Allport distinguished rational hatred from character-conditioned hatred rooted in frustrated personalities

Evidence

Citing Fromm, Allport further distinguished rational hatred (for those who pose severe, realistic threats to one’s life or values) from “character conditioned” hatred arising from a lifetime of disappointments and frustration (see Duckitt, ch. 24 this volume). In the latter case, hatred is not meaningfully connected to the source of the frustration; rather, the individual “thinks up some convenient victim and some good reason. The Jews are conspiring against him, or the politicians are set on making things worse” (1954/1979, p. 364). In other words, hatred of this type is a function of personality abnormalities rather than being rationally targeted at groups that pose realistic threats. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 2246

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies Allport’s rational vs character-conditioned hatred distinction, useful baseline for the personality-level accounts.