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By Joe Arney

How do you get that neighbor, relative or coworker to change their mind about abortion, gun control or immigration?

You won’t. And Matthew Koschmann wishes you’d stop trying. 

The associate professor of communication at the University of Colorado Boulder’s College of Media, Communication and Information said our personal experiences should have taught us by now that those who don’t agree with us won’t be swayed by us correcting the information that’s led them to their beliefs. 

“If anything, it’s the opposite,” Koschmann said. “We live in a very information rich—if not gluttonous—environment, and more information does not necessarily make us change our minds. … Most of us don’t say, ‘Oh, thank you for correcting me on my assumptions about the world.’”

But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk to each other, a theme Koschmann returned to during Monday’s Difficult Dialogues series hosted by the university’s Center for Humanities & the Arts. He was part of a panel examining political polarization and how to stay good neighbors at a time of deep division in the United States. 

“If you can’t talk about something, you can’t fix it,” said Jennifer Ho, director of the center, in opening the discussion. “So, how do we find a way forward—how do we stay good neighbors, no matter what results happen in November or in January?”

Polarization and the press

The panel also featured Angie Chuang, an associate professor of journalism at CMCI and a former journalist whose research looks at race and identity, especially as presented by the media.

“The news media is part of the problem,” she said. “It informs people, and creates this rich source of information, but it oftentimes polarizes people.”

It’s a problem that’s arguably gotten worse in the digital age, as the number of publications and platforms has mushroomed. Instead of the mid-19th century penny presses, clickbait proliferates through alternative news sites.

“The news media is not there to improve our national dialog or improve our nuanced understanding,” Chuang said. “There are individual journalists who are trying really hard, and there are organizations trying to fight this—but as a marketplace, it is trying to get advertising money. Understand that, and you become a savvier media consumer.”

Chuang and Koschmann were joined on the panel by Boulder Mayor Aaron Brockett, as well as moderator Michaele Ferguson, an associate professor in the university’s department of political science.

If you’ve tried to have conversations with people who don’t share your views, you know how difficult the proposition can be. Chuang said our social identities—race, gender, sexuality, religion and others—are seen as essential to who we are, so when that becomes the topic, discussion quickly veers off course.

“If I were to say, ‘Michelle, your views on the economy and foreign trade are just totally ignorant, and I can’t even understand why you think the way you do,’” Chuang said to Ferguson, “it comes off differently than if I say, ‘Michelle your views on race are completely ignorant.’ 

“If I say, tell me your experience based on your identities, that is a different conversation than, ‘Why is your position on policing or affirmative action the way it is?’ If we bring it back to experience, it can be a moment of sharing, rather than a moment of debating positions of things that are very personal to us—which is very difficult.” 

Defusing disagreements

As the mayor of a city with a well-publicized progressive bent, you might expect Brockett’s days are spent on friendly territory, but spoke about the difficult conversations he’s had with residents on any number of issues. He defuses such situations by offering to learn about how the other person formed their viewpoint, and sharing materials that demonstrate where he’s coming from.

It doesn’t always work, he said. Once, he sent a peer-reviewed paper to a resident to shine light on an issue, which she countered by sending a thesis proposal from a master’s student that she found online.

“On almost any topic, you can find something to support a position, any position, somewhere on the internet,” Brockett said. Online, he said, “many of us are accustomed to getting feedback loop, hearing the same viewpoints over and over again—and then it becomes inconceivable to you how other people might think something different.” 

The panelists agreed that those difficult conversations are worth having because when you find a moment of connection, it’s authentic and validating. Just don’t go in expecting to bring people around to your ideological corner. 

“If you are interested in being influential and persuasive in implementing change in your community, the most effective thing you can do is not explicitly try to change people’s minds,” Koschmann said. “Try to live a beautiful life of human flourishing, that is attractive and winsome, that draws people to you—and then people say, ‘What’s going on, tell me more about your interests and why you’re happy.’”