Or anything else really?

I think hating is under-rated. Or perhaps “like-ing” is over-rated.

We are invited to “like” ad nauseum -- the most visible example being social networking, but that isn’t the only example. Do you like this top? Do you like your soup? Did you like the movie?

Isn’t “like” sometimes a placeholder for other words, such as “approve”? As in, Do you approve of this top?

And if it is (even if only at times) used as a placeholder for “approve”, can “hate” be a placeholder for something too? Perhaps for not-approving?

Wondering what changes when I think about what it means to step away from habitual phrasing of terms. What does it mean to think about hating something versus, not-approving of something, some action, some state of the world... Thinking-shifts such as these can be useful ways of turning something we think we know how we feel about, and looking at it from another angle.  

Photo from uberpix.net