I've recently been struck by a thought that a large portion of the left has an often irrational hatred of the wealthy.
The hatred usually manifests labelling the richest as some abstract "1%" to distance them from the rest of the society, which isn't bad in itself, but such a division does raise one hell of a call to dehumanize the wealthy.
An example is the infamous "Will the 1% kill all of us off" from this very site, which basically denied the wealthy's capability to feel human empathy, or a post I saw on Reddit, where the author postulated replacing racism with hating the richest 1%.
Also, it may be just Godwin talking, but when another "how much does the richest few own" study is made, I sometimes feel like there are some parallels to Nazis emphasizing how much of the finance industry is Jew-controlled - trying to fuel hatred to a group by showing how much more it has then you.
In fact, some left-wingers (like Pope Joan from this very site) often say they can't judge the rich in an equal way, showing that even if they don't hate a rich, they certainly are biased.
However, I don't think it applies to the whole left - the lighter sections of it are more-or-less immune from such hatred. It's the more hardline left (though not necessarily non-capitalists) that indulges in it.
And what are your thoughts on the matter?
