Learning to navigate political discussions in our heated climate can be difficult. Corporate media outlets and politicians alike do their best to entrench divisions to keep the public divided and docile-minded to prevent unity and shepherd people into accepting policies that harm working people.
The outrage machine is well-oiled, designed to redirect people’s righteous rage and grievances at their peers rather than systems of power and those who enable them.
As the facilitators of difficult and nuanced discussions, many instructors are put in the uncomfortable position of fostering productive and lively discussion between opposing viewpoints while making sure they do not venture into malicious and personal territory.
In response to the heated political climate, the university is holding a series of trainings for employees to learn how to better facilitate these discussions. The “We Hear You” trainings, hosted by Keith E. Glover throughout the months of October and November, seek to provide educators with the tools to navigate these discussions.
While I think they provide a good resource for instructors unsure of how to handle our current moment, I do not believe human resources training sessions like these are what will bring communities together. At best, it will allow for more productive discussions to be had in a classroom setting, which is certainly good for students and professors alike.
Discussions should make people feel uncomfortable by pushing their rhetorical abilities, making them question their beliefs and arriving at new understandings of difficult concepts, not by arguing against their opponents’ personhood.
However, this will not ameliorate the underlying issues in these conflicts. Change must occur from the grassroots up, not managed down. We should not attempt to create a more civil public, but a public sharp enough to challenge both the astroturf and very real divisions present in our society.
These discussions are only productive if we learn not how to be more polite, but how to more effectively challenge narratives that maintain a system that denies basic decency and living standards to all people.
