The License to Hate
There is a reason the children of the powerful occupy such a central place in our moral imagination. They represent continuity in a society defined by rupture. When Nigerians debate, once again, whether it is justified to resent them, the argument is not about manners or cruelty. It is about whether inherited advantage, especially when produced by public harm, can ever be separated from the conditions that made it possible.
Is it justified to hate the children of politicians and billionaires?
The respectable answer is supposed to be no.
Children did not choose their parents. They did not loot the treasury. They did not rig elections. They did not sign the contracts. To resent them is to commit a moral error. Guilt by association. A failure of empathy. An indulgence in envy.
This answer is neat, comforting, and insufficient.
It assumes that resentment is always about individual moral...



