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Earlier this year, Elizabeth Behrens and Corregan Brown led a course in the Be the Bridge Academy entitled “Politics as Bridge Builders.” They discussed how the history of our political divides, the nature of conflict and styles of conflict, and the neuroscience behind conflict and debate in order to have more productive conversations. It was a fantastic course!
As we are a month out from the 2024 Presidential Election, we wanted to give you a taste of the wisdom Elizabeth and Corregan brought to the course. This conversation will give you hope and help you engage in politics in a healthy way in the days to come. Even now, we can be bridge builders!
Find the Be the Bridge Academy courses here!
Want information about our trainings that include presentations like this? Email [email protected]!
Join in the conversation on our social media pages on Facebook and Instagram and LinkedIn to let us know your thoughts on this episode!
Host & Executive Producer – Latasha Morrison
Producer, Editor, & Music – Travon Potts with Integrated Entertainment Studios
Producer – Sarah Connatser
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Not all views expressed in this interview reflect the values and beliefs of Latasha Morrison or the Be the Bridge organization.
*this was transcribed by Spotify and has not been checked for errors
0:01
You are listening to the Be the Bridge Podcast with Latasha Morrison.
Each week, Be the Bridge Podcast tackle subjects related to race and culture with the goal of bringing understanding.
0:17
But I’m going to do it in the spirit of love.
We believe understanding can move us toward racial healing, racial equity, and racial unity.
Latasha Morrison is the founder of Be the Bridge, which is an organization responding to racial brokenness and systemic injustice in our world.
0:34
This podcast is an extension of our vision to make sure people are no longer conditioned by a racialized society, but grounded in truth.
If you have not hit the subscribe button, please do so now.
Without further ado, let’s begin today’s podcast.
Oh, and stick around for some important information at the end.
0:52
Welcome and thanks for tuning in to the Be the Bridge podcast.
I am Corrigan Brown.
I’m a general purpose volunteer at Be the Bridge and sometimes adjunct faculty.
And I have with me here Elizabeth Barons.
Tell me, tell us a little bit about yourself, Elizabeth.
1:08
Yeah, hi everybody.
I am a part of the Be the Bridge staff.
I work remotely from Kansas City.
I’m on the training teams.
That works pretty well for me.
We do a lot of online training or or flying various places to train groups so able I work remotely, but yeah, I living work up here with my married with four kids and I’ve been with the fridge since the beginning since the you know, we’re just getting started.
1:36
Thank you.
So as we know, we are in the midst of a volatile political season here in the US and at Be the Bridge in our community, we’re always wrestling with how to maintain this challenge of maintaining a bridge builder perspective in all situations.
1:57
A perspective that is informed by our values, but not necessarily hewing to a partisan divide or representing and matching the values of a particular political party or political point of view.
Elizabeth and I, today we’ll be talking more about this season and we’ll be thinking about ways to engage fruitfully with others about politics.
2:18
So not just to argue for red team, blue team, green team, whatever your favorite team is, but to engage fruitfully and gain more perspective about each other’s values and the things that we hold dear to hopefully make decisions that will make things better in the long run.
2:36
Yeah, absolutely.
You know, one of the things that, well, first up, Corgan, I got to teach, Co teach a class called Politics as bridge builders over the course this last year.
And it’s been a really fun and interesting time.
2:51
But part of the reason I said, hey, Corgan, when you teach this class with me is that the way you engage in online conversations about politics to me really models that bridge builder mindset, that bridge builder way of engaging in that the the level of intentionality I think is what’s there.
3:15
And so I wanted to talk a little bit about like, how did the rest of us engage in that same level of intentionality?
And one of the first things I was thinking about as I was processing through what that looks like is especially in this time when things are so divided and emotions are so hot and, you know, tempers flare and people pop off in comment sections Before I post anything on social media or engage in a political conversation with someone, really setting a goal for myself, whether that’s overtly stated or not.
3:51
But sort of like, what is my purpose in posting this?
Because that really shapes the way and that I script a post or that I that I think about then engage in people that comment on it.
But I’d love to hear sort of when you go to post something about politics, what do you think about when you’re thinking about like, what?
4:11
What is my goal for this?
That’s a good question.
I think the thing that I think about the most is what is it that I want to happen as a result of this post?
Am I trying to tug heartstrings and get people to align with the value that I have?
4:32
Am I trying to have real dialogue about what’s better?
Am I seeking to understand?
And so I have posts, you know, I do have a point of view.
Sometimes I can be a little partisan, but I do have posts that are, hey, I think this thing is great, or I think this thing is terrible.
4:51
Who’s with me, right?
But when I am trying to have a real conversation, no, I would describe that as more of expression.
When I’m trying to have a real conversation, my posts look a lot more like, here’s my guiding principle, here is the thing that is happening and here is why it lines up or doesn’t line up with my guiding principle.
5:17
What do you think about these guiding principles?
If you disagree, what guiding principles do you hold?
That’s the, that’s probably my most common kind of post that’s non editorial.
And then the third kind of post I like to do is seeking to understand because I know that I am somewhat partisan.
5:38
I know that I have values that I think line up with sound bites from one particular side.
And so sometimes I want to challenge that.
I want to challenge that for people who agree with me and challenge it for myself.
And I will ask, seeking to understand questions where I will explicitly createspace.
5:58
I will explicitly set aside the assumptions that I make.
A lot of times it’s really easy to go, oh, well, if you don’t agree with this, it’s because you hate this situation.
You know, you hate freedom or you hate autonomy.
And it’s much more interesting to go, let’s assume I’m wrong about this and help me walk through a values framework that leads to me thinking that the way you think is a good idea.
6:27
Walk me through that, I promise not to get in your way, and maybe we’ll have learned something.
Yeah, I think that’s fantastic.
And I mean it even think of those different types of posts.
You know, it really when when you go into it with a goal like that, then you really are that able to say, you know, what actually works to get me to what I’m hoping to create.
6:52
Because if it’s like I’m want, if you’re in your head thinking, well, I’d love to start a conversation about why someone would vote for this candidate that I think is horrible.
And so if my post comes out there and it’s how can anyone think this absolutely ridiculous person and who, why, who would be dumb enough to, you know, like you’re you may have a goal of having a conversation, but you’re for sure not going to have a conversation if you or at least not a healthy 1, if you’re going into it already, you know, putting people on the defensive or, or setting a tone that, hey, this is this really is a space just for people who think the way I think.
7:31
And anyone else who comes in here is gonna get lambasted.
Like that’s not really embodying that the way we would hope to engage politics in this in this moment.
But I think even what can be so helpful and what I always see you doing, especially in those posts that are really encouraging conversation.
7:49
It’s just say like, Hey, here is here’s what I’m hoping to get out of this and here’s how I’d like the posture I’d like you to take is you, if you want to join in this conversation and, and being explicit about that, saying like, Hey, I actually, if if you disagree with someone on here, I’d really hope you honor that.
8:08
Here’s how I’d like to engage people you disagree with or here is how I’d like to.
Here’s what I’m hoping to get out of this.
If that’s not, if that’s not a conversation you can participate in now, that’s fine.
Keep scrolling, but being so clear about those expectations and and the hopes for what will come out of it, I think makes a really big difference in in how that goes down in that comment section in particular because people get in their feelings in the comment section.
8:35
They do.
They do.
And I, yeah, I do.
I will.
Especially if I’m like, hey, person who takes what would typically be an opposing view to me, I want to hear about it.
I will specifically and very explicit to say, please don’t dunk on these people.
8:51
Don’t, you know, get angry or try to or try to convince them why they’re wrong.
Please only engage with what they said and hold it up against itself.
That’s one thing that I do try to do.
Another thing that I really think is important is sitting with my feelings.
9:14
One thing is about social medium.
I always refer to it as a limited bandwidth medium.
So I will tell people like sometimes if I reach a place where I can tell we’re just not connecting, I’ll say I think we have reached the limits of this bandwidth of this medium, right?
9:32
In person conversation has the highest bandwidth.
Most communications, non verbal, everybody’s heard that maxim.
It is literally and factually true.
This is this medium where you can see my expressions and so on, but I’m across the screen is a little less personal and social media, it’s just a stream of words.
9:51
What humans tend to do is fill in the gaps with their hopes or their fears.
If I like you, I’m going to fill in the gaps in your communication with my hopes.
I’m going to idealize you or idealize your perspective.
10:08
This is also not to get too deep into the science of this, but this is also how we end up with partisan divides.
And if I don’t like you, then I’m going to fill it in with my fears.
You want these things because you want to hurt me and you want bad things for me and people like me.
10:27
And that is why you were saying this.
And so that’s going to happen.
You can’t stop that process.
But what you can do is set it aside and force your prefrontal cortex to get involved and go.
They did not explicitly say they hate me and they want bad things for me.
10:45
So I am not going to respond to what I thought.
I’m going to respond to what they actually said.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think that’s so helpful and you’ll even think about that responding piece from I remember talking with people about this just forever a day go back when, when there was a lot of conversation happening in the Facebook group for be the bridge and whatnot of of responding instead of reacting again, being aware of it.
11:14
Like, Hey, it takes a minute for my brain to catch up with like that immediate response.
So if I if I read something someone writes and I’m immediately typing something out and hit and send, like that’s reacting right.
Like that is not giving myself time to actually deeply consider what they said, not be in a spot of justice, like, well, that made me mad.
11:38
And so I’m going to go off of my mad and get but to actually be really considerate.
And that like responding over reacting tends to turn the dial down on the temperature of a conversation too.
Because also because in in social media so often, like it’s just this like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, right.
11:54
It’s like back and forth and back and forth and back and forth of commenting.
And it’s like, OK, everyone is just reacting.
Like, no, like there’s this isn’t going to go anywhere.
But when you give space, you allow everyone in the room to have to pause and think and engage for us.
So, so yeah, not doing that immediate reaction I think helps so much in making make sure that make sure that we’re, you know, presenting ourselves like we want to be to be seen, experienced.
12:22
I, I agree completely.
I think one of the things about that as well as one thing I talk about, I also am kind of working on a model of transparency and communication and leadership in work environments.
And one of the things that I have said to my colleagues when I’m discussing this is emotion is an invitation to curiosity.
12:45
I think one thing is when people are trying to facilitate or mediate, there is a cultural thing in the United States in particular that I don’t think is true, which is the calmer person is the more correct person.
And so people tend to spend energy trying to present themselves as more reasoned and calm rather than as more correct and backing their backing their statements with a consistent chain from value to to strategy.
13:15
So I think emotions are valid and they’re not wrong to experience, but it is important to use them as an invitation to.
Why did this invoke this in me?
I could not tell you how many conversations I’ve had on Facebook where a person is taking a really strong opposite stance to me.
13:34
I have medical opinion AI have not medical opinion A and I think it’s horrible.
And then when I meet them with that unemotional tell me about why you feel so strongly about this and really patiently walk with them.
13:49
It’ll be my uncle died because of medical opinion A, my sister had this huge problem because of medical opinion A.
And I don’t want that anymore, right?
And so there’s a very deep, often the things that people feel most vehemently about, there’s a very deep personal wound.
14:06
It’s a personal issue for them.
And that’s a conversation where you have to go.
I’m sorry that happened to you.
I understand we may not be able to come to an agreement on this today, but that was awful and that shouldn’t have happened.
I will reflect on ways, irrespective of medical opinion A versus not medical opinion A, that we could prevent something like that from happening in the future.
14:30
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You don’t feel as much on opposite teams when there’s that like, oh, you actually care about me as a person.
15:47
And that actually made me think of this conversation.
That was I just was a semi part of online.
Someone else had started about with the Central Park 5 being brought up again during the the debate.
And you know, some, someone they posted, you know, like this, I can’t believe it.
16:04
You know, it was a very charged post and lots of commenters underneath like reinforcing that charged nature and like agreeing.
And then someone came in and said, hey, they, they, they admitted their guilt.
16:19
They should still be in prison.
And like put that under every single person’s comment.
And so immediately, you know, the fight is on like people are.
It’s it’s a, it is fact slinging back and forth and back and forth and it’s going nowhere.
And then what I wanted to say was and thinking of the time was going.
16:39
It is not, it’s not necessarily a normal reaction to comment that on every single comment.
Like there is some something is happening here that is not about the Central Park 5.
And again, just similar to your example there come to find out like he has it, you know, there has there was a criminal incident in his a family member of his history and there was a, you know, someone pled guilty and then still was let off the hook, you know, basically like it hit home.
17:14
You know, it felt personal because if you’re letting people off the hook when they admit to a crime like that, that’s what happened to me.
And it’s, you know, like there was no way for him to engage in a nuanced conversation in that moment.
17:30
And in that way, like, given how the post was set up, given the way the conversation was going, like that was not going to be.
And so, and I was like, OK, then back off the conference like it does you if it, if it’s not a play the time or the place for this person, you know, doubling down on my efforts to convince them of how wrong they are is not going to work.
17:52
That’s not how, that’s not how humans work, right?
Like we have to consider if, if we’re hoping to actually change people’s minds or to engage in healthy ways, like we have to be aware of how how brains work, how our own brain works, how the brain works, the person that we’re talking to, so that we can actually hopefully end in in a place where people walk away from the conversation feeling like even if they didn’t change their mind, you’re someone they can talk to about this issue.
18:21
If they eventually do change their mind or want to reconsider it, that they know that you’re a safe person to have that conversation with.
You know, it along those lines, I was thinking about one of the things in the the class, we talked a lot about cognitive dissonance, Speaking of how brains work and how there’s this reality that, you know, if you and I are if you and I disagree on something and it’s something like, you know, the the best musical artist from a certain genre or you know, whether this new album that came out is great.
18:53
And I’m like, oh, I thought it was horrible.
And you think, oh, I think it was amazing.
We can have that conversation without without there being much emotion involved, but you know, or with we can that is a very much agree to disagree kind of conversation, right, Like that’s not charged.
19:09
But when we differ about something that really deeply effects sort of like our self concept, the way we the way we see ourselves, that that’s when it’s really different.
And that’s what I see coming up in all these political conversations is that, you know, for the most part, people view themselves as competent, right?
19:32
Of able to look at the issues, to look at what’s happening and make the best choice.
And that that there are good, that, that you’re a good person.
And I’m a smart person and I make good choices.
And here’s what I’ve chosen.
Therefore that is the good choice.
Like that is, that’s just a normal human thing, right?
19:51
But the reality is that if we are, once we have that set, like here’s who I’m voting for.
I’m a good person.
I make good choices.
They’re for all the things.
If someone comes at us with like disconfirming information that says like, here’s why that choice is foolish, or here’s why that choice is dumb, or here’s why I think I, you know, here’s all the reasons that if you make that choice, you’re actually not a good person.
20:17
But we all kind of hope.
I would think that like it’s like, oh, if someone came in with information, I would, I would consider it.
But like that’s not actually how any of us work really.
Rather, you know, we are given information that challenges that really central belief about ourselves.
20:36
We know that we go into self justification mode of like here is why I’m continue to be right and here is why they are wrong.
And that usually when approached that way, not only do I not change my mind, I tend to double down on my decision all the more because I have to, in order for my brain to be OK with like, rejecting the information I was just given, right?
20:59
Like I have to all the more feel justified in my decision.
And so when I look at these political conversations that are happening, and so often it is here’s why you’re dumb.
No, here’s why you’re dumb, here’s why you’re wrong.
No, here’s why you’re wrong.
I’m like, oh, everyone is going to leave this conversation more entrenched, not more open and willing to engage or reconsider.
21:22
And so I think it’s just so important for us to to not go into a conversation assuming that this time will be different.
But this time, if I give someone a bunch of information, they’ll change their mind, right?
But rather than go like, that’s, that’s not how that works, not how it worked yesterday.
It’s not how it’s going to work today.
21:38
It’s not, not how it’s going to work tomorrow either, you know, so, so how do we, how do we think about that when we’re deciding what it looks like to engage?
And also goes back to what’s my what we talked about the very beginning and what’s my goal of this conversation.
21:53
If my goal is to change minds, then I can’t ignore the fact that that that is how brains work in those conversations.
Right.
It’s it’s a political maxim across the spectrum lately that we’ve heard facts don’t care about your feelings.
22:14
It’s probably more accurate if you’re looking at the human side to say feelings don’t care about your facts.
And guess what?
Feelings run the show.
We like to think of ourselves as rational beings, as beings that are controlled by measured and straightforward thought process of deduction, scientific method, all those sorts of things.
22:36
But if our brains actually worked that way, where we thought through everything, weighed everything up and did the best outcome, we would get three to five things done in our lifetime.
There’s there’s a lot of data that we have to process to make very complex decisions.
22:58
And so our brain has lots of systems to shortcut that thing for us.
If I walk outside and I see a bunch of green, it’s probably trees and plants.
I don’t need to deduce that it’s trees by analyzing.
It’s it’s tall, it’s green, it’s outside, probably a tree.
23:17
Sometimes it’s not.
Sometimes it’s a tower, right.
But that’s those are the kinds of things that my brain is shortcutting and managing all the time.
And the trick is to understand that these conversations for the very reasons you described, we have to actually forcibly engage that side and kind of sideways crab walk into it.
23:41
Because if we don’t, we’re going to run into all those systems that are telling us, Yep, tall green thing is tree.
It’s a tree.
And we’re going to and we’re going to see that double down that entrenchment.
It’s just accepting the reality of how we work.
And the other thing is, no matter how much we learn about this, no matter how much we are aware this is how we work, it is still the mechanism, right?
24:06
It is knowing.
Knowing about gravity doesn’t change the fact that I know what happens when I let my hand go and I’ve got something in my hand, it falls.
I don’t have to know what gravity is for that to be true.
I can know what gravity is, and knowing what gravity is doesn’t let me affect.
Doesn’t change that fact, Yeah.
24:23
Right.
So, so those are the kinds of, you know, those are the kinds of things that you want to come in with.
And you know, you were talking about this whole notion of I’m a good person, I’m a smart person, I make good choices.
I think that again, is also part of one of the mechanism.
One of the mechanisms are I’ve made a decision and I need to not have to second guess and revisit every decision I make because again, like to get more than three to five things done in my lifetime.
24:49
So when you understand that, it changes the way that you engage and it makes it a little easier to sideways crab walk into the conversation.
I think about TA Nehisi Coates, and he wrote an essay years ago called A Muscular Empathy.
25:07
It’s in The Atlantic.
And it changed the way that I thought about these kinds of conversations because the heart of his essay is you are not unusual.
He’s a little harsher.
He’s like, you’re probably pretty mediocre.
25:24
But that’s a that’s a deeper topic that we want to get into.
But I think the important thing to take away is you are not unusual.
And so it is less is less interesting to assume that you would make better choices than another person when you’re looking at their situation, which is not yours.
25:41
And it’s more interesting to go, Let’s start with the premise that I would make the exact same choice.
Let’s say I’m a candidate A person all the way instead of going candidate B person is obviously stupid or obviously something’s wrong with them, you know, or you know, they were hit in the head by candidate A as a child or something like that.
26:01
It’s more interesting for me to go, Let’s start with the premise that I would absolutely vote for candidate B.
Now let me walk backwards.
What are the kinds of things, what journey would I have to go on to vote for this person?
Right?
That is.
And you develop what he calls a muscular empathy.
26:18
So not just a oh, I feel your pain.
There’s a place for that, but there’s also a place for I disagree with how you went on that journey, but I validate the journey, right?
26:35
And let’s now we’ve seen the whole journey.
Let’s start at the beginning and we can talk about some of these less incendiary things and start to have a conversation that’s more like favorite band and less like talk about my Mama.
Yeah, absolutely.
26:53
Absolutely when it makes me think of too within that, you know, conceptions of empathy and just how much online interactions make that so much harder, you know, because there’s this reality that when we’re having a conversation in person with someone, you know, it, there’s there are mechanisms of feedback, right?
27:16
There’s social feedback, there’s social reward systems happening there.
I am, you know, if I’m talking to you in person and I see you kind of sit back, right, You know, I am reading all of those cues you’re giving.
I’m seeing how you’re responding to what I’m saying, you know, mid sentence.
27:34
I can moderate my tone or shift my vocabulary.
It’s like, oh, that word had a weird spot.
I’m in love like that.
Oh, they seem really uncomfortable.
I’m going to slow down and work my way into this conversation a little.
You know, there’s all of this.
There’s this highly attuned nature of humans to one another.
27:53
And that’s, I mean, that’s how we have is the way our brains have had to know to exist, to work and, you know, since the dawn of time.
But when we end up in these online spaces, all of a sudden we’re trying to have the same depth of conversations without the same social feedback, right?
28:13
We don’t have the same, we’re not being given the same information midway through the conversation, right?
So, and sometimes that’s even via text message.
I look at how often you know, people you read tone into a text message and it reads really different depending on all those things you add to it that your brain wants to have because that’s how it takes in information.
28:36
So when we’re having these conversations without any non verbal feedback, we can’t modulate our tone and we can’t shift our words or shift our speed.
And so there is that tends to be why things just get so heated so fast, right?
28:53
Is it just, there is no way to you can’t read the room and and who is even in the room is constantly changing, right?
Like you may think you’re having a conversation with one person, then all of a sudden a whole bunch of people walk in the door and they’re overhearing the whole conversation.
Now they want to jump into like our grades are not set up to engage that way right now.
29:14
At least.
Maybe over time they, you know, we will adapt better to this form of communication.
But but it is there is just all those social conventions feel like they go out the window a lot of times in the ways people engage online with one another.
29:30
It’s like there is that 0 empathy as well as no non verbal cues and no ways of engaging.
And I think one of the things that’s been hard for me to see is that I think when people spend a lot of time online engaging in that way, you start to see that shape their offline behavior and conversation styles and things as well.
29:52
You know, they start ignoring those social cues or just being less attuned to them.
You can they start to be happy to get a big outrage or a big response from somebody, right?
Like they’re they’re used to getting that kind of big moral outrage kind of feeling.
30:08
Or, you know, if they’re having a conversation with you offline that they’ve had a bunch online within like their in Group where everyone is thinks that same way about this issue as they do.
They really agree with them.
There’s going to be a lot of, they’ve gotten a lot of social reward for having the viewpoint that they have and for stating it really strongly and for not backing down.
30:30
And that’s getting lots of likes and on all of their comments and it’s, you know, it’s feeding that system for them.
And then they’re having that same conversation offline.
Well, listen, this is what works.
You know, I’ve got a lot of reward for, for talking about it this way.
So I’m going to continue to talk about it this way offline as well.
30:46
And it just, it doesn’t translate because the way we engage online just doesn’t, it lacks that empathy.
It doesn’t match the reality that we need to still be highly attuned to one another and and how people are feeling and and reading the room.
31:02
Like I said, being able to read the room.
Absolutely.
The a thing to remember.
It is very easy to feel like, especially if you were under 30, it is very easy to feel like we have always had massive amounts of word based communication going back and forth amongst ourselves.
31:26
This is an incredibly new phenomenon.
Those of us who are over 40 are old enough and 40 is not that old, are old enough to remember a time when if I wanted a word based communication with you, I would have to write a letter.
31:47
You would receive that letter, you would read it how you read it, and you may or may not write me back weeks or months, days, weeks or months later.
Phone calls cost a lot of money outside of your local area so you didn’t do a lot of phone calls.
32:04
We have thousands of years, at least 6000.
Shout out to my young earthers.
But possibly up to 200,000 years of face to face communication.
We have only a few decades of this and so I think it is true that we may adapt over time and may get better at reading between the lines and filling in the details.
32:31
But right now, we are in a place where often the worst of both worlds is being chosen.
We have this limited bandwidth medium we’re not prepared to process, and we process it in difficult ways.
We then are bringing that back into the real world and getting worse at talking to each other in person.
32:50
And then there’s a third aspect, which is addiction, right?
Social media is designed to go directly to your reward centers.
There’s been a lot of studies about this, a lot of science.
There’s there are a number of people who have worked at these places.
33:07
And I’m not trying to be alarmist.
I am on social media almost every day.
But there are people who’ve worked at those places who were like, I absolutely would not let my kids touch those systems because they’re designed to go straight to the reward center like a hit of cocaine or sugar.
That variable reinforcement.
33:23
Exactly.
And so you get this.
Not only do you have these kind of heightened feelings because you’re projecting your hopes and fears into a bland message, but you also are getting rewarded for your extreme reaction.
Your extreme reaction produces an impact, like being lauded by the whole village for killing the lion, right?
33:46
Or like being shamed by the whole village for missing the lion.
So that kind of that that kicks in very old reward and shame centers and can produce a cycle of toxic behavior that culminates in these extreme things we see like trolling or friendships being broken up over social media.
34:12
And these are things that we all have to be mindful of.
And the techniques we’re talking about are simply ways to work against some of those slippery slope systems we have.
Yeah, absolutely.
That made me think of, you know, in talking about that, that variable reinforcement mechanism that like, you never know when the like or the comments going to come and yeah, feeds that addiction to posting and engaging in certain ways.
34:36
I, I’d heard a researcher, a social media researcher and I can’t remember the name off the top of my head right now, but he’s talking about those algorithms, right?
That that tell us here’s here’s what is going to show up on your feet and here’s the conversations.
You, you seemed you like to engage in that.
It’s sort of like we’re all driving on this highway and there’s a car accident and all of us being human, you know, we’re you we’re turning our heads.
35:00
We’re, we’re staring at the car accident.
What happened?
What had you like, you know, like we’re really engaged in it.
And so we train the algorithm.
We love car accidents and it’s like, do we?
I don’t think we do.
I think we are just really intrigued by them because we’re, you know, it’s different, it’s engaging.
35:17
And and so basically our algorithms, all of our algorithms become car accidents become whatever gets that like draws everybody’s attention, whether it’s good or bad.
And So what that also tends to do is you’re going to end up seeing in your algorithm people who deeply agree with you and are posting very strongly about it, and people who deeply disagree with you and are posting strongly about it.
35:45
You’re going to get the extremes of the belief system.
And what that also produces then is that the only people I’m engaging with who think different than me are people who feel extremely different than me.
And so I’m now I’m only reinforcing my perspective that if you don’t think the way I do, you are way off base, right?
36:07
Because my only experience with people who think differently than me on that issue are going to be those who really think very, very differently.
And we are all the more able to make these caricatures with one another and not enough engaging in a way, again, that produces health or that has nuance to it allows for any level of like, hey, I don’t agree with you, but I don’t necessarily disagree with you strongly.
36:30
I, you know, like there’s none of that.
Like the algorithm does not feed.
I have a moderate opinion about this.
Can we talk about it?
So remembering to not caricature those who, again, like, who think differently than you actually, like, how do they get there?
How Like what’s happening?
36:46
So.
I’d love to.
We’ve got we probably even over our time we thought we would take because that’s how you and I get when we get talking, but we’d love to talk about, you know, we started with talking about how do we do this?
Well, let’s kind of end with, you know, given what we’ve just talked about, how do we do this?
37:02
Well, like we talked about, you know, setting a goal, setting expectations.
But what I also like to lean into is that often times the things that actually do change people’s minds are actually do lead to some kind of big change, which honestly doesn’t often happen.
37:22
The reality is that most people, once they have their mind up, sort of make it similar to, you know, we talked about the class like whether your first cell phone was an iPhone or a Samsung, I think there’s only a 10 to 15% chance, if not even smaller that you have switched, right?
37:41
Because you make good decisions and this is what you decided.
And so here is how right you are about the the device you chose to go down, you know, down that rabbit hole with so similarly, knowing that like, hey, people don’t often change their minds, especially not in drastic ways.
37:58
But if there is going to be heart or mind change, it usually comes out of narrative and storytelling of me saying, you know what, I I used to think that way too.
And then here is what happened to me.
38:17
Not here are my list of facts.
I honestly often to give an example of this, you know it in the if the topic or it used to be much more.
It’s not on people’s radar as much right now.
The topics are on mass incarceration, right?
So if I’m going to be giving you if I’m trying to change your mind, am I going to give you Michelle Alexander’s book and the as soon as I try to say her name, of course, like the title is making help.
38:48
Thank you.
Do I give you the new Jim Crow or do I give you just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson?
What?
They are both fantastic books full of really great information.
One of them is much more focused on here are the facts.
Here’s a diagnostic of the system.
39:05
And the other is meet Roy.
Here is his story.
Here’s what happened to him.
So I eventually hope someone will read both.
But if I’m trying to open your mind up to that conversation, if I’m trying to open your mind up to even considering this might be an issue, I’m going to start with just mercy.
39:24
Because when we connect as humans, when we’re able to actually like hear people’s stories, it is much easier for us to to sit in that with people and allow ourselves to say like, oh, that, that is really interesting.
39:39
That actually does make me think a little differently about this.
Where if I gave you just a list of statistics that doesn’t, that doesn’t touch anything inside it.
Like it doesn’t, like, change your posture toward the issue in the same way that someone’s personal story does.
Absolutely.
39:56
I I think as well about.
The you’ve probably seen the meme kind of going around on the Internet of the black man holding up the Klan leaderhoods, Darrell Davis, who is known for getting 200 and something people to walk away from the Ku Klux Klan.
40:17
And you, you ask yourself, how did the black guy get a bunch of people to walk away from the Klan?
It’s because he engaged with them on a human level, one-on-one outside of the context of their group and the group think.
And when, when you start to get to actually know someone personally, not necessarily in the context of an issue, but just getting to know, hey, this is me, this is my story.
40:43
Not saying anything other than this is what happened.
A funny thing happens.
All those good parts of our human connection centers kick in, and I can no longer lump you in as some undifferentiated mass of people or worse.
41:02
You know one of the most common kind of first steps of genocide is dehumanization, right?
So I can no longer dehumanize you.
And so it’s important to use story in a helpful way to help people connect to the humanity behind issues so that they can go, if this is happening to a human, to someone I recognize as a human, is this something that aligns with my values?
41:33
Forget all the policy stuff.
Forget, you know what I’m supposed to do?
Is that how I would want things to go if I were king of everything or Queen of everything?
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I think that’s the last thing.
41:48
Like I if you touched on this, but like tapping into people’s sense of self as well.
You know, we talked about how often it’s like, well, I’m a good person who makes good choices, so clearly I made a good choice.
So even leading with that of like, hey, you know, as a good person, I have no doubt you would care about how this vote impacted the people around you or you know, since since you since I know you and I know how much you value continuing to learn, I really thought you would want to hear this right.
42:18
All of a sudden that really does do something to the way we can think and engage with what is said next.
Now that’s not saying you know puff people up with a bunch of empty flattery, but actually be honest about who you know them to be and why you think giving them this piece of information isn’t about trying to change who they are, but rather information they would want.
42:44
Because it would.
Because it fits their values to want that information and to utilize that information to shape how they move forward.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
When we approach people that way, we actually can have some success in saying, is it?
Is this something that you might reconsider?
43:01
And it’s not just about them, it also when we acknowledge a truth about that other person, it reminds us how human they are and it causes us to start to listen with more nuance.
43:17
And so it’s important for both sides of the conversation to have that acknowledgement of humanity.
And I think that is a central tenet of bridge building, right?
The other side’s land is just as green and verdant and has just as much to offer.
43:34
And we have to build a bridge so that we can exchange and get the best of both.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Well, Corrigan, let’s hope we make it through these this next weeks until the election.
Hopefully this was helpful for for people say, attempt to be a bridge builder, not just in areas when they’re directly engaging racial reconciliation, but rather like embodying that, that way of engaging the world.
44:02
It’s a lot more health to come out of that than than sort of this, this current, this current reality we’re all living in.
So so with that, best of luck everyone have those healthy conversations and and take care of yourself.
All right.
44:17
Thanks, everyone.
Take care.
Thanks for listening to the Be the Bridge podcast.
To find out more about the Be the Bridge organization and or to become a bridge builder in your community, go to bethebridge.com.
Again, that’s Be the bridge.com.
44:34
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Today’s show was edited, recorded and produced by Trayvon Potts at Integrated Entertainment Studios in metro Atlanta, GA.
44:56
The host and executive producer is Latasha Morrison.
Sarah Connatser is the senior producer.
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This has been a Be the Bridge production.
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