December 03, 2020
This has been a persistent question ringing in my brain since before the recent election. In fact, it has been a constant companion in my thoughts since the 2016 election showed us just how divisive our society and, particularly, our political discourse had become. Certainly nothing has improved on that front in the four years of Trump.
But, as much as we’d sometimes like to, we can’t blame Trump for this “great divide,” as I like to call it. He just figured out a way to play it like a fiddle. He used it in 2016. He used it during his entire period of residence in the White House. He continues to attempt to use it now.
The source of this “us and them” divide, however, lies in a variety of obscure places, that smarter brains than mine will have to dig out and illuminate. What I can do, or, at least, what I hope to do is to find the roots of divisive attitudes in my own heart and expose them to calm reason and work to not feed into the “divide” with my thoughts and, particularly, with my language.
Many of us have felt high stress during the past several years. This stress has fed our fears, our distrust, and our anger. These emotions, which have only been heightened during the past 12 months, often lead us to believe those “others” out there just don’t get it. Their perceived and sometimes real actions lead us to believe they are, in some way, out to get us. This perception feeds into our negative emotions and often makes us want to lash out in equally offensive actions or words.
Our rallies over the summer and fall, both for the Black Lives Matter movement and our own Democratic vigils to get out the vote, were often showplaces for this divide. Occasionally, passersby in big trucks revved their engines enshrouding us in clouds of diesel exhaust. Some motorists flipped the bird and/or shouted expletives. One sweet looking elderly woman stuck out her tongue at me. Really.
I can’t say I honestly had an urge to respond in kind, but somewhere in my brain I would formulate what I would have said, if I didn’t have the power and wisdom of restraint. I knew that any reactionary response would be useless and would only fan the flames of their anger and mistrust. So, I smiled and flashed a peace sign.
But now, the rallies are over (for the time being). And my aching question still lingers. How do we bridge the “great divide?”
My belief is that many of those who find themselves on the “other” side in our political discourse are people, just like you and me, whose political position has been formed, just like our own, by their economic, social, and familial situation. I am pretty certain that if we could just chat for a spell, being careful to avoid the flash points, we would find that our wishes for our selves, our families and our communities, would, in more ways than not, be quite similar.
We would also find, I think, that our fears, the things that keep us awake at night, are also similar.
The difference lies in our beliefs of how we get the things we wish for and how we alleviate the things we fear. But, if we could come to the table to talk without anger and get to that realization that we really want and fear many of the same things, we should be able to recognize that this commonality is the bridge that can bring us back together.
The first step in the process is, I believe, being very careful not to feed the flames with our words. I personally am working very hard at not using words that, when spoken to me, cause me to flinch in defense. It’s kind of a Golden Rule of language. I’m asking my friends, you fellow Dems, to help me by pointing out when I cross that line.
This won’t be easy, but just imagine what a few less angry words, less accusatory remarks, less “us and them,” and a lot more “together we can” in our dialogue could do to calm things down. Let’s try it!
Fred Bassett
Chair, Tillamook County Democrats