"If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility." -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

If I am killed in a terrorist attack before or after this article posts, my words still stand.

You've read that right. I love terrorists.

I love them because I love people. I love the idea that no matter what they have done, there are still those little shreds of humanity left.

Love equals understanding, so if love is too strong, let us use the term "understand".

I understand them, those people who instill fear in others because they believe it is for the greater good. There are no "terrorists", but people who perform terroristic attacks.

We need to remember this because once we place that label of "terrorist", we remove that reality of "human". The only true terrorist is hatred. It attacks our brain, destroying our common sense, and deteriorates at our ability to love.

Maybe if we saw the heartbreak in their chest, the parents they lost, the child that was taken or the distress they felt as the result of another human being, we might lower our weapons long enough to see that they were fighting for the same reasons we were.

I don't watch the news, but I watch the way humans interact with one another. We scream and cuss over the opinions of others. I hate you's and go die's fall harder than the bombs we want to launch at those who wrong us.

We watch "civilized" men holler at each other about how the other is wrong, screaming so loud that they are unable to remember how to use the ears they were gifted with, with the hearing they were born with.

The human instinct to love and understand has evolved into the need to worry about only yourself.

Since we invaded Iraq in 2003, war has increased sevenfold worldwide. We fought this war, claiming we are "fighting for peace", but doesn't fighting for peace make just as much sense as constructing to destruct?

Hatred cannot fight hatred. So instead we need to lower our guns, diffuse our bombs and fight with the words that Ralph C. Smedley gave us.

"Understanding comes through communication, and through understanding, we find peace."

My mother always taught me that I am only human. I am Caucasian and a female. But these are not the things that define me. These are not the things that are meant to shape my life or my beliefs.

I believe there is not a single life that is worth more or less than another, even with the things they may or may not have done.

There are not bad people, just those who do bad things.