Why Talk Across Party Lines
The political popularity of the inspiring but relatively inexperienced Barack Obama is one of many signs that many Americans are increasingly frustrated by the way that divisions of ideology, race, and religion are affecting our lives. People are beginning to notice that it is far too rare to have honest, authentic, and non-combative dialogue about social and political issues that affect us individually and collectively. The almost universally bombastic tone of political discourse on television and radio re-enforces the sense that we can no longer have civil discourse with people outside of our narrow demographic and ideological niche.
This site envisions a different possibility – one in which Americans have shed our grandparents’ admonitions about talking about religion and politics, and humbly but courageously engage others, even those who see the world very differently. Our vision is that people can muster the willingness and learn the skills that will equip us to talk with co-workers, neighbors, acquaintances, and others about various aspects of our society– from political candidates, government policies, workplace decisions that affect us all, to cultural developments – in a way that is healthy, invigorating, and that leads to increased understanding.
The uniqueness and depth of each person means that we can always discover more about those we are similar to and know well. But there is special richness in coming to hear and perhaps understand the perspective of those who do share our same ideologies about politics, religion, race, gender, and other aspects of our individual and collective selves. Interestingly, no matter who we are, we are all subject to biases about these issues, even if we know that such biases don’t represent our best selves, and are not good for our democracy. So we thought that that a good place to start would some individual and collective honest exploration of these biases. By taking the survey and answering it honestly, we have a chance for us to honestly reflect on the ways that our political preferences might run counter to our highest vision of ourselves. By looking at the collective results, we can see that we are not alone, and that few of us fully live up to our aspirations of being completely bias-free. Our learning is not complete however, unless we engage each other in some honest sharing and genuine curiosity about how we and others came to be the way we are. A discussion page within the site allows for this in writing. Our real hope is that people use the survey as the starting point for verbal conversations, with all the additional richness therein. (A dialogue guide will be coming on-line soon).
Our hope is that by honest conversation across lines of difference about our prejudices, we can lay the groundwork for conversations about our democracy that are less about demonizing and blaming our political “enemies”, and more about finding ways to find our common connection.
David Campt – The RaceDoctor
Talking Across Party Lines
