Where is the middle?
I’ll start walking your way, you start walking mine…
I heard the story of girls in college who were roommates. The four of them were eating dinner and the conversation turned to politics. One girl said to one other girl, “You can’t be part of this discussion because the three of us are not on your side. We are on the other side.” This was brought to my attention because I know some of them. My immediate response was, “Why is there a ‘side’?” But really, why does there have to be a side? This isn’t a new problem.
There we were, people were willingly losing lifelong friends in the name of “Their team.” The entire first term of Trump and the entire time Biden was in office, this permeated throughout society. Biden and his team were making claims that no one consciously believed to be true. Men were not having babies. But this was being said by very important people that were believed to be smart. But this is what one “side” was saying. The more the conspiracy theories became true, people began questioning what a conspiracy theory really was.
Then comes Trump for a second term. Trump could announce that he will dedicate a state park and include outstanding black men and women in American history and someone would still find a way to hate him. In fact, he did just that! Notable black people in American history, like MLK Jr., Fredrick Douglas, Muhammed Ali, Harriet Tubman, and many more, will be honored by this new park. But it will somehow become a bad thing. Why? Because we can’t find the middle.
What does the middle look like?
It probably looks like a place where I get to think for myself. If I like Trump more than Harris, and I vote for Trump, then he renames the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, I can think for myself and come to the conclusion that this was one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen a president do. The middle is also a place where I can acknowledge that one the best moments of the Biden administration was when they began making steady moves towards bringing mental health to a place where it is recognized similarly to physical health, in the way of insurance coverage and medical recognition. It is being normalized by the medical society and subsequently helping save lives every day. This was because of the Biden administration.
If I loved Biden/Harris and despised Trump, the middle would look like a place where I could acknowledge that the insanity of claiming men can have babies and that anything non-white is good must cease if we are to move forward as a country. In the middle, I could despise the things that Trump says, enjoy the things that Biden or Harris say, and still recognize that both Trump and Biden gained the most financially from the production of covid vaccines. In the middle, I could see that while Biden was my choice for president, He changed the catch and release program from release back to Mexico awaiting trial to release into America while awaiting trial, causing there to be less actual trials for asylum seekers than ever before. I could recognize that the First Step Act enacted during Trump’s first term released over 1000 black men on day one of the implementation, and that this is a great thing. I could acknowledge that one is my president but call him out when he makes a bad decision. Because in the middle, I am my own person.
We have this terrible tendency to look at politics in much the same way we do sports. There is a binary way of thinking. Me against you. One way or the other way. Good verse bad. In sports, it is my team against your team. The problem with this analogy is that, in sports, when the Eagles beat the Chiefs in the Super Bowl, America still won. When one part of America defeats another part, nobody wins. We become the divided states of America.
We find ourselves looking at the middle as if it is a severe compromise that denigrates our own conceptualization of what is right and wrong, causing us to combat such cognitive dissonance with blind fervor in an effort to retain what’s left of being right, regardless of whether we are right or not. This perception of the middle is a very nihilistic and produces nothing good. We would rather hang on to wrong information than accept that fact that we could be wrong and welcome new correct information. James Baldwin once said,
“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to hate so stubbornly is because they sense, once the hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with the pain.”
So what happened to the middle?
Well, it moved. If you found yourself just slightly to the left of the middle 10 years ago, it is now moved to your left. You are now slightly right of the middle. How did that happen? Each group pulled to the outer realms of their beliefs. The right pulled towards the far right and the left pulled to the far left. The results were that the left pulled stronger. How did that happen? Negative emotions. Studies show that when an emotion is tied to an event, you are far more likely to remember it, especially if it is a negative emotion (Kensinger, 2009). This is because during episodic encoding and retrieval, neurologically encoding negative emotions involves the sensory systems of process and positive emotions involve conceptual processes. So when something good happens, we see it from a conceptual framing, as if it contributes to the overall existential congruence we hoped for. But when something negative happens, it catches all of our senses, particularly sight, feeling, and hearing, which is directly involved in the release of cortisol.
Why is this relevant to the left pulling stronger?
Because the left are typically the ones responsible for suggesting new ideas to replace old broken ones. This is vital to our country’s success. However, this usually involves being emotionally tied to a negative situation where there needs to be a new policy or a changed policy. So they feel strongly about a situation and begin acting on this negative emotion. This activates the sensory system and gets emotions directly involved, which studies show can severely cloud good judgment. That’s where conservatives come in. Conservatives’ job is to address the new suggestions from a more analytical approach. So when the pulling began, the emotional ties to policies were stronger than the conceptual ties to policy. Thus, the left pulled stronger.
Why are feelings bad when making policy?
It has been shown that empathy can cloud judgement beyond the scope of morality or even legality. Studies have shown that juries are more likely to find one guilty based on the emotional display of the victim regardless of facts, laws, or evidence (Prinz, 2011). Studies also show that people are willing to inflict pain on an innocent person if that person is in competition with the person one is empathizing with (Buffone & Poulin, 2014). Lastly, studies show that people are willing to be unfair and unjust to someone if they are in the way of the person we are empathizing with getting the help they need, even if it means someone else, or a group of people all dying as a result of the person you’re empathizing with getting help (Batson et al., 1995). It is a terrible idea to make policy based on emotions.
So how should this work?
The ideal situation goes like this: A liberal sees a flaw in a policy or a lack of a policy and suggest, “This is broken (or missing) and we need to do something about it. I think we should do_(xyz)__!” The conservative says, “Ok, let’s look at history. Has it been done before? Has it worked? What do we think will happen if we implement this policy? How will it affect the overall population?” Then the liberal and the conservative reach a compromise, and a policy is enhanced or created that is better for society as a whole. Emotions drive it, analytics define it, and reason implements it.
Why is this not happening now?
Algorithms. If you are not paying for the product, you are the product. The algorithms of social media are designed to only show you more of what you say you like. So the amount of opposing views you now see is minimal, on purpose. If you only see what you like, it only pours gas on the fire of fury you have over perceived atrocities. If we can remember this, we can understand that the real world looks nothing like the online world. Then and only then we may be able to meet in the middle… beneath that ole Georgia pine (please tell me you’ve heard of Diamond Rio!).
Stay Classy GP!
Grainger
References
Buffone, A. E. K., & Poulin, M. J. (2014). Empathy, Target Distress, and Neurohormone Genes Interact to Predict Aggression for Others–Even Without Provocation. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 40(11), 1406; 1406–1422; 1422. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167214549320
Kensinger, E. A. (2009). Remembering the Details: Effects of Emotion. Emotion Review, 1(2), 99–113. https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073908100432
Prinz, J. (2011). Against Empathy. Southern Journal of Philosophy, 49, 214–233. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,sso&db=pif&AN=PHL2175308&site=eds-live&scope=site&authtype=sso&custid=s4672406