'The people' vs. real people

By DOVID BEN-MEIR
Planet "Internet" is often called the "virtual" world. Now virtual conjures up a vision of, well, people with good virtues. But of course that isn't necessarily so: there's a lot of stuff on the Internet that it can be downright ugly and evil.
Examples I've found of ugliness – combined with prejudice and ignorance, which altogether is a mighty triple whammy – can be found in those FB pages dedicated to what purports to be a good "cause" but really aren't.
For instance: there are all those good persons who are all for "the people". They wanna stand up for "the people", especially the "little guy". [Btw: that isn't a height thing, for in that case they'd wanna stand up for the "vertically challenged" person, which is a logical thing to do since you can't see the small guy in a crowd even when he does stand up, so go ahead and stand up for him!] These good-intentioned persons love "the people", fight for the rights of "the people" and speak for "the people" who have no voice.
The only thing is that I often find that while these supposed do-gooders (or FB-gooders, to be more exact) love "the people" – in truth they can't stand people! They are in love with an ideological agenda for the abstract "people", but they neither know nor really care for actual people who have real lives and actual problems to solve. If they have to sacrifice the well-being of real people for the abstract good of "the people" – well, that's just the way it's gotta be.
I remember sitting in the lunchroom in high-school, when being sympathetic, (theoretically, of course, from the comfort of the U.S.) to socialism or communism was chic, and being a capitalist was as evil as Snidley Whiplash tying poor dear Nell to the train tracks. And yet – I had this argument, and wanting to be chic ('cause I wasn't good at sports, so what else can a guy do to survive the popularity contest that's called high school?) I took a pro Red-China stand. The guy arguing with me, who was a red head (really) who got near a 100% score on his SAT test, said that Mao had killed tens of millions of people – which clearly showed that Communism was an evil doctrine. I remember to this day what I replied – because I am deeply shamed of it to this day and deeply regret it. I said – if that's what it takes for the good of "the people" – then so be it! You see – I didn't have any real life experience, so I was for "the people" but not for people.
The same is true when I see some FB pages where people are all for "the Palestinians", but they're not actually for the welfare of real Arabs who live in the Holy Land. There are people who blame Israel for everything bad that happens – because they accept the propaganda disseminated against the Jewish state by the corrupt Arab leadership. That leadership doesn't even have to be corrupt – it's enough that they're for "the people", while they let their real people suffer. I try to tell these good souls: look, it is Hamas that is making the lives of Gazans a living hell. Hamas prefers "the resistance" over the welfare of the people that are in principle under their care. So building materials will go to the military before they go to reconstruction. But if those FB-gooders, who repeat the Hamas propaganda and blame Israel for Hamas' mistakes, were to love people, the welfare of people, as opposed to "the people" (and I'm not talking about those with an anti-Semitic agenda) – they would be doing their utmost to get Hamas removed so that the actual people can get on with their lives.
I remember one festive occasion, years ago, when an elderly rabbi who had personally known Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Cook, said this about him: What was unique about the rabbi was that not only did he love the Jewish nation, he loved every individual Jew.
So please – don't love "the people" – love real people! Think how you can actually help people, real people of flesh, bone and soul.