What specifically would I learn? How we each are biased by our news silo? What is missing from both? I know that when I am part of something public, the news reports on it are never quite perfect or always seem to have missed something I knew from being there in person, in truth. But still, believing deliberate lies and being used like that is pathetic. I suppose I could ask "How am I also being 'used' by others, manipulated, ...and do I sometimes want or need to be?"
You don't know what you would learn. The research shows that liberals and conservatives both are wrong about the other side. We have stopped talking to each other and instead use the news media, which have a tendency to exaggerate and exacerbate the conflict. Amanda Ripley calls people who do that conflict entrepreneurs. Here's an article from the Atlantic that talks about how we don't understand each other. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/liberals-conservatives-wrong-about-each-other/620996/
How does this apply to the folks driving by in their trucks who seem to hate Democrats, and who walk by agreeing with our Uncle Sam telling them to VOTE, ... and walk away in disgust when they hear it is the Democrats having an Open House? They are so dogmatic they would not even agree to talk, and surely cannot read an article or agree it isn't simple! I did do that sort of thing with my students in Bioethics, .... and educated colleagues. But deliberate ignorance finds these people voting against their own interests, and forgive me, but I find myself wishing they would die of ignorance and science denial. I know several people whose old dogmatic aunts who were Trumpers, who died of COVID since they took his words/ lies to heart and thought it was a hoax. I think we should arrest folks who endanger others, or somehow stomp out media coverage and parroting of lies. If Trump and several of Trump world's leaders would be arrested, publicly, bravely, that might set a better example. Aristotle said that SOME people cannot be reasoned with, but just need PUNISHMENT!
I have similar thoughts, but then I try to remind myself that their viewpoint comes from their worldview. The more I can understand the other side, the more they become not the other side, but people that I can learn from. There is something that I can learn from them! It takes work, but it is the only way we will solve this divide.
What specifically would I learn? How we each are biased by our news silo? What is missing from both? I know that when I am part of something public, the news reports on it are never quite perfect or always seem to have missed something I knew from being there in person, in truth. But still, believing deliberate lies and being used like that is pathetic. I suppose I could ask "How am I also being 'used' by others, manipulated, ...and do I sometimes want or need to be?"
You don't know what you would learn. The research shows that liberals and conservatives both are wrong about the other side. We have stopped talking to each other and instead use the news media, which have a tendency to exaggerate and exacerbate the conflict. Amanda Ripley calls people who do that conflict entrepreneurs. Here's an article from the Atlantic that talks about how we don't understand each other. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/liberals-conservatives-wrong-about-each-other/620996/
How does this apply to the folks driving by in their trucks who seem to hate Democrats, and who walk by agreeing with our Uncle Sam telling them to VOTE, ... and walk away in disgust when they hear it is the Democrats having an Open House? They are so dogmatic they would not even agree to talk, and surely cannot read an article or agree it isn't simple! I did do that sort of thing with my students in Bioethics, .... and educated colleagues. But deliberate ignorance finds these people voting against their own interests, and forgive me, but I find myself wishing they would die of ignorance and science denial. I know several people whose old dogmatic aunts who were Trumpers, who died of COVID since they took his words/ lies to heart and thought it was a hoax. I think we should arrest folks who endanger others, or somehow stomp out media coverage and parroting of lies. If Trump and several of Trump world's leaders would be arrested, publicly, bravely, that might set a better example. Aristotle said that SOME people cannot be reasoned with, but just need PUNISHMENT!
I have similar thoughts, but then I try to remind myself that their viewpoint comes from their worldview. The more I can understand the other side, the more they become not the other side, but people that I can learn from. There is something that I can learn from them! It takes work, but it is the only way we will solve this divide.