Transcript:
In the last lesson we spoke about the two leading political ideologies, liberalism and conservatism, and how they might be related to differences in common personality traits. Today let’s talk about how we talk about politics.
My Name is Shaun McMillan and this is the Best Class Ever.
Framing Matters
Another issue is framing. Every ideal or value can be framed using positive language, or framed using negative framing. The same value, patriotism, can also be described negatively as nationalism or ethnocentrism. The need for security can be described as fear. Diversity and inclusivity can be framed negatively as identity politics.
Add to this our proclivity for hyperbole, the tendency to overstate things using the most extreme words we can find, and we have a perfect storm for even the most basic expressions about political opinion to sound really offensive.
So to put it very crudely, liberals look down on conservatives for being fascist fundamentalists. Conservatives look down on liberals for being dangerous unpatriotic radicals. And Centrists look down on both for not being able to see each other’s value.
Maybe It Comes Down to Views about Morality
Confirmation Bias
One theory is that ultimately it all comes down to our views on morality. There is a popular social scientist named Jonathan Haidt who recently wrote a book titled, “The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics & Religion.” He said that “intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.” This means that we listen to our gut instinct and then go out looking for evidence to support our initial idea. This leads to confirmation bias. We tend to see support for our ideas, and irrationally ignore or easily dismiss evidence to the contrary.
Straw Man Arguments
We build up straw man arguments, or easy to defeat representations of our opponent’s view, and then beat those artificial representations into submission. The last and final step is to smugly declare victory. It’s embarrassing to have it pointed out to you after you do it, but we all do it. It shows that we don’t really take the time to truly consider opposing views. It’s an unflattering feature of being a walking contradiction.
Sacred Symbols
The second reason we do this, pointed out by Jonathan Haidt is, “morality binds and blinds.” When people circle around sacred objects they are more easily able to trust each other and collaborate. The sacred object does not necessarily have to be a god or religious in nature, but it can just as easily be a flag, a document like the Constitution, a cause, or an institution like family, church, or science itself. Jonathon pointed out that atheists use science as their sacred object interpreting wrongly that science is automatically on their side. And then they fall into the same unflattering behavior they see in believers. They take up a smug attitude despising those with different values.
Loyalty, Authority, & Sanctity
In fact, Haidt, like other political science researchers are finding that asking about a person’s morality might be a more accurate way of differentiating people than asking them where they fall on the liberal/conservative spectrum. Asking people how they feel about loyalty, authority, and sanctity in particular show high correlations with how they see themselves on the left-right political opinion dimension. In fact, they found that a person’s attitude toward sanctity was the most powerful predictor of attitudes on many culture-war issues, particularly abortion, biomedical issues (such as stem cell research) and sexual issues.
Tension Creates Stability
Allowing every side with such extreme differences to have a voice may seem volatile in the short term, but is quite resilient and adaptable in the long-term. Like a pendulum that swings heavily one way and then the other, but keeps swinging nonetheless.
When everyone has a voice, it might be loud and even noisy, but the real danger comes when one side is allowed to shut out the voice of opposition. Without an outlet for expression, resentment will build until it spills out in ugly ways. I think that’s what we saw in early 2021 when the state capital was overrun by protestors.
What is the proper response to something so monumentally disruptive? Disruptive chaos like this is destabilizing and is being condemned by representatives on all sides. But you might have noticed that each side interprets the events according to their own narratives, and is insensitively dismissing the concerns of the opposing side.
My Personal Experience with Discussing Politics at the Workplace
When I went to work on the day following the crowd’s invasion at the United States capital I told a coworker that I had not watched the news the previous evening but that I was aware of the news. I expressed that I often find such images upsetting and chose to attend an online church service instead. She said it must be nice to be so privileged, inferring that my being white made it easier for me to ignore what’s going on. We both made uninformed speculations about why the treatment by security may or may not be different from other recent protests and she also told me to stop gaslighting her, a term I was not at the time familiar with. Our casual conversation about the subject came to an awkward standstill and I found the whole thing profoundly confusing.
Now looking back I think we both unconsciously fell into each other’s blindspots. Because we don’t share the exact same values and have slightly different cultural backgrounds, I casually disregarded her views, and she casually disregarded mine. It was an easy mistake to make, yet I couldn’t stop thinking about it later that night. How can we act so morally superior to those we share so much in common with? It’s infuriating to have your values which mean so much to you so casually dismissed.
Religion & Politics
I also heard a student this week say that they did not like to eat at a particular fast food chain because of the owner’s position on gay rights, claiming that the owner was immoral. I found it ironic because the owner of this organization openly associates with Christian religious views, so expressing his views on gay rights could be seen as couragously taking a stand in the name of morality. Especially considering how unpopular and politically incorrect that position would be considered by more recent standards. From his point of view he is being morally upright for doing so, but she is accusing him of being immoral for doing so. It just goes to show you how closely political views and religious views differentiate people in similar ways.
Etymology
The words itself, conservatism, sounds like it means conserving the past. Liberals, which we have established as being more open to new ideas, is typically seen as a far more progressive platform. For anyone who experiments with new ideas a lot, we know that most new ideas fail. But the ones that succeed can change the world in profound ways. Conservatives are careful not to disregard the ideals built into our institutions. Perhaps what keeps America moving forward is our liberal willingness to try new things, while conserving the wisdom built into our institutions so that we don’t change too fast, or throw out the baby with the bathwater. It is the tension between the two that keeps us moving forward without going off the rails.
In the next lesson I would like to discuss the importance of speaking well and listening well. And when is it appropriate to get angry? Even Jesus turned the tables of the tax collectors when he got angry, so let’s discuss righteous indignation in the next lesson.
Have you ever had your own blindspot pointed out to you, or gotten into a frustrating discussion with someone you thought shared your views? Share with us your experience in the comments or feel free to visit me at www.BestClassEver.org.
