Seeking Out Disagreement, Buster Benson
Summary
TLDR这段采访主要探讨了理解和管理分歧的重要性。嘉宾认为,生产性地处理分歧不仅是一项关键技能,更是一种心理技术,能帮助我们更好地获取新技能,解决问题。他提出了一些建议,比如邀请不同群体进行对话、共享美食等,来增进相互理解。此外,他还反思了硅谷科技行业在这一过程中的作用,呼吁通过自省和开放态度来缓解分化。总的来说,这段对话为我们提供了富有洞见的视角,帮助我们以更积极、有建设性的方式看待分歧。
Takeaways
- 😄 我们正处于一个难以解决分歧的时代,因为沟通方式往往无法让双方真正理解对方的观点和价值观。
- 🤝 生产性分歧是一项元技能,可以帮助我们更好地获取新技能和看待问题。
- 🧠 焦虑是我们内心价值观受到挑战的信号,可以成为建立共同理解的出发点。
- 🔍 培养好奇心有助于我们打开心胸,更加理解他人的观点,是解决分歧的关键。
- 🍽 共同用餐可以缓解紧张气氛,让人更容易建立友好关系,从而促进生产性交流。
- 👨💻 科技行业在一定程度上加剧了人们之间的分歧和对立,应当反思并采取改正措施。
- 🗺 尝试加入不同的在线论坛或社群,主动与持有不同观点的人进行对话交流。
- 🌐 通过长期的对话实践,我们可以培养跨越分歧的能力,为社会带来正面影响。
- 👥 需要更多无所属"部落"的中立者,在不同阵营之间进行沟通和调解。
- 📖 阅读相关书籍和研究成果,有助于我们更全面地理解分歧的本质和解决之道。
Q & A
为什么会出现吵架的情况?
-人们会感到沮丧和束手无策,觉得之前所采取的方式都失败了,因而选择吵架的方式来表达自己。
什么是"生产性分歧"作为一种元技能?
-生产性分歧是一种能提高我们获取其他技能能力的元技能,就像语言和阅读一样,掌握了这种技能后,我们可以更快地获取新知识和技能。
特朗普当选对作者产生了什么影响?
-作者意识到,尽管他自认为擅长与持不同观点的人进行理性对话,但在特朗普当选后,他发现自己无法与亲密朋友进行有效沟通,这促使他反思并致力于提高这方面的技能。
作者提出了哪些具体建议来促进生产性分歧?
-作者建议主动加入不同的社交平台和群组,与持有不同观点的人进行对话;与亲朋好友就争议话题展开对话并记录分析;邀请他人就分歧问题进行对话等。
作者认为在分歧对话中面对焦虑时,我们应该怎么做?
-焦虑往往源于我们内心的某种价值观或信念受到威胁。我们应该审视自己的焦虑,并由此作为切入点与他人展开对话,了解对方的想法和价值观。
作者认为科技行业在加剧分歧方面扮演了什么角色?
-科技行业以为能够通过连接世界和赋予每个人发言权来造福世界,但忽视了可能带来的负面影响。现在,行业内部也存在严重的意识形态分歧。
《Letter》社交平台对促进跨界对话有何贡献?
-Letter提供了一个长篇对话的平台,让持有不同观点的人能够耐心地进行深入交流,相互了解对方的立场,并努力达成某种共识。
关于罗宾迪安吉洛的《白人脆弱》一书,作者有何看法?
-作者认为,人们可能对迪安吉洛的观点存在误解,她的论点是复杂而有细微差别的,我们应该耐心细读她的原著,而不是武断地对其工作进行评判。
共同用餐对促进分歧对话有何益处?
-共同用餐能让人放松,降低对立情绪;需要当事人亲自出席;饮食文化也能增进人与人之间的亲和力,让人把对方当作朋友或家人看待。
作者希望这本书能带来什么影响?
-作者希望人们将分歧对话视为一种可以不断实践和提高的技能,并且通过个人的体验和实践,来改变人们对于生产性分歧的期待。
Outlines
📚 对话与争议的艺术
本段介绍了Buster新书《为什么我们在喊叫》的主题,探讨了人们在面对分歧和争议时感到困惑和沮丧的原因。书中提出了一系列理论框架和概念,旨在帮助人们理解和应对分歧。Buster强调,生产性的争议是一种元技能,能够提升我们其他技能的发展,促进个人成长。此外,他探讨了如何将争议转化为增长和连接的机会,提出了有效沟通和解决问题的策略。
🌐 拥抱分歧的价值
这一段落讨论了Buster如何在个人生活中实践并欣赏分歧。他加入了多个社交媒体群组,包括与他观点不同的群组,目的是为了理解不同的世界观并建立对话。他分享了这一过程中的挑战和收获,包括如何通过分歧来促进个人观点的发展和成熟。Buster鼓励人们以艺术的形式看待分歧,而不仅仅是用作争吵的工具。
🤖 技术背景与分歧处理
Buster介绍了他在科技行业的背景,包括在亚马逊、Twitter和Slack的工作经验,以及如何将这些经验转化为处理个人和职业生活中分歧的技能。他讨论了技术行业如何间接促成了分歧的产生,以及他个人如何通过书写和社区建设来寻找解决方案。此外,Buster强调了不公开表达分歧可能比直接面对分歧更糟糕的观点。
💡 科技产业的责任与自我反思
Buster批评了科技行业在推动社会分化中的角色,并分享了他个人对于这一问题的觉醒和行动。他讨论了科技行业内部的分歧和许多人转向更有意义工作的趋势。此外,他还探讨了焦虑如何触发我们进入争议的状态,以及如何通过识别和理解这些焦虑背后的价值观来促进更富有成效的对话。
🧠 激发好奇心与心理安全
在这一段中,Buster强调了好奇心的重要性以及它如何帮助我们在面对分歧时保持开放和探索的态度。他讨论了心理安全与团队多样性之间的关系,以及如何在保持对话安全的同时,也鼓励观点的多样性。Buster提到,理解和应对自己的防御性反应对于促进生产性对话至关重要。
🌍 探索政治立场与观点多样性
Buster分享了他在政治立场和个人观点上的旅程,特别是在特朗普选举之后的反思和成长。他讨论了如何通过与不同观点的人对话来扩展自己的世界观,并强调了理解和尊重不同价值观的重要性。Buster还提出了“跨越部落”进行对话和理解的想法,鼓励那些愿意作为中介的人参与其中。
📝 使用长篇对话进行深入交流
本段讨论了Buster在Letter平台上的体验,他通过长篇对话与持不同政见者进行深入交流。他分享了一个具体的对话案例,即与一位枪权倡导者的讨论,展示了通过耐心和开放的对话,双方如何达成共识。这一经历强调了长篇对话在促进理解和找到共同解决方案方面的价值。
🍽️ 通过共享用餐促进对话
在最后一段中,Buster强调了共同用餐作为促进对话和理解的简单而有效的方法。他解释了共享用餐如何通过化解紧张气氛、促进亲密感和增强社交连接来帮助解决分歧。Buster提醒我们,有时最古老的方法——如一起进餐——可能是克服分歧和促进沟通的最有效方式。
Mindmap
Keywords
💡生产性分歧
💡元技能
💡心理技术
💡部落主义
💡承认差异
💡身心统一
💡反思
💡信任缺失
💡理解动机
💡同理心
Highlights
Productive disagreement is a meta-skill, a psycho-technology that can make all our other skills better and help us acquire new skills more rapidly.
The Trump election was an awakening moment that made the author realize he failed to relate to and understand his friends with differing political views, despite priding himself as someone who could disagree civilly.
Hidden disagreements are worse than surfaced ones, as 85% of people know something is wrong in their job or relationship but are afraid to talk about it.
The author advocates running towards disagreement and finding people with different perspectives to have conversations with, joining groups like flat earth, pro-life, and libertarian forums.
The author's views have become more nuanced rather than drastically changed, gaining appreciation for perspectives he previously dismissed, like believing in ghosts.
To improve at productive disagreement, the author intentionally invited more conversations, created online communities, and analyzed recordings of disagreements.
The book aims for people to see disagreement as a practice, like meditation or going to the gym, to physically experience productive disagreement.
The tech industry is complicit in creating societal divides by not considering potential negative side effects when connecting the world.
Recognizing anxiety sparks can point to the common values driving disagreements and serve as a platform for more productive conversation.
Developing curiosity and noticing physiological shifts, as described in polyvagal theory, can help rewire defensive states during disagreements.
Political beliefs are often rooted in fundamental moral values and temperaments rather than just facts and evidence.
The letter platform allows long-form conversations across disagreements, like discussing gun policy proposals over 14,000 words.
Sharing a meal can create a calming environment and tap into cultural roots that foster viewing the other person as friends or family.
People from more privileged positions could serve as mediators between different tribes to understand multiple perspectives.
The author advocates open and nuanced engagement with works like 'White Fragility' before dismissing them as unproductive or wrong.
Transcripts
[Music]
Buster it's really great to speak to you
we've made kind of impossible
conversations and difficult
conversations a real topic on the
channel recently we had a film with film
called impossible conversations and also
a series on the science and psychology
of polarization and you've just brought
out a new book called why are we yelling
and it's really good I've read it it's
really good really interesting lots of
interesting tips frameworks concepts for
understanding disagreement and I guess
the first question should be why are we
yelling that's a great question to start
with let me thank you for inviting me
this show I'm so glad to be here why are
we yelling it's because we're we feel
stuck we feel frustrated about being
stuck we feel like everything we've
tried has failed
and we feel like we put out our good
will and we've tried to do the right
thing multiple times and I've been
stomped on like all of these things have
made us resentful about trying to reach
out again and have productive
disagreements so you know what can we do
if we feel like we have no other option
you know we can yell into our pillows we
can yell into Twitter we can do whatever
we could do all that kind of stuff and
that's why we're yelling right now
I really enjoyed some of the
distinctions that you draw in the book
between different kinds of disagreements
and different strategies and want to
tease those out but I want to start with
one that you talked about productive
disagreement as being a meta skill and
we never miss a a chance to go meta on
this channel so what do you mean by that
and what is productive disagreement as a
meta skill yes so a better skill is a
skill that makes all of your other
skills better or more likely to progress
and grow faster and you know you can
also think of as psycho technology you
can think of it as a superpower it's
really you know similar to you know
learning how to read learning how to
talk you're learning a new language all
of these things once you learn them you
can now acquire new skills much more
rapidly and we know what can make us
even acquire skills even faster
obviously working through our
disagreements working through our
problems and seeing what's on the other
side of a lot of these
duck conversations like we desperately
need some of that the word and the
concept of psycho technology seems to be
like it seems incredibly useful John Bob
a key I think is kind of given it to us
as a concept and it's like language as a
psycho technology many of our habits of
thought are psycho technology their ways
of dealing with problems and what are
the key psycho technologies that you
think we need for difficult
conversations or productive disagreement
as you called it yeah I think the art of
productive disagreement is a technology
a psycho technology in this sense right
this disagreement is when two worldviews
or perspectives are differ and it's
unacceptable
so the psycho technology I would like to
advance is the one where we can move
into that space of differences different
worldviews and come out of it smarter
more connected you know having enjoyed
the time if we can such that you know
the problems that we have
don't you know I often say that we're
stuck arguing at the gate of many of
these problems we're talking about
whether or not the problem exists not
how to solve it and we have to get
through that gate which productive
disagreement can help us do so that we
can solve the problems and can you talk
about your personal background with this
because you do describe in the book how
the Trump election was a real kind of
awakening moment as it was for a lot of
people certainly on the more liberal
side of the spectrum so can you talk
about that that kind of it was that
connected with the origin of the book
100% yeah that was I've always prided
myself on being a civil disagree or you
know someone that can talk to people I
disagree with without resorting to anger
it turns out though that that's not
enough right I have these group of
friends and we discussed the election
politics situation happening all the way
up through illiac election and after it
happened I was unable to talk to them
anymore and so I felt like I had failed
to relate to them to understand them to
actually have a conversation and I ended
up just being feeling lost and you know
if if we feel lost in our closest
relationships because we can't connect
with them and can't talk about our
disagreements like what are the chances
that I'll ever be able to do
with you know a co-worker or a family
member or someone that I work with or
you know someone I run into on the
street so it was an eye-opening moment
for me to realize that I was I thought I
was good at this it turns out I wasn't
and I had a lot of work to do to figure
it out and I like in the in the book
that you talk about running towards
disagreement or using disagreement
productively where are you
how would you recommend people do that
and where are you doing that at the
moment in your life yeah it's so I mean
this is this is the most surprising
thing to me is that I now my eyes light
up when someone is like I disagree with
you but that's gonna be fun you know and
that could seem facetious I guess if you
know you don't know me but it's true and
I think that we do need to find that
right level of disagreement to help us
grow like we have to develop each
other's skill in this but once you do
you know things that I've done I know
I'm in several Facebook groups for
example where I'm the only liberal
person the only progressive person and
my goal is to really just see the world
from somebody else's perspective get
into a build some relationships and then
have these conversations you know I'm in
a couple of those I'm in like a you know
I'm in a flat earth group you know
that's really interesting and fun I'm
gonna in a pro-life group that was
really interesting a fun and maybe not
fun but you know interesting I mean some
libertarian groups I'm in you know some
that are about you know the culture wars
and you know I'm oftentimes the token
you know progressive in the group and
I'd love that and there's so many places
once you start looking on discord on
letter on medium on you know forums on
Eve on Twitter you can find people to
have these conversations with as soon as
you see it as the art you know and not
the the tool for ranting right you have
to just shift your your goal in terms of
right why you're there and what you're
looking for and how is that vein how is
your experience being doing doing these
explorations
at first it was rocky honestly no it's
you know that when you're when I was
first stumbling into this idea and you
know opening up every disagreement you
know I could find I you know you step in
poop every once in a while and you know
I had to do some
sort of backing up in terms of you know
what I went too far this was out of my
skill zone I've lost you know some some
of my friendships are probably no harmed
by this so it's it can definitely go
both ways that's why I definitely
advocate developing the skill and steps
but yeah I think it has changed a lot of
things and once you start seeing this
Agreement as an opportunity you know my
job you change you know I'm going to
counseling for my marriage like we're
considering different career choices
different you know moving to another
different piece of the world all these
things that we were avoiding become
places to you know explore and hopefully
find something better out of it and have
you a views change through any of these
interactions I think so
I think they've become more nebulous in
a lot of ways you know in this sense of
like you know simplistic opinions became
more complicated
I have also in some cases like there's a
chapter about ghosts where I think my
belief about ghosts has radically
shifted and I'm now like really into the
idea of ghosts you know it's not just
necessarily truth or like do they exist
or not but I appreciate the idea of
ghosts more than I did before gun
control immigration whether or not it's
okay not to vote these are all issues
that my perspective is shifted on over
time and I I you know some of them have
been 90-degree turns some of them
hundred degree turn some of them just
three degree turns but always now I
could see why somebody would have the
other perspective and what have you done
since then to to make yourself better at
that yeah I mean I really just had to
face it head-on with a beginner's mind
in the sense of not feeling like I knew
how to do it which meant inviting a lot
of people to have conversations with me
and I opened up a lot of different I
called a lot of my friends and said like
okay you know how we always argue about
this let's have that argument and I'm
gonna record it and I'm gonna like
reanalyze it afterwards and invited
people into my home I created Facebook
groups I created a discourse community
all focused on different angles into
this and some of them work some of them
didn't work and it was through that
process that you know I I've discovered
a lot of people that I've thought about
this a lot and I
helped translate that into practical
tips that can be used in everyday
conversations because we have a lot of
tips that can be used in a courtroom or
in a sales you know pitch but we don't
have the ones that work at the dinner
table and online and you know in on the
street and what do you hope the book
will achieve I hope people will look at
a disagreement as a practice you know in
the same way that meditation or going to
the gym is and find their skill level
and start practicing because before
until we can physically feel what it's
like to have a productive disagreement
and physically feel both our own
stretching and sort of seeing something
differently and sort of seeing how it
brings you together with other people
we're not going to be able to expect
that of other people and I think that's
one of the you know the crucial elements
that's missing in our debates right now
is we don't expect our politicians and
our leaders to have productive debates
the way that we change our expectation
is by first experiencing ourselves
seeing why it's useful and then hoping
that others also have it and that's the
bottoms up sort of change in the world
that I hope happens and can you talk a
bit about your background why you wrote
the book and where what the origins of
it were yeah so my background is from
the tech world I was an Amazon Twitter
slack hitting a bunch of startups and my
job as a product leader has always been
to facilitate you know diverse
collections of people and get them to
coordinate and produce something on time
and actually achieve the results that
you want and so inadvertently I found
that a lot of these skills could
translate to all kinds of other aspects
of our lives from the relationships to
our work to politics to you know
everything else the friendships and even
at our own self-talk you know can can
benefit from this kind of stuff so that
was the impetus and when I took stock of
you know what I could do to have a
positive impact after the election this
was an area where I thought there was a
big enough gap in knowledge and I was
sort of you know I felt like I was the
right person to be doing this that this
is a better use of my time than almost
anything else I could be doing and also
in the book you mentioned the hidden
disagreements are worse than surfaced
ones which i think is a really important
realization and it reminded me of a
saying my good friend raffia talks about
everything registers in the field and
this is sort of more from a kind of
personal growth perspective that
everything on some level everything
that's going on is registered and is is
aware and playing out in the dynamic
somewhere so from a maybe sort of less
sort of personal growth orientated
perspective how would you frame that
what why do you think that's an
important framework yeah I think that
you know the there is as I was writing
this book I was assuming that we would
just I would be practicing having
unproductive disagreement and making
them productive what actually turned out
to be the case was that people had
already given up with disagreements we
are we are okay with ranting and we're
okay with doing zingers and sort of
making lists I'd feel bad but we're not
actually in dialogue with the people we
disagree with across many different sort
of dimensions and that was the most
surprising thing and I also read um and
willful blindness by Margaret Heffron
and I believe her surname and she found
that like 85% of people in a job
situation or in a relationship situation
know that something is wrong that
they're afraid to talk about and that's
really just putting things below the
surface under the rug and they don't go
away and they're in the field and
they're gonna come back in some way
they're gonna grow they're gonna
accumulate and soon that small problems
again turn into a big problem and be
harder to resolve at that point yeah
just you you said that we weren't having
disagreements people were just sitting
on them do you think that that's some
kind of exhaustion or maybe sort of post
post trump election kind of we've had
enough disagreements and now we're just
sitting on it what what do you make of
that
absolutely yeah I think lot of it is
exhaustion the lack of energy the fact
that we're all feeling really anxious we
don't want to add more to that to that
pile but also I think it's there's
there's a positive spin to it as well
which is historically you know how if we
do resolve disagreements we've used
force you know my might is right to
resolve disagreements and you know the
fact that we're not doing that
is as good except for some extremists
we've always thought that reason was the
way that we're going to resolve our
disagreements but it turns out that only
works when you're both appealing
to the same source of truth and the sort
of state authority and when you're going
across tribes you don't have the same
authority and trust in that authority of
different sources for information and so
that's not working either and so you're
like well this doesn't work that doesn't
work I got nothing I'm gonna stop doing
anything and plus I'm tired and the
question I think it's it's good to admit
that the two things aren't working but
the thing I would you know I would
encourage us to go one step further and
have curiosity about you know what are
the what are we missing like why is this
so hard to resolve what is it about our
culture right now that is or our
relationship right now that's preventing
us from communicating and we got to
build new skills to do that
and I think that opens up a whole new
Vista of possibilities in terms of how
we relate to each other that are worth
exploring do you have any theories about
that why it is now that things are so
much more seem to be so much more
difficult part of it is we don't have
the skills we're in an arena where the
the difficulty of the conversations is
way beyond our skill level and so we're
sort of like being thrown you know
you've never done any public speaking
you're thrown on stage at the Rose Bowl
or something and it's really
intimidating and so you resort to you
know defensive sort of things that will
save your dignity a little bit and
oftentimes getting angry isn't as a way
to do that and being negative as a way
to do that
and so we have to be able to get onto
that stage you know maybe it starts with
a smaller stage and you know not freeze
and not lash out but actually continue
being up there and be like okay well
this is what's happening let's talk
about this I wonder what we can learn
from each other and and then do that
until you're really good at it and then
move to the next arrow sort of
difficulty level and you're you're kind
of in the center of Silicon Valley and
have worked in the tech industry do you
think the tech industry is at least
partially to blame for this absolutely
yeah I mean it's it's we're so complicit
and I had this real awakening when I you
know I've always been an idealist and
growing up and that's part of what
brought me to tech was this possibility
of you know connecting the world and
sort of giving everyone a voice and we
didn't think about the side effects as
much and that is something we definitely
have to reckon with and I feel complicit
in
in you know the various roles I've had
directly and just indirectly by being
you know a participant in that ecosystem
so I think there's a lot of people here
I'm not the only one by far that has
come to this realization that
yeah there's we thought what we thought
was wrong and we have to figure out what
to do now house mmm and you sort of
hinted at it there but you think that
feeling is quite widespread and what
what are the conversations are going on
in in Silicon Valley now around this
yeah I mean a lot of people are leaving
tech I think you know just state you
know I could clean myself you know
writing a book is just so much more
fulfilling to me than continuing to
build these platforms that I feel you
know are potentially making things worse
so a lot of people are leaving a lot of
people are seeking smaller you know less
ambitious goals you know just let's
let's let's step away from the thing
that is potentially a great good and a
great bad at the same time and find
something like you know let's just start
a yoga studio or something and just
finding this you know again like trying
to find the arena that we can actually
feel more confident in and just
generally there's a lot of infighting
you know any of these companies that you
go inside the walls you're gonna find
vastly polarized communities of
employees there that are fighting about
this you can go anywhere and see that
and I don't think that's as visible from
outside the tech world but it's
certainly there and you we saw it with
Google you know obviously in Facebook is
starting to have that I know Twitter has
it and so they're not uniformly bad
necessarily they're they've done some
you know damage to the world but there's
also people in there that care about
maintaining that and fixing it so it's
it's an interesting situation and
everyone has to decide where they want
to be in that ecosystem if they can
handle it or not you also talked about
in the book look how anxiety sparks in
you can you explain what you mean by
that and what what that looks like
yeah so that I think that beginning the
first step we can take is to try to
think about why we get angry why we feel
anxious why we leap into disagreements
you know the whole joke about someone on
the Internet is wrong I have to go you
know tell them why they're wrong
why why have to do that what is and I
know what I found through just the
research and consulting with experts and
sort of reading a lot is and having
conversations is that almost always you
can tie that anxiety back to a value in
a belief that you personally have and I
believe that that's a much better
platform to then reach out and have a
conversation about you know you can say
like hey I feel threatened you know I
feel like maybe you don't respect the
same people that I do or you don't you
know value the you know the humanity and
these people as much as I do is that
true and you can find out like maybe
they had that that was not on their mind
at all maybe they were thinking about
something completely else and that's one
way to identify that because we're
always like you know fightin shared
common ground but how do you do that
well anxiety is the signpost that can
sort of point you to the potential
common ground to address so yeah you
mentioned the word curiosity before and
I think that that sort of come up again
and again is a really important meta
skill to develop we did a series of
films and called the science and
psychology of polarization which could
have been called the science and
psychology of difficult conversations
that used polyvagal theory and a lot of
somatic experiencing work that comes
from trauma work and showing how we're
either in an exploratory frame of mind
were open to new information or
defensive frame of mind and how we flip
between the two and the the key for get
it potentially getting out of that was
if we can become curious about our own
defensive nurse that literally can
rewire our experience we can we can
start changing our own internal state
and that can start changing it's like I
think it's a kind of physiological hack
that if if we were taught this more
widely could really change our
conversations what will you what firstly
what you make of that work were you
aware of like polyvagal theory and those
frameworks before you wrote the book
I've learned about it from your channel
a little bit that's played the extent
that I know it but I there are a lot of
conversations about psychological safety
and curiosity and the especially in the
tech world where you know and there's an
acknowledgement that that is crucial to
having high-performing teams and yet on
the other side you want diverse
city so diversity and sort of having
multiple perspectives to sort of broaden
your your view of a problem is directly
in tension with psychological safety
because that's what makes you
potentially have challenges of
communication misunderstanding and that
can spiral out of control so again it's
like this two sides of the coin you need
to like make it a little bit safer make
it little more diverse and vice versa
you can't be curious unless you feel
safe and you can't force yourself to
feel safe and so that that's what I
think about like it's not just about you
and me talking it's also about what is
the environment that we're in what is
our power dynamic what is the the
expectation about you know bringing
ideas to the table inviting new people
into the room that kind of stuff and all
that kind of stuff can then trigger our
psychology about you know are we safe
can we be curious perhaps you can you
know if you're on the verge there you
can jump into curiosity but it's a fine
line mmm because I mean that we're
talking about diversity and I mean one
of the big things with diversity is is
ideological diversity which is a lot
harder to measure than some of the other
metrics and that maybe is where Silicon
Valley has been criticized in the past
of not having enough ideological or
political diversity yep I did yeah the
past and the present I believe you know
that I think there's definitely it's
hard you know it does because it
challenges your safety and you we're
we're all at this sort of feeling of
feeling threatened all the time already
it's really hard to then extend that and
make it more the case so yeah I think
that there's that's another piece of
serious self-reflection that the tech
world is doing and yet you know it's not
that easy to solve so it's not like we
can just admit it and then fix it it's
more systemic than that yeah I don't
want to put you on the spot as the
representation of the whole tech
industry so that would be really unfair
thing to do yeah what did you make of
the the sort of polyvagal frame did you
find it useful I do and I think that
anyone that you know does meditation or
yoga or things like that and you're you
can sort of sense when you shift and I
think that becoming aware of that is
crucial especially when you are
ding from sort of safe conversation to
disagreement there's always this moment
where something flips and you turn into
your shield and your sword and you're
like ready to fight and that's probably
when the polyvagal you know I forget the
terms but like one flips to the the
threatened state and being able to
notice when that's happening and
potentially shift it back that's
probably the best time to do it rather
than further down the line when you're
feeling even more threatened or more
hurt as a result of the back-and-forth
so yeah I think being aware of that is
really important there's been a few
other books coming out recently around
this same topic like it feels like those
that there's a real well of interest in
it as an area or inquiry and one of them
was to how to have impossible
conversations by Peter Bogosian and
James Lindsay I wonder what you you made
of that I'd say I've read both books and
I'd say that theirs is probably more
conversational techniques tactics and
probably less goes less into the
psychological realm and your book goes a
little bit more into that sort of
psychological area I mean they do talk
about psychological safety but it but
I'd say that focus is more on strategies
yeah yeah yeah that's true and I think
that's that's great we need the
strategies to use in the moment but I
also think we need to respect the fact
that there's a lot more going in like we
can't we can't just unroll the strategy
list and do it right we have to also
consider our emotions consider the sort
of backdrop of the cultural divides that
are happening and that means also being
willing to self reflect and think about
your own place and that and you know I
always considered a blessing and curse
that I'm I I doubt everything that I
think or do all the time and yet that is
sort of what we have to do I think to
step back from you know I'm not just
here to convince people that I'm right
because we actually don't know the
answers to a lot of these questions yeah
I think there's a really big question
here a friend of mine and I think
someone you know as well peter lindbergh
who wrote a really interesting piece
about culture war too
in tow where he talked about the need
for mimetic mediation which i think is a
really great concept the idea that we're
sort of splitting off into mimetic
tribes and that what's required is
mediation between the tribes that for me
feels like a really important concept to
enter the the discourse at the moment
yeah absolutely
and I love that article that was written
in the document and I already even go
further so that we need people that are
tribe less you know in a certain sense
like we have we we acknowledge that
there are people out there that have
more privileged than others and I think
that the people that do have more
privilege that are willing to they want
to put it to good use
could be the tribal of people that go
around and try to hang out with the
tribes that you know most of their sort
of culture has not gotten along with to
understand them to also be a
representative of sanity of the other
side I think it works both ways to you
know but it's it's a huge amount of
effort and so it's not an obligation for
us to do but there is this opportunity
for people to travel between and
hopefully not get exiled from all of
them as a result and I'd love to hear a
little bit I'll ask you a couple of
questions about your particular kind of
political journey because you talked a
bit in the book about the Trump election
and some arguments that were had around
that and we've taught just before we
came on air about that that you feel
that you this is partly related to
writing the book can you tell me a bit
about kind of how your views have maybe
changed or you've tried to kind of get
more of a different perspectives into
your worldview yeah I would put myself I
think I took one of those tribe tests
and I got the you know far left
progressive liberal designation that you
know is is sort of unpopular right now
amongst some people so I think that was
my background and that was that is
continues to be my background I see a
lot of the the good that comes out of
that sort of line of thinking what
changed for me was this realization that
I was completely blind to a lot of
things that were happening a lot of
things people were thinking because I
had my own
you know worldview that I was filtering
everything through and this came through
like just having you know a long
conversation with a couple friends and
realizing that we've known each other
for twenty years and we can't connect
and that was heartbreaking and if I
can't connect with the people I know the
best how am I ever gonna have a
conversation with a stranger or a
co-worker or you know somebody else that
disagrees with me so I had to sort of
sit back and think you know I'm doing
something wrong what am I doing wrong
and you know that means having a lot of
these conversations and being willing to
examine hard things that I tended to
believe by default and and being willing
to not necessarily change my mind but
expand my belief to include other
possibilities as well the conversation
with those two friends was that a
political disagreement or it was
definitely the you know the the
conservative versus liberal argument you
know my friends are religious and have
you know they live in you know texas or
Florida or often or the Middle East and
often give me this perspective like oh
yeah this is how the other side is
seeing what's happening I'm interpreting
it this way and they're interpreting it
completely differently and yeah it was
it was definitely just a political
disagreement at the time but it does go
much deeper than that in terms of you
know values and of like you know what's
more important taking care of everyone
or having freedom and independence and
and so those those are the the big you
know disagreements that we're having as
a culture and I saw it reflected in my
friendships and you must be aware of
Jonathan Heights work I imagine and so
he talks about would you agree with his
framing that many of our political
beliefs are actually temperamental so
that a lot of the time we were arguing
with when we're arguing about political
things we're arguing with different
temperamental types rather than
fact-based or things that can be
reasoned through yeah that was hugely
influential in my book because I it was
the first time I realized that hey
there's several moral spectrum's to
judge something on and we don't talk
about them we talk about good and bad we
don't talk about you know freedom versus
you know
slavery nor harm versus care or disgust
versus cleanliness and all these other
things and yeah that but it's and you
know once you see that and you think
that all my arguments are about evidence
and yet all of this is about values we
are arguing over here about this and
that's why it's not working we have to
first move into the what I call like the
the realm of the heart right Bethel
talked about our values of our what we
care about what we prefer in order to
then connect and then we can move on to
what I call the realm of the hands like
doing something and seeing what works
and seeing how how it unfolds and just
leave the evidence behind because that's
not going to actually you know solve
anyone's question in the moment because
they were actually carrying about
something completely different than you
first we're talking about kind of
dialogue across divisions and I know
that you've been very involved in the
the letter platform which is a kind of
new social media site designed for
long-form conversation across divides
however you have you found that what
kind of conversations are you having
their great ones are so great I mean
it's just the ability to have a
long-form conversation with people you
disagree with you know where else can
you do that I mean you can technically
do it on your blog but you can do it on
podcast and stuff like that but for the
most part we don't have a way to do that
just as people and in using Twitter and
Facebook so I my first conversation on
there was with a fellow named BJ
Campbell who was a gun rights advocate
and had published some really amazing
articles and medium that were thoughtful
too data-driven evidence and we're like
let's talk about this on letter and we
had a fantastic conversation about it
where our goal was to agree on some kind
of policy proposal that we both felt
would have an impact on gun violence gun
death in the long term and after
something like 14 thousand words we got
there which is you know it's a lot of
words but it's also we got somewhere
that we've never gotten before and I
think we have to be willing to be
patient to have those conversations
individually before we can have them as
groups before we can have them as a
country or you know as a world so it's a
great place to start I was straw reading
your book you reference the work of
in D'Angelo and white fragility my
understanding of her work and is that
she talked about white fragility and she
talks about how white fragility you
display white fragility by did
essentially disagreeing with her or
being silent or leaving the room or
bursting into tears
pretty much what I understand pretty
much everything apart from agreeing with
her you demonstrate white fragility
which a lot of people have described as
a casket wrap and so I'm that that would
be an area that would be the one point
in the book where I was thinking I'm not
sure yet that there was sort of a few
red flags came up yeah that's it I mean
it's really interesting to explore
because I've read the book and I didn't
get those impressions at all I've
listened to her talks and workshops and
stuff and I'm a big fan of what she says
that's the step that I would encourage
us to do is like let's let's confirm
whether or not our belief about what
she's claiming is true but you know
let's let's does she claim to speak for
white people does she claim to sort of
have all the answers and tell people why
they're ron and know better than we do
what we're doing wrong I think we can
continue and those facts are about
asking her I guess or reading her book
and I think there is a lot of you know
the same way that like someone like
James d'amour has been you know
demonized by the left and you know Robin
has been demonized by the that group you
know the I don't know what they're
called but yeah so I think there's a
there's the there's a projection of
something and that if that was true I
would not necessarily try to defend it
but there's also the possibility that
we're misrepresenting her and her work
and I think that's definitely the case I
I encourage people to read the book
before thinking that they know what
she's saying
because this is a nuanced thing that is
hard to understand and it's complicated
it's easy to mischaracterize
which is stuff that we should be having
conversations about that kind of stuff
and putting up gates and saying that
they're doing it wrong is kind of
productive yeah and I'd like to - open
it out and maybe
it would be great to see her in dialogue
with someone maybe on the letter
platform or on this channel or or
wherever so maybe let's let's sort of
put some feelers out and see whether
that might be possible with someone who
is critical of her work and those a bit
more about it than I do yeah
I'd be great I would love that so yeah
my last question is there's one very
practical tip that I really liked that
you talked about in the book and that's
to eat together which I thought was a
really like it makes perfect sense if
we're sharing food with someone it's
probably tapping into some very
deep-rooted patterns of safety and
community that and that that sounds like
if you need to have a difficult
conversation maybe do it over dinner is
that is that something that that you
would advise absolutely it might seem
trite but you know I think we there's
several reasons where I think this is
good number one food you know is a
calming sort of satiating chemical that
can sort of prevent our blood pressure
from spiking suddenly and our heart rate
from jumping out and turning us into
sort of in the moving us through the
attack mode to the person has to be in
the room with you you know oftentimes we
think we're arguing with someone or a
group of people that a group of people
or that person isn't in the room so this
is this requires you to go out and
invite them into your house or it right
to doubt with you and they're gonna be
there so that they can surprise you with
a different perspective and three I
think there's just like some kind of
cultural deep-rooted cultural elements
that you tap into when you're breaking
the bread and you're sharing a meal and
all this stuff where you start to see
them emotionally subconsciously as
friends and family and you will ask some
different kinds of questions you look
more likely to behave in a productive
way than the unproductive way so you
know when it comes to solving something
really hard like disagreement it's a
great it's great to lean on these old
technologies that we've invented you
know thousands of years ago to help us
through them
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