Source: Bigstock

Some of the commentary that followed the articles was so vile that I wondered whether it accurately represented the state of mind of those who wrote it, or whether they thought up this vileness especially for the internet:

Grind them [the rioters] up for animal food, hopefully pig slop.

The commentators soon moved on from Stockholm and Sweden to Mexico, Mexicans, and the famous”€”or infamous”€”proposed wall:

We gotta dig a bad ass trench for the wall’s foundation, line it with invader criminal corpses and fill with concrete.

Worse, perhaps, was:

By deport, we mean send them 6 feet under. Use the bodies to fill the coyotes”€™ tunnels along the border and there will be a lot fewer uneducated, marginal gardeners and housekeepers for the faux rich and multinational corporations to exploit in the blue hives.

I presume that what the writer meant by the blue hives were the states (such as New York and California) that voted Democrat in the recent election; but what was particularly unpleasant about this last comment was that it was clearly written by an intelligent and educated man and not by a high school dropout. It breathes a hatred and resentment so strong that it overcomes all reason. The writer evidently does not believe or understand that a desire to kill and dishonorably inter hundreds of thousands or millions of human beings should not be expressed, and that decency requires that one controls one’s darkest thoughts. To express them is to encourage and strengthen them.

I am against political correctness and in favor of freedom of expression, but I am against the coarsening of thought and language. The latter will lead in the end to one of two things, or both: vileness of conduct or censorship.