Based on what I have learned of how man is now, I believe that there have always been two things in all of us - seeing meaning and the desire to elevate oneself as the only thing meaningful by trashing everything else. The former has made for true art, real religion, honest science, accurate love and so much more. The latter has made for the mental insufficiency that makes up cynicism, racism, religious bigotry, greed-based economics, and the Republican Party. The first makes one proud, the other ashamed.