Scorn

Of all human interaction, perhaps nothing is more volatile and dangerous than scorn. Scorn is a wildfire which will as quickly burn down the house of the scorner as the scorned.

Scorn may be the spoken word, but it is just as often a silence when there should have been a word of support or defence. It may as easily be a gesture, a dismissive wave, or even an unwanted hand on your body that says, “I may do with you as I like.” In our electronic era, scorn can be digitized as a meme, a tweet, or even an emoticon.

Scorn is a barb sunk deep into the soul of the receiver. And although we may be confident that there is no fair basis for having been scorned, the spear nevertheless sinks deep into the depths of our souls, carrying a virus which will fester and contaminate our entire beings. Scorn is never forgotten, the hurt and anger as fresh today as decades ago.

Even to the strong of spirit, received scorn is darkening, distracting, and destructive. At the very least, it becomes the hundred kilogram backpack, weighing you down and holding you back. Even the strong and self-confident will be distracted by the false whispers of scorn, but a gentler soul may be robbed even of the will to venture, condemned to waste away in a dark harbour.

Scorn harms not just the scorned, but also the scorner, leaving a stain and a stench upon his soul. The habitual scorner gains a reputation as a callow jackass, and soon finds he has only friends like himself. The more disrespect you dish out, the more disrespected you become.

Scorn has a child, and its name is revenge. The scorned soul seeks a solace, a deliverance, from the dark and deprecating mockery of the scorn, and the most readily apparent remedy is revenge. Lashing out at the scorner, “getting even”, and “making him eat his words” may seem a sweet candy, food for a ravenous soul, but it too is poison.

Scorn is a virus which enters your cells, where it will replicate itself and burst out to infect all around you, friend and enemy alike, breeding such monsters as civil strife, genocide, and poverty of spirit.

Perhaps in the last half-decade, no words have had a more profound effect on our collectivity than “a basket of deplorables”. A catchy soundbite, perhaps, a laugh and a smirking confirmation to the cool insiders, but a spark that set ablaze angry and bitter politics which will not soon be extinguished. Scorn inevitably turns on the scorner.

Once uttered, scorn cannot be recalled. It’s no wonder that the Psalmist cries out, “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.”