Has a healthy, amicable conversation about politics ever been documented? Or even religion, for that matter. Why are these two topics of discussion so extremely polarizing? You can’t discuss them in public without someone throwing up their hands and saying, “Woah, woah, woah!” What happened (or is currently happening) to create this divide, where there is no middle ground? There is only right vs. left, right vs. wrong, etc. Actually, this is not strictly limited to religion and politics. Basically, any disagreement, we can no longer see anything from another’s point of view. And should your point be proven incorrect, no matter how miniscule the detail may have been, the fear of being wrong drives people to dig in further, inhibiting their chance to grow intellectually. You could actually know or understand that you are incorrect amidst an argument and still argue your point. Is it the thrill of competition? A sense of power over another? A self-fulfilling fantasy that you cannot possibly be wrong about anything or have been fed the wrong information? A lot of times, the other person in this discourse/argument is not even listening to the other’s conjecture; he or she is just waiting for their moment to speak. With this erosion of conversation, a person merely just waiting to speak seems like a monumental win. Nowadays, if you can’t get your thoughts out as clearly or as quickly as another person may desire, you will just as quickly be interrupted, thus not allowing for any further learning or development to occur.
I am currently in the midst of a “religious education” (I refuse to say that it is an awakening) among a couple of believing friends and am also involved in a political deliberation with a self-titled Republican friend. We agree and disagree, but the main goal is to learn and we enter each conversation under the impression that we will move forward peacefully if we have different views. This is not easy and I cannot understand the basic reason of why. I find myself considering how I handled myself on a certain topic that we may have (respectfully) disagreed upon and I often get a sick taste in my mouth at how I reacted. It is kind of like that feeling you get when you look back at some of the Facebook posts or Tweets you wrote year (or days) ago and contemplate not just how you thought of what you had posted, but how those thoughts made it past the built-in filters that (SHOULD) exist to hinder pressing “post.” How could I possibly react with anger or immaturity when I actively tell myself before beginning the conversation, to not let anything boil over? Are we as humans born this way or have we been programmed to think this way? May it is not an either/or question.
I am guilty of everything that I just screamed about in the first paragraph, though not to the extremes that we are subjected to on a daily basis on the news and social media (thankfully). Self-reflection is paramount for growth, but only if you can be honest with yourself. Being honest with yourself is harder than the words suggest. It may be an insurmountable task for most, myself included. How can you maintain strict objectivity when you love yourself so much? I love who I am and will be the first to tell you that I feel that I am right 90% of the time. On all topics. What happens when I meet someone who feels the same strength in their beliefs and is correct 90% of the time in their mind, but our views differ greatly? Do we just scream at each other until we are light headed?
Our society is being shaped, and to a large degree has already been shaped, by who can scream the loudest, who can say the most witty comment, who can find the most dirt on another person to prove that he or she is indeed a terrible, abhorrent person and obviously cannot be trusted. This is a frightening examination and an alarming path that we, as humans, are following. Thinking critically about your actions and thoughts is difficult to do because it is sometimes uncomfortable and impossible to see further than your own subjectivity on any issue. Unfortunately, the difficult path must be taken, but it may prove even more ambitious to get anyone to realize where that path begins.