 2002 riots in Gujarat remains a sensitive and polarising issue, the former NDTV journalist says she turned to crowd-funding, as she was unable to secure institutional funding for her work. The project comprises a book and a website, The Anatomy of Hate, which aims to be a repository of information on hate crimes, genocides and mass violence worldwide, drawing on the best scholars and articles on offer.
IN HER OWN WORDS: Revati Laul to SheThePeople.TV
The Anatomy Of Hate is a non-fiction narrative, a journalistic venture that talks about 3 people who have committed hate crimes in a mob, in a Hindu lynch mob in the state of Gujarat in 2002. The story is really about what hatred is from the inside out. There has been reams written about the 2002 violence, but it’s either about the politics around it, or it’s about what the plight of the victims has been.
We’ve never looked at the perpetrators. We’ve looked at maybe the class or the caste they come from, but we’ve never looked at them as individuals. What I’m trying to do is look at three perpetrators to see what it’s like to be one of them. The reason for this is, I feel unless we look at the perpetrators of mass violence or a genocide, we won’t understand what hatred is.
The reason for this is, I feel unless we look at the perpetrators of mass violence or a genocide, we won’t understand what hatred is.
It’s too far-removed, it’s too comfortable, too convenient, and unless we look at this inconvenient truth, which implicates all of us, because if you look at it closely and unpeel the layers, you can see how you could be one of them.
When that happens, the politics of that space begins to open up — we can both see how the hatred happens and how to change it. That’s what this book is really about.
Photo courtesy: https://theanatomyofhateblog.wordpress.com
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