November 2022

This month we challenged our students to write about how to get
beyond political polarization at the family thanksgiving table, by
considering what things we all have in common.

Can we just be nice?

Sarah Miller
MSMU Class of 2026

Heineken released a new advertisement showcasing individuals' vast beliefs on the political spectrum. They paired members with someone who was far right and far left to see if that would impact what they later found was building a bar. After the individuals completed it together, they showed interviews of each other that showcased their political views, highlighting how different they were. The experiment later allowed them to either talk about their differences over a beer, or leave. They all chose to stay and have a civil discussion over a beer, which allowed them to become more personal with each other and become educated on their differences. The message, besides drinking Heineken, is that we are all different, yet the same. Seeing both sides is crucial to understanding others, which is what they achieved. The two people from different ends of the spectrum enjoyed their time, one pair even deciding to keep in touch. In the beginning, it was all about politics, but in the end, politics meant nothing. Although I am only 18 years old, my first drink when I am 21 will be Henikin. My philosophy is that a great impact must mean even greater beer, right?

Sometimes I wonder why there isn't a news channel that only shows the good news. The news channel puts politics aside and shows what we are truly doing in society that is making an impact around us, while allowing us to know others better. Our nation is divided, and America needs work; America’s people change as the trees do in a season. We grow as we go through life, which can change how we feel about certain aspects. The colors of our leaves, though, do not define the winter that is the season. Winter, signified as the time when everyone is gloomy, comes with beautiful qualities too, like nature, crisp air, and great campfire weather. After seeing a lovely winter, "the cold shoulder" should develop into meaning something good. That they are taking time to process and respond tentatively, and that the snow doesn't turn into a thunderstorm. All humans have good qualities and live for the greater good. We all do need a little work, but first, let's just start making some new friends so that way we can start being nice to each other and seeing the good.

Choosing friends based on topics like if they are pro-life or pro-choice can be a challenge for some. Understandably, morality is a significant factor when making friends. I am sure we must reevaluate if political arguments are that big of a factor. The Thanksgiving season can be enjoyable because of politics and religion. These are the months when we try to provide more gratitude, list the things we are grateful for and what we cannot live without. Maybe other things will come to light? This would be a great conversation around the Thanksgiving table. Politics or religion doesn't change that my grandma makes some fantastic chicken, my uncles can play some nasty cornhole, and my grandfather was phenomenal at his job.

Although being wickedly good at cornhole isn't necessarily important in life, at the end of the day, we all want to be happy, because the world is not always the friendliest place. Collectively, we all want to be the best version of ourselves, and I found for me that my family is always here for support. The family also doesn't have to be by default; friends and significant others can be chosen and can even be the most constant people in our lives. I believe everyone can put politics aside and look at the greater good because there is always much good to be looked at; after all, Trump vs. Biden isn't quite like a fantasy football game.

I bet that Trump can't cook as well as you and Biden can't sew as well as your grandmother always could. We need to consider putting aside our political agendas and thinking about what we all love and appreciate, which is the other people around us. We value each other's skills; without them, we could not survive. New York City wouldn't be as metropolitan, clean water would be even harder to come by, and we wouldn't be able to communicate easily with others.

We can all agree that life is scary, and we need each other to keep moving forward. Being nice is a necessity and going out of our way to help someone can be significantly appreciated, sometimes even more than we would ever know. I believe kindness can affect people significantly, and taking that extra step can make a difference. Consider the issue of ocean plastic pollution. In that case, we are making necessary interventions that have aided our shores and will even help the Pacific Garbage Patch soon. We can have cleaner fish, cleaner beaches, and a healthy reef because of the unyielding efforts of humanity and wanting to change the planet for good.

In preschool and the Jurassic ages of making friends, we didn't know where the other kids were on the political spectrum; we befriended them because they had the same interests. As humans, we want to be appreciated, loved, and safe, which is accessible as a little kid if you are in a stable environment with fun recess time. Engaging and being with other people in places where politics and religion are put aside can bring out our true colors. The people you meet who are different from you can be the most impactful. As we age, we are exposed to more experiences to show what we want our friends to be like, which does not stem from politics or religion. While politics and religion can fuel mortality, the two can be the icing on the morality cake. As long as we can all be nice, respect each other and "treat others the way you want to be treated," this can be the foundation of our beings. By being friendly, you can make a friend; find out the rest later.

Read other articles by Sarah Miller

Stasis theory

Joseph Carlson
MSMU Class of 2025

Increased polarization in recent years has less to do with radical movements left or right—though these certainly exist—but rather with an increasing assumption made by many that those who disagree with them are culprits of grave immoralities.

There is a system to identify where disagreements lie in an argument, invented by Aristotle and perfected by Cicero, called Stasis Theory. There are five levels of an issue where individuals can disagree: definitions being used explicitly or implicitly, the facts related to the case, cause and effect relationships and where they exist, values, and policy (what should be done). It is always necessary to identify on which level a disagreement exists if you ever want to understand someone’s argument, be the issue with your spouse, someone online, or anyone in between. Once we begin to do this, very rarely does the discussion get heated, so long as it stays within these bounds. This is because, first, you are actually listening to each other, and second, you will quickly discover that most of the time you do not disagree on values, but rather on one of the other levels. While it is certainly true that many people have differing values, on values related to issues that are typically polarizing, people almost always agree.

For example, on the issue of abortion (since it may be on your Thanksgiving guests’ minds this year), one side may think that the other hates women, and the other side may think that the other wants to kill babies. Much of the time, this is not true, though there are people with extreme views, for whom we should pray. Most people love women and love babies, or at the very least would prefer them to not get hurt, and it is really on the definitional level that we disagree: is the fetus or zygote a human being that deserves rights? With the issue of gun control, very few people you will talk to want innocent people to be harmed because of gun violence. The majority of people on both sides have the same values here, the preservation of human life—they instead disagree on facts, cause and effect relationships, and policy. We quickly turn ourselves into the extremists when we accuse other people of not caring about innocent people, when they probably do, and they disagree with us on how best that should be done. We can only make accurate judgements on individuals’ values when they state them clearly, or through continual intuitive examination of how someone lives. We are never in a place to accuse pluralities of otherwise normal Americans of grossly immoral values—we simply do not have the information necessary to make such claims, and anyone who tries to do so is himself the bigot.

I often wonder why it seems like polarization has gotten worse. People like to blame Trump, but they forget that he was reacting to some pretty rigorous polarization himself even in 2015; what else could have driven a lifelong New York liberal elite to be such a scaly Republican? His rhetoric has been especially outlandish, but it is he and everyone else, except that he happens to be the target of the mainstream media. No, time did not begin with Trump. We forget that Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz back in 2012 was calling Mitt Romney, the most milktoast Republican in the Senate, a racist. We forget about Kanye West saying that "George Bush doesn’t care about black people" on live television for a special celebrity broadcast to raise money for Hurricane Katrina relief back in 2005. The racism mudslinging has been going on this whole millennium, but in 2016, the media decided that that was practically all they were going to do. All we hear about, from CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, is how someone out there that we’ve never met is a horrible person because, [insert glittering generality]. The difference is that, somewhere along the way, the polarization sunk into the American subconscious, and now there is no one with whom I disagree. Democrats, Republicans; they all want to yoke themselves to an ideology and accuse someone else of being a terrible person, when at best they’re probably only a little more terrible than themselves. Sure, I’ve got the way I vote at the ballot box, and it doesn’t change, but that is only because we are in a system where people are refusing to think critically, and they are refusing to insist that their leaders think critically. Yes, there’s an ideology that more closely fits my views than other ones, but I think for myself. The Party doesn’t think for me.

Truthfully, politics and religion are some of the most interesting things one can talk about (although, I am biased as an Economics and Theology double major). Our family and friends are the ones we should be able to speak most openly to, and instead we avoid all discussion of controversy, because they are the ones we cannot afford to deal with upsetting. Is that the loving thing to do, though? If we really believed we had the truth, and that the truth sets you free, we wouldn’t stick strictly to mundane common discourse; rather, we would take the time, and stick our neck out a little to truly understand our loved ones. Hopefully through it all, we all might get a little closer to the truth.

That’s the issue, isn’t it? The us/them mentality. If we really cared about making positive change in our world and in our families, we would recognize that most of us want the same thing, and that we’re all pretty ignorant, and that no one is beyond correction, because no one is beyond love. We can disagree; in fact, we often ought to. While pursuing the truth, and while inevitably disagreeing, we must always do all things out of a genuine desire to give of ourselves for the sake of others. So, maybe, if you have a chance, ask someone this Holiday season about their views on something controversial. Listen, ask a lot of questions, and if you disagree, identify on what level you disagree, and love always.

Read other articles by Joseph Carlson

Family, friends, and food

Claire Doll
MSMU Class of 2024

At Thanksgiving dinners, I was the slightly annoying (but mostly cute) child who made everyone say what they were thankful for. The adults around the table—my aunts, uncles, grandparents, and even parents—would say the same boring, generic answers: family, friends, and food. As a mere eight-year-old, I would think, Aren’t we all thankful for those things? Can’t you be a little more creative?

I was hoping on more unique-to-the-person answers. Back then, in the third grade, I was thankful for my silky terrier Toby, for my American Girl Dolls, and for extended recess. Now, as a junior in college, I’m grateful for slow mornings spent with my roommate, Friday nights spent baking with my friend Lexi, and Facetime calls with my sister. The little things in life. The simple things, if you will. The things that are specific to me, the things that make me smile, if even for a moment.

As I come closer and closer to approaching real adulthood and the real world, I am now realizing that those clear-cut answers—family, God, and food—were blanket statements, rather than real reflections.

Of course we all appreciate those things. So why don’t we talk about them more?

I think it’s funny how one of the unspoken rules of Thanksgiving is to not talk about politics or religion. Given the state of our world, and the political atmosphere of November, this makes sense. Why would we want to interrupt our dinner of roasted turkey and mashed potatoes to debate gun control? Or the dissonance of our religious beliefs?

Humans have grown so used to not talking about these things. We have settled in a world of polarization, of frustrated debate and stubborn rebuttals. We believe that there are only two sides to one argument, and if we disagree, then it’s over. No more roasted turkey, no more mashed potatoes.

I’m arguing, however, that this doesn’t always have to be the case. What can we, as humans, agree on? What is one thing that we can talk about without yelling or screaming or flashing looks of ignorance?

I can think of three: The thankfulness for family, friends, and food.

But I don’t mean in the cliché, "I’m thankful for these things" kind-of-way. This Thanksgiving, I’m challenging you to really reflect on these three aspects of our lives. The aspects that shape our day-to-day experiences. They may be the big things in life, yes, but in the span of twenty-four hours, they become the little things. The moments that belong solely to us, that we appreciate with our entire hearts, even for just a bit.

For example, I mentioned my friend Lexi. Pretty much every Friday night this semester, we’ve opted to stay in, turn on a fall-themed movie, and bake. We’ve made chocolate chip butterscotch cookies, banana bread, and pumpkin muffins. Not only that, but we will literally walk around campus on a crisp September night and give these baked goods to our friends (and sometimes strangers). Because of this, we’ve spent countless hours talking to people we’ve never even met, or never even thought to meet. We’ve learned about different students, and we’ve shared plenty of laughter while talking with these people.

I’m thankful for that.

And basically, it covers the three: family (Lexi’s considered family, for sure), friends (meeting new people), and food (delicious cookies and treats). It’s really not that hard to dive deeper into the "family, friends, and food" blanket statement that everyone gives at Thanksgiving.

I feel that as humans, we relate particularly to the little moments in life. We say that it’s the big things that really shape our existence, but what about the conversations with friends on the way to class/work? The perfect iced latte on a rather terrible day? The random text message from your mom, saying "I love you"? We cling to the fun, repetitive, magical things that life often gives us on a whim. We love little gifts like this, because at the end of the day, the happiness endures.

It always endures, doesn’t it?

Even through the politics, even through the polarization. Beyond our political discourse, our argumentative debates, happiness endures, because humans inevitably relate on our abilities to feel and express joy.

So, at the Thanksgiving table when we say that we’re thankful for "family, friends, and food," we’re not wrong. All we really need to do is explain ourselves. Why are we thankful for family? What has your friend done that has made me smile? What is your most favorite and delicious food?

Maybe when we slow down and reflect on these little things in life, we’ll also slow down and recognize that politics and religion and everything we deem as "taboo" aren’t really that bad. In fact, to avoid this polarization and just talk about these deep and unsettling issues, we need to relate on a more human basis. What makes us human, and what do we do from there?

That’s one of the things we focus on at the Mount: what does it mean to be human? While I won’t dive into that question (I’ll answer that at a different column), I’ll leave you all with this. We are human because we love to reason, because we get passionate and argumentative when talking about politics and elections and laws. But we are also human because of our natural will towards others, because of our ability to love unconditionally and express utter happiness. We recognize what we are thankful for, but we must act upon this. When we reflect on the minor, small, tiny-but-so-important things, we inevitably reflect on the larger image of our lives.

This Thanksgiving, you may be thankful for the three F’s. You may also be afraid to talk about subjects beyond surface level discussion. But if you really want to connect with the members at your dinner table—and enjoy some delicious turkey and potatoes—I challenge you to look at just one day in your life and think of every little thing you’re thankful for. Then, talk about it. You’ll be surprised at how much others will relate, and where you’ll go from there.

Read other articles by Claire Doll

The virtuous political elephant

McKenna Snow
MSMU Class of 2023

What feeling is worse than being at a nice meal over the holidays, extended family in town, everything going well, and then, suddenly—a topic is brought up that makes everyone freeze. You glance over at your arch nemesis of this topic: you know how that family member feels about it—and you know you feel differently. Then you, along with mostly everyone else at the table, decide niceties are over: you gear up to dive right in with your opinion, ready to include all the new information you’ve learned about the topic since last Thanksgiving. You’ve watched all the latest YouTube videos on it. Read all the latest news articles. With this level of intelligence, your relative in disagreement won’t stand a chance against you!

A very nasty argument ensues. At least one person leaves the table early. Several people are very disappointed the family didn’t even make it to post-dinner dessert to bring up these hot topics.

Nine times out of ten in these instances, nobody really wins. All involved opinions are too proud to admit that the other person might have a point. Even you, who thought the other side would just spew fallacies, are left secretly worried that the other opinion have some weight. But you would never give them the satisfaction of knowing they might be, even in a small way, correct. By the end of the evening, nothing has really been accomplished. The turkey is cold and needs to be put away, so the relatives passive-aggressively assist one another in cleaning up the kitchen.

In another household, such political topics are never brought up at all at the holiday table. This group of varying opinions knows the risk that such a topic runs, and they don’t want to spoil the one time a year that the whole family comes together. One conversation won’t make a difference anyways, they reason. A whole night of niceties are exchanged, and, in a different kind of way, still nothing is accomplished.

In both households, politics and religion are the elephant in the room. The first house is quite messy by the end because the elephant got up and walked around, knocking everything over. The second house’s elephant is so stressed it doesn’t move.

Everyone’s house has this elephant in it. Not everyone wants to acknowledge it—some people in the family are truly removed, hardly polarized at all, and are just "done" with politics. Morality becomes a "to each his own," kind of topic. It’s the sort of mindset where relativism wins, which is a significant problem for another time. Regardless of if you fall on one strong end or the other, or somewhere in the middle, acknowledging the elephant in the room is worth it. Politics and religion are worth talking about, but the difficulty is that it requires exceptional virtue to do so well.

One of the many difficulties in talking about these things is that more often than not, pride gets in the way. Consider the way the elephant in the first house is treated. Pride makes the person assume they are entirely right on the topic and absolutely won’t be swayed the other way, so they’re hardly open-minded going into the discussion. Pride makes the person laugh inwardly at the other, considering their absurdities, and internally making fun of them. The trouble here is, there is no charity. There is no humility. Nothing can be accomplished without these two virtues. Before going into a discussion with a family member or friend about a charged topic next time, ask yourself first: Do I value and recognize them as human beings with goodness in their hearts, even if it is harder for me to see? Am I approaching this conversation with charity and compassion, rather than belittlement or just a need to be right?

1 Corinthians 8:1 says that, "knowledge inflates with pride, but love builds up." Philosopher Srren Kierkegaard examined the latter half of this statement very closely in "Works of Love," published in 1962. The first half, "knowledge inflates with pride," can clearly be related to those in the first house, who are so adamant that they are right because they know so much, but can see very little beyond their own supposed genius. Love, in contrast, builds up not only the other person, but also you—yes! You too have capacity to grow in a conversation. Love builds up and creates bridges that arrogant knowledge cannot, and can get people much farther in a discussion about what they disagree on.

In examining the phrase, "love builds up," Kierkegaard explains that in order for genuine love to be built up, it is necessary to presuppose love exists within the other person as well. Love was in the other before you arrived, and was implanted by God Himself, because He Himself is love, and made all human beings out of love. Each person is created "very good." Even if the love within the other person is incredibly difficult to find or see, it is crucial to presuppose that it is there within the other person. It allows for the most charitable interpretation of their beliefs, arguments, and needs. Often it lifts the veil to see a deeper hurt the other has experienced; at their core they desire love, but some hurt from the past may have misshaped or misplaced this, but from your narrow point of view, you only see the surface effects of such a hurt.

Presupposing love in the other, as Kierkegaard suggests, allows for a bridge between the two of you. Even if you disagree deeply, recognize that you are both created very good, and that there is more to the other person than the political beliefs you see on the surface. At the heart of it, there is a person looking for truth, just like you. Rather than tear them down, build love up. Acknowledge, cherish, and celebrate their goodness. Walk hand in hand with them in the pursuit of truth, together. Nobody has it all figured out. Love allows us to learn together. And it allows the elephant in the room to have a proper space at the dinner table.

Read other articles by McKenna Snow

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