You've got to be carefully taught!

You've got to be taught to hate and fear.
You've got to be taught from year to year,
It's got to be drummed in your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught!

You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made
And people whose skin is a different shade
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate
You've got to be carefully taught!

Love is quite different.
It grows by itself.
It will grow like a weed
On a mountain of stones;
You don't have to feed
Or put fat on its bones;
It can live on a smile
Or a note of a song;
It may starve for a while,
But it stumbles along,
Stumbles along with its banner unfurled,
The joy and the beauty, the hope of the world.

Oscar Hammerstein II