And the winner is...

CALIFORNIA!

That's right, beautiful California has the highest number of hate groups (84) in the United States, leading Texas (66) and third-place Florida (56). My home state, Illinois, is getting its ass kicked (23) by New Jersey (40). Come on guys, we've got nearly 1.5 times more people than them (IL: 12,852,548 NJ:8,685,920). I think we can be doing a bit better than 23, and really, can we diversify a bit more? All our hate groups are of the same ilk: white supremacy. But overall, I think we - as a nation - are doing much better at showing our xenophobic nature (our 'true colors' if you will).

According the Southern Poverty Law Center, the number of "neo-Nazis, white nationalists, neo-Confederates, skinheads and others - have grown in number by 54%." With Obama in the White House, the economy in the crapper, and Mexico on the verge of spilling over into Texas, these numbers are only likely to rise.

I wish I knew the remedy for the type of stupidity that leads to racism and hate. Sadly, I'm a mere graduate student, and not a very good one. But I do have this to say: The more they scream, the less they have to say. The more the media screech the same message at the top of their lungs, the more likely they are to be wrong. The more inflammatory the rhetoric, the less substance there is to support it. The more black-and-white the presentation . . . you get the point.

A friend of mine recently said that the whole situation (meaning everything from the corporate-ization of the world, to the atrocities in Africa, to the systematic profiling of Americans by the police, to the unwarranted tracking of places of worship and homes) is simply too overwhelming. Sadly, he's right. And sadly, many people respond to this overwhelmingness by giving up and focusing on what is immediately in front of them rather than turning to address the world.

The problem with pure hate and with hate groups is that there is no logic or argument that can undermine them. They are devoid of true logic. Thus, they are immune to it. They start with a grievance, find a target, make up some excuse to attack the target (often using misinterpretations of history and/or religion), and then re-frame reality to match their explanations.

So what do can we do when even California, that basin of granola-loving-tree-hugging lefties, is being overrun by hate? In times like this, I like to think back to high school, when morality, purpose, and direction seemed so clear. During these painful, pimple-filled years, I filled my time with Orwell, Kafka, and (my love) Vonnegut Jr. And it was Vonnegut who most clearly explained what one should do.

In his book Player Piano, the main character joins an organization called The Ghost Shirts to oppose an impending technology-spawed class war. Unbeknown to him, the Ghost Shirt movement, from which the organization got its name, was pretty much a failure. The founding Native Americans were not able to stop the encroachment of the Americans and were massacred for their movement. At the end of the book, when everyone realizes their opposition was futile and that they couldn't stop the wheels of progress, they realize that their mission was not to win in the moment but to give hope to future generations.

However romantic and toothless it sounds, there is a whole lotta truth to this realization. We must get it into to the record book that we tried to stop it. We must show up as blips in the history books as those who stood against hate and confronted intolerance, even if it ended up leading to nothing. Even if all we can do is scratch at the mountain, we have to do something.

So get to work.