There are better ways we can transform this virulent hatred - by

Hear the wise counsel of Helen Thomas, the indomitable voice of American journalism, who declared: “There are better ways we can transform this virulent hatred—by living our ideals, the Peace Corps, exchange students, teachers, exporting our music, poetry, blue jeans.” These words carry both urgency and vision. They remind us that hatred cannot be conquered by force alone, nor by silence, but by the living witness of culture, compassion, and shared humanity. Hatred is fire; to feed it with violence only spreads the flames. But to answer it with understanding, with the simple gifts of human connection, is to quench it at its root.

The meaning is profound: hatred thrives when peoples are strangers to one another, when fear is greater than familiarity. But when nations exchange their sons and daughters as students, when teachers cross borders, when music and poetry are shared, when even the common garment—the blue jeans—travels farther than the sword, then enmity dissolves. For people see not enemies but fellow travelers. They hear the laughter, taste the bread, wear the cloth, sing the songs, and realize that behind the walls of politics, humanity beats with one heart.

History itself testifies to this truth. Consider the Peace Corps, founded in 1961, which sent young Americans into villages and towns across the world, not with weapons but with hands eager to work, to teach, to build. Where suspicion had lingered, friendships were forged. Where hostility had threatened, bridges were raised. Or consider the Cold War exchanges—American jazz musicians traveling to the Soviet Union, where their music broke through ideological walls. Dizzy Gillespie’s trumpet, Louis Armstrong’s voice, carried a message no propaganda could silence: that beauty unites even where governments divide.

Helen Thomas’s mention of poetry carries a deeper weight. For poetry is the distilled soul of a people, the heartbeat of its language and dreams. To share it is to reveal the depths of human feeling, and in that revelation, strangers become kin. Think of Pablo Neruda’s verses crossing oceans, or Langston Hughes’s words inspiring not only Americans but oppressed peoples worldwide. A single poem, translated into another tongue, can dissolve the armor of prejudice and remind enemies of their shared humanity.

Even the mention of blue jeans is no accident. For they are not lofty, but humble—a garment worn by workers and youth alike. When American blue jeans found their way into Eastern Europe during the Cold War, they became symbols of freedom, of connection to a wider world. Hatred cannot withstand such ordinary intimacies. It withers when people see each other not as distant abstractions, but as neighbors with similar desires, similar hungers, similar joys.

The lesson is eternal: to transform hatred, we must live our ideals visibly. Ideals kept only in speech or on paper are powerless. But when embodied in service, in art, in everyday life, they become forces stronger than enmity. The poet must write, the teacher must teach, the traveler must cross borders, the musician must play, and the citizen must wear their ideals in the choices of daily living. Hatred shrinks before such light, for it cannot long survive in the presence of shared humanity.

Practical steps follow. Engage with cultures not your own—learn their songs, read their poets, taste their food. Support programs of exchange, teaching, and service abroad. Share your own culture generously, not with arrogance but with openness, offering your art and your stories as gifts. And in your daily life, be an ambassador of peace, living in such a way that others see the ideals of justice, compassion, and kindness made flesh.

Thus Helen Thomas’s words endure: “There are better ways we can transform this virulent hatred—by living our ideals, the Peace Corps, exchange students, teachers, exporting our music, poetry, blue jeans.” Let them remind us that hatred is not eternal, but a shadow that dissolves in the presence of human connection. The task is not to destroy the enemy, but to turn the enemy into a friend—through the beauty of art, the humility of service, and the courage of lived ideals.