We Need Deeper Understandings of Human Nature to Stop Cycles of Anger, Hurt, Bigotry, and Partisanship

(Hmmmm. . .maybe this whole turn a social media thread/rumination into a blog entry might yield too much.)

I currently have Episode 89: You voting in 2016 vs you voting in 2018 of the Make Me Smart podcast on queue with some of it partially listened to. As of the point I've reached, the hosts, Kai Ryssdal and Molly Wood, are revisiting their interview with George Lakoff from Episode 12: This is Your Brain on Trump. This re-visit feels like a coincidence because I'm looking into some of Lakoff's work for my bachelors project.

I've taken out three to four of his books from the library and looked more into his thought on the Internet, (though I haven't yet started the books). In what I've seen and heard from him so far, though, I'm a little disappointed.

Then again, I've been disappointed a little, in general, with thought in positions of pluralism and the importance of thinking independently, openly, and empathetically, though I support these causes 100%. To be frank, I also feel disappointed by most positions out there in the present day, Far Leftist, liberal, conservative, or Far Rightist.

I have problems with assumption of correctness without building up a basis for the correctness. Even the Rawlsian "Veil of Ignorance" argument for coming up with equal rights blindly without knowing your position in the world still feels somewhat shallow. Even then, I'm sure after the veil has been pulled away, people with unfair advantage will try to push for more advantage. Some type of logical fallacy must exist regarding the veil.

The Invisibilia podcast even had an interesting episode about the UN trying to inculcate pluralistim into Somalian culture. A study of one of these initiatives confirmed that art and performance could push people into these positive directions and what factors do so. Nonetheless, the study couldn't determine the why's and reasons for why people are susceptible to such manipulation.

So this phenomena leads me to a flipside of questions: if these tools can be used for good without understanding them, couldn't the phenomena be used in a similar fashion for evil? Shouldn't we work harder to understand these underlying causes and sources? Shouldn't we understand what human factors lead us to be manipulated, lead us to adopt Lakoff's Strict Father or Indulgent Mother models?

Sometimes it feels like Lakoff, many academics, and all of us in our politics, depend on the elegance and coherence of arguments and narratives to convince people. If people simply don't accept the argument, then we dismiss as ignorant or as adopting the wrong side of the argument. In the case of Lakoff's models, they have adopted the "Strict Father" (since Lakoff demonizes those who do).

Now, I'm coming from a difficult position. I believe in

• Pluralism
• Fairness
• Empathy
• Open mindedness
• Ppenness to experience and
• Against true systemic unfair advantages/privilege and will fight tooth and nail to protect them

At the same time, to fight tooth and nail, I want to have good back up to the causes I'm fighting for. I want an understanding of human nature, tendency, instinct, and inborn causes that bring about these reactions in people. I'll fight without good back up, but I still want the back up.

Hopefully, through this understanding, I can show the other side their incorrectness and that they're hurting themselves by not standing down. Their persistance to continue in their ways of hate and pain hurts them. Even take the standoff of terrorism and civilization. I don't like to go back to pinning down the rise of cycles of hate, anger, and violence down to some historical point. After all, it's possible to go even further back to reach another historical point to show the injustice of that original historical point. It's called a cycle for a reason.

Rather, though, investigating the human reactions to these historical points that reverbate further and further back in time and investigating how those historical points have fired up human instinct to start cycles that cause so much damage and hate can help show us

• The positives and negatives of actions taken
• How they can be self destructive to
• The self
• The community
• Civilization
• Earth

If we understand where we have come from, we can break out of our cycles.

I am a Unitarian Universalist, not a Christian, so I tend to appreciate texts and ideas from multiple different heritages in all of human history. Some text from Paul's letter to the Romans has always stuck me since I had read it:

[. . .] But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit. [. . .]

I cut a bunch from the quote. I'm not so into the divine and theological interpretation of the text, even though that's the origin of it. Rather, if you replace "God" with "understanding", "human nature", or "reality" (which, obviously, Christians will argue is blasphemous), I believe the text better fits my approach.

I like to think that if we can figure out a good interpretation of the original causes of human behavior, we may not need the laws created by politicians. These lawas were created at a time when one partisan side had the power vs when another side was out of power. For instance, I'm coming to appreciate a constant between all sides of conflict in humanity: we all have an instinct for "fairness".

Yet we have different interpretations of what fairness means because of our position in the disagreement. If we can figure out some basic premises of how the human instinct of "fairness" works, including how different individuals and groups interpret the application of fairness, we can have a better idea of how to extrapolate and reason out how to act without needing to remember rote legislated laws.

And if there's an existing cycle of conflict, maybe we can figure out how to get out of the cycle in a way that satisfies all sides. Getting out might even require one or all sides to feel and accept guilt, but to do so in a way that they accept their part in contributing to the cycle of anger, hate, bigotry hurt, and even violence.

In the current atmosphere of politics in the United States, I urge our politicians to behave civilly and engage in a due process that respects impact and unveiling undue advantage. I also urge our politicians to figure out better ways to get a better tab on their consituents, electorate, and the facts, considering

• Their staffers seem to be getting information that leads them to believe their electorate is more conservative
• Their staff is underfunded thus causing dependence on lobbyists for information
• That services put into place to provide Congress with nonpartisan information, like the Congressional Research Service, is being sabotaged

Since Congress, especially the Republican establishment (whatever that means these days), can't seem to get it through their heads that they have lost touch with the country, you won't find me telling everyday people to be civil. The United States government is supposed to be "government of the people, by the people, for the people" (interestingly, our heritage has gotten that from John Wyckliffe). If politicians won't do the work to find out what the people think and feel, then the people of America need to make sure we let the politicians know how we think and feel (even if that means to happen in public, in an elevator in governmental buildings, in restaurants, in town halls, etc.).

Nonetheless, whether one group or another should act civilly or not, we should all seek to

• Understand the nature of the phenomena behind us
• Figure out why we and others behave the way that they do
• See how our current trends are destroying us, even though we believe it's saving us

If we continue with this partisan cycle, we're going to do destroy ourselves and the world. On the other hand, if we can understand our human nature, we can hopefully break out of this cycle and figure out how to prevent such cycles in the future (including preventing genocide).

Who's with me on this one?

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