The Trying-to-Understand Blog

There is a great article in the New York Times today, written by Matt Flegenheimer. Its title, The Year the News Accelerated to Trump Speed, does a perfect job of telling the reader exactly what the story is about. If you’ve been watching the news. Even if you haven’t, there must be a sense of a whirlwind of news stories happening around you.

Flegenheimer describes the short-attention-span news cycle, with each outrageous day undoing the focus from the previous day. In this atmosphere, the truly important stories get forgotten in a tidal wave of what seem to be newsworthy stories.

There is a disorder of mental health called Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). Marsha Linehan, creator of the gold standard of therapy for BPD, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, describes working with those suffering with BPD as attempting to, “pitch a tent in the middle of a hurricane.” This metaphor also seems appropriate to describe reporting, and reading, the news in 2017. As soon as you get one stake in the ground, the tent starts flying away. As soon as you start looking into one story, another happens, and you’re pulled into a different direction.

There are a few tactics that BPD specialists suggest for coping with such a situation:

• Resist being brought into an argument, or tit-for-tat
• Learn to validate feelings rather than behaviors or ideas
• Focus on yourself and your own needs
• Look at that hurricane as the problem, not blaming the people involved

There could be some really good ways to help journalists and their audience make sense of the world if we are able to work these ideas into our lives.

This might be a lot to ask journalists to learn some therapy techniques, but we seem to be headed into uncharted territory in the United States and news reporting. Perhaps borrowing from psychology could help us all understand the world just a little better.

For further reading:

I Hate You, Don’t Leave Me, by Jerold J. Kreisman, MD, and Hal Straus

Cognitive-Behavioral Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder, by Marsha Linehan

Stop Walking on Eggshells, by Paul T. Mason, MS, and Randi Kreger

Motivational Interviewing: Helping People Change, by William R. Miller and Stephen Rollnick

I was just reading the transcript from a 1988 interview, in which Bill Moyers talks with the historian Barbara Tuchman. Several things stood out in terms of trying to understand the world of today.

In the beginning of the interview, Tuchman laments the lack of vision in the world of 1988. She says that people are not roused into action by the desire to stop something (a negative goal) as much as they are by trying to move toward an inspiring vision of a better future (a positive goal).

This makes intuitive sense. However, the conservative party seems to have been very motivated to stop what they saw as the Obama/Liberal agenda and, “drain the swamp.” And the liberals now seem very motivated to stop the Trump conservatives. Is either party motivated to a great degree by a positive goal or a vision for the future?

This is a question worth thinking about while watching or reading the news.

What is the vision of each party? Are there any other visions outside of these parties? And is there any way to combine the visions, meaning, can we create a unifying, non-partisan vision for the future of the United States?

Tuchman goes on to describe the fallen morals of a society and how moral failure is to blame when some great societies have failed. I’m generally wary of any argument that states the world had once been a better, simpler, safer place and its decline is due to some decline in morals. Later, she wonders if people have just become complacent about things and have accepted the world as it is. She talks about George Washington and draws on him for inspiration, especially that he just kept moving forward to his vision, even in the face of great odds. He did not become complacent.

This idea of complacency seems closer to reality than any lack of morals. The world is full of wonderfully moral people who try, with every inch of their being, to do the right thing. However, there can be an overwhelming sense of pessimism, that one person changing their behavior cannot make any difference in the grand scheme. I have suffered from this pessimism myself. The access to news around the globe has never been greater, and with it, can come that pessimism and complacency.

Tuchman is saying that George Washington would not let this deter him, because he had a vision of a better future. She even quotes William the Silent of the Netherlands who said something like, “it is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere.”

So, what is our vision? What is the better we want to bring to the world, aside from the wrongs that we want to stop? And can we persevere, even at times without hope, toward that vision together?

(Interestingly, Tuchman, in a bit of 1988 prescience, says that with the increasing reliance on fundraising in the political system, that Americans will soon have entertainers in office, rather than people who know what they are doing. Some of this surely stems from having Ronald Reagan as President at that time, but it seems she was also predicting the rise of a Donald Trump-like character. Twenty years early.)

It is not too hard to imagine that a rich person has started life in a better position than a poor person. We say sometimes that the rich person’s “starting line” in the race of life (I guess racing to “success”?) is farther down the field, while a poor person’s is way behind.

We often attribute this to the money they will be given, the schools that they can attend, the help they can afford (private tutors, etc.), and the experiences they will have.

This last one, the experiences they will have, is the unsung hero of their lives.

We use the term “cultural capital” to describe all of the traits a person picks up, just by being around others, that help them make progress in their lives and achieve their dreams.

This can be as simple as having an uncle that runs a large company, and you spend a lot of time at his house as a teenager. You begin to pick up his way of thinking about life, his approach to business, how he talks to his employees on the phone, what he looks for in a business deal. He might not even be explicitly teaching you these things, but these ideas are talked about at the dinner table, and you pick up on them.

When you then begin applying for jobs and working, you will have a head start on the world because you have absorbed a certain knowledge about how things are done. This will be recognized by your employers and you will be rewarded with praise and promotions.

Eventually, because of all of your hard work, you will run your own company.

And then some “liberal jerk” comes and tells you that you can’t be proud of what you did, that you can’t take credit for your hard work and intellect.

Of course you can. You did it, after all.

But it is important to remember that you were given a gift that many people were not. You were given the cultural capital, the experiences that taught you, to capitalize on opportunities and create new opportunities for yourself.

Many others have not received this gift.

That is inequality of experience. What will you do about it?

I have been spending a lot of time on social media, mostly Twitter, trying to engage with people who I really disagree with but want to try to understand.

There is this thing that keeps bothering me, a common refrain for people who are at an ideological impasse: it is either, “all you liberals,” or, “all you conservatives.” There are worse terms people use (to bastardize the word “liberal” especially) that I don’t feel it necessary to repeat here.

Why do we find it so hard to take people on a case by case basis?

There is an argument to be made that we need to simplify people and things into categories in order to make sense of our world. So, if you believe in gun rights, strong borders, and are pro-life, you probably will be called a conservative (and might call yourself one, proudly); and if you believe in gay rights, immigration, and government aid to the poor, you will probably be called a liberal (and might call yourself one, proudly). This is a way to categorize people so that we can understand them quickly. The problem seems to be that these categories, rather than aid in understanding, halt all attempts at understanding one another. What if you believe in gun rights, gay rights, pro-life, and government aid to the poor? People seem to label you based on the first thing they hear come out of your mouth. And if you are too idiosyncratic to be labeled, you will be ignored, or labeled as “other.”

To understand the terms “liberal” and “conservative” being used as blanket epithets for anyone who disagrees with you, we need to look at in-groups and out-groups.

More to come on this, however, because I spent hours on social media this evening engaging with people and have spent my brain and need rest. I’m on to sleep. More tomorrow.

Sean Hannity is a conundrum. Well, actually, how to interact with a Sean Hannity seems to be a conundrum.

When he says that he wants to make America great and work for Americans, I do believe him. I don’t believe he means all Americans however, and I do believe that he means some Americans at the expense of others. Notably, those “others” might be poor people receiving government benefits, first or second-generation Muslims, anyone who thinks “Black Lives Matter,” and generally anyone who might question the libertarian/conservative view of small government and privatization. (Jeez, so  much for me being non-biased already!)

While I don’t dare believe that I know exactly what is going through Sean Hannity’s brain, I would like to use him as an example.

Here is a man that is ostensibly a patriot. He talks about loving America, he loves talking about America, and he talks lovingly about Americans. But, he doesn’t seem to allow much room for the Americans who might disagree with any of his opinions. He seems to be of a classic “with us or against us” variety.

So, let’s try to understand.

In a recent Politico interview, Hannity said this:

“Most people really don’t understand me. All I really want is my country fixed. That is all I really care about. I want our budget balanced, I want a Supreme Court that is not an extreme left court. I want our borders secure, I want healthcare choices that work for people, rather than this big top-down government failure of Obamacare. I want to see the men and women in poverty and on food stamps and out of the labor force, I want them to have the same opportunities that I have had in my life.

“The media has a bunch of overpaid, out of touch, lazy millionaires that have nothing but contempt for the people that do make this country great, I am not one of those people.”

Let’s take this line by line:

“Most people really don’t understand me.”

He may believe that people really don’t understand him and, by mentioning this, he may bely a deep wish to be understood and to be seen as a patriot who wants to fix his country. It is normal to want to be understood, and to want to be seen in the light that you see yourself in. Many of us, on different sides of the ideological divides, see ourselves as close to freedom fighters and we desperately want others to see us that way too.

“All I really want is my country fixed. That is all I really care about.”

This presupposes that 1. the country is his, and 2. it is broken to begin with. Everyone can agree that we want to fix things that are broken. It is a natural human impulse. So, when someone points out that something is broken, our hearts react and want to make it all better. Now add on top that it is a country (“my country”) and we think, of course, I want to help you fix this. Our emotions tend to act quicker than our cognitions that might ask, is this country broken? What needs to be fixed? And, whose country is it anyway?

Ask yourself these questions. Does the country belong to only one type of people? Are the things that are “wrong” with the country just differences of opinion?

“I want our budget balanced.”

Who doesn’t? We’re taught from a young age (not all of us, though) that balancing budgets is the right thing to do. As we get older, many of us begin to understand why. If we don’t plan where our money goes, it goes somewhere on it’s own. The question here is, how do we get to a balanced budget? And, how are we doing right now?

“I want a Supreme Court that is not an extreme left court.”

Ok, what about an extreme right court? How about let’s just not have any kind of “extreme” court and let’s have justices that know the constitution. Why does he have to explicitly mention “extreme left” here?

“I want our borders secure.”

Few could possibly argue against secure borders. We don’t want terrorists coming in, or criminals. But by saying that you wish for secure borders, you are telling people subliminally that the borders, as they stand, are not secure. Here the questions become: what ne’er-do-wells are getting through the border? In what numbers are they coming through? Is there such a thing as a perfectly secure border? What number of ne’er-do-well crossings is likely if we have the best possible borders? We need to answer these questions before we think about strengthening the borders.

“I want healthcare choices that work for people, rather than this big top-down government failure of Obamacare.”

Quite a loaded statement. It seems that every statement of Hannity’s relies on some presuppositions. Here, he presupposes that the Affordable Care Act (ACA/Obamacare) is a failure, without letting us figure out what he thought was wrong with it and if it could be fixed rather than scrapped. Also, here again, the statement “I want healthcare choices that work for people” is impossible to argue with. But, we have to then ask what does work for the people? Which people does it work for? Who does it not work for? And why?

“I want to see the men and women in poverty and on food stamps and out of the labor force, I want them to have the same opportunities that I have had in my life.”

Great sentiment. What opportunities has Hannity had that others have not? And how could we, as a country, give those to people who have not had the same chances? How would we fund those opportunities for people?

“The media has a bunch of overpaid, out of touch, lazy millionaires that have nothing but contempt for the people that do make this country great, I am not one of those people.”

All I’m saying here is: Rupert Murdoch, Acting CEO of Fox News. (Though I do not know if he is lazy, out of touch, or harboring contempt, he certainly is an overpaid millionaire that is Sean Hannity’s boss.)

So, how am I trying to understand here? Am I just being judgmental?

This has been an attempt to understand the language one uses to rouse emotions in people rather than provide information, to get people to feel reactively rather than examine the presuppositions. Anyone can skip over questions and answers that are difficult in order to appeal to people’s emotions. Don’t we all want to fix things and care for heroes and patriots and be understood and provide opportunities for others? Of course! And by appealing to those sentiments, our opinions are often highjacked and sometimes even used against us.

Break all the questions and statements down into their presuppositions and we can begin to understand what people are trying to convince us of, and where they are trying to steer our opinions.

So, you might notice in the posts that are to come that I have a political leaning. We all seem to have a political leaning and it often results from the way we were raised, or the circumstances we find ourselves in, or it could be due to some other variable that hasn’t been studied yet.

But, I am going to try to suspend my political leaning, for the most part, in order to try to understand the perspectives and beliefs of others. There will be times that I may not be able to do this, possibly because the cognitive dissonance is just too great. However, maybe we could learn to afford everyone the right to sometimes be a little less understanding. No one is perfect, and expecting perfection from others can get us into some pretty sticky wickets. (I’m not English, I just like the “sticky wicket” saying. I’ve lived my whole life, since birth, in the U.S., except for a little traveling in my 20’s.)

We also happen to be 11 days into the Trump administration, and a lot of this blog will be dedicated to trying to understand what is happening in the United States between Trump supporters and detractors and why no one seems to be able to talk to anyone else anymore, unless they hold the same opinions.

Thanks for visiting and I hope this blog can be a nice, cool place in a hot, hot world.