Those who say that media and our political leaders are out of touch with the "real" America have a point. Take the recent ABC News analysis of the last Republican presidential debate. After asking, "Who threw the first punch?" and "Who drew blood?" Karen Travis commented, "It's unlikely that Romney delivered the attacks that he needed to get the job done."
If we were watching a re-run of the famed Liston-Ali fight, this kind of commentary would have been appropriate. But instead of helping us elect a president of the United States, it undermines the political process and even the fabric of American life.
By framing everything as a fight, media encourages all of us to be combative in our interactions. To gain press coverage and political advantage, candidates take the bait. The result of this downward spiral is evident in the divisive politics of today: a surreal, Alice-in-Wonderland political landscape where everything is about winning the headline fight in today's 24-hour news cycle, and nothing worthwhile gets accomplished.
It's not just a problem with political coverage. Take so-called "reality" TV, which often is just an excuse to inexpensively produce sensational programming. It wouldn't be a problem if it didn't have real effects. Instead, the programming legitimizes conflict, and that carries over into all aspects of American life. Our children and even adults replicate the language and actions they see on TV, on the Internet and in the newspaper. Politicians degenerate into gladiators; journalists into sportscasters.
A friend told me the story of a woman on the planning committee for a large non-profit event that raises funds to support an important and worthwhile cause. During the planning of the last couple of events, she noticed her co-chairs have been increasingly disagreeable, catty and outright, publicly mean. Then someone explained they've been watching The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Ten years ago these women would have been horrified if they saw themselves behaving this way, but now they think it's acceptable or even normal.
It's human nature to mimic what we frequently see. When, through the media, reality is consistently reflected back to us in a distorted mirror, it just gets easier to find ourselves becoming caricatures of caricatures unless we actively resist its influence.
Fox News commentator Juan Williams wrote recently, "The excess of provocateurs corrupting public dialogue in America sets up a fight on every issue for every American."
He goes on to say, "Individual Americans are going to have to turn away from the entertainment (italics mine) associated with extremist, at times buffoonish, demagogues on the air and their imitators who are now running for public office. They will have to personally raise the bar for conversations about important social and political issues."
If we don't, America is headed down a rabbit hole into a surreal world where everything involves a fight; where we see others who oppose our ideas as evil interlopers; where we see advancing an idea as a battle for limited resources or a grab for power; and worse, where techniques such as lies, attack speech, meanness, and disrespect are considered legitimate tools on a stage where the end justifies the means.
In fact, we are already there. How do we climb out?
There are excellent examples of workplaces that foster civil conversation to get things done. At Disney-Pixar, producers present ideas to a panel of peers who, instead of "critiquing" a film, "plus" it by presenting their ideas about how to optimize the project. At Ohio's Fairmount Minerals, employees take part in "Appreciative Inquiry" summits where they dream, discuss the company's future, and develop projects that fit with their motto "Do Good, Do Well."
In these examples, others with different ideas are seen not as enemies, but collaborators. Questions are not asked to provoke an entertaining response, but to produce results. Both companies nurture cultures that foster sustainable results.
Our current conversation in America is not sustainable. By vilifying one side over the other and turning everything into a fight, public policies become intense wars that will be be reversed once the other side comes into power. The thrill of victory ultimately is tempered by the constant fight to gain more ground. And around we go again!
An America that constantly fights is an America that does not fulfill our mutual pledge for the American Dream. This Dream is based on the idea that, through hard work, fair play and equal access, even the lowest person on the ladder can achieve his or her potential. The American Dream envisions a world of "plus-ing" and sustainable progress, not one of fighting. It creates a world of expanding ingenuity and possibilities.
In the real America where most of us live and work, not a cowboys-and-Indians film or a cops-and-robbers drama, most of us strive to get along most of the time. Most of us aren't always looking for an argument.
So let's demand art, politics and citizenship that reflect the values and goodness of America and spur us to be our best. It's going to take each of us at the grass roots, talking to our neighbors and friends, extolling our leaders to be leaders, and sometimes even shutting off TV to make civility return. The alternative is a surreal world where crazy will become normal and normal will soon be seen as crazy.
To see how America's shared values can help unite us and spark this civil conversation, go to www.Purpleamerica.us
Follow Stuart Muszynski on Twitter: www.twitter.com/purpleamericaus
And yet, the politics of yesteryear, right down to the nation's earliest days were at least as hostile as they are today-- see Federalist writings and political cartooning re Jefferson in the election of 1800, and see Whig writings and cartoons re Andrew Jackson. See also, ominously, election of 1860.
When sweeping changes are going on, as is the case today when the twin towers of financial collapse and endless war on abstraction cast their long shadows over the nation, real people are getting hurt, real money is being extracted and more folks are seeing politics as an existential contest-- not hard to see that things will get increasingly combative in the media and the public square, anytime so much is at stake for so many.
In this day and age, in America, it could be argued that POLITICS is an expression of WAR by other means.
""We are trying to change the tones in the state capitals -- and turn them toward bitter nastiness and partisanship."
quoted in John Aloysius Farrell, "Rancor becomes top D.C. export: GOP leads charge in ideological war," Denver Post, May 26, 2003
Grover Norquist...............the man over 95% of Republicans in Congress have signed a pledge to.
I don't entirely agree that politics suffers from this palpable divisiveness, I believe that it is one of the primary causes of it.
For my entire adult life I have witnessed politicians use fear and divisiveness to get elected. They have everyone convinced that every issue is clear cut. That they are one of us and will make the call in our favor. The problem is that they go to each neighborhood and give the same speech. And the true irony of it all is that the last thing any of them want to be is one of us. They even publicly admit to looking at us as "voting blocks". We are nothing more than a cheering section that helps them settle the pissing contest they play between themselves to see who gets to divvy up the proceeds of feeding at the public trough.
A major problem I see that you didn't discuss and actually, the tone of your article actually makes worse (in my humble opinion). The trap you fell into and that is persistent and consistent among media and individuals who are trying to be responsible and as non-partisan as possible. That trap is that both sides are just as bad. When in fact that is not true, at all. The most telling reason I say that is any poll that asks Democrats and Republicans if they want compromise. And in every poll of this nature, most Dems want compromise, while most Republicans do not. This is a fundamental problem. And is a fundamental reason Republicans have become far worse offenders of the type of behavior discussed in this article.
And, of course, I am speaking in general terms and not about individuals. But on the whole, Republicans (the party and it's talking heads) lie more often (Fox 'News' has consistently the most misinformed viewers). Republicans accuse Dems of the worst tactics, yet are far worse offenders than Dems. Republicans use hyperbole, fear-mongering, demagoguery and all sorts of reprehensible tactics at a far higher rate and with more aggressiveness than Dems by far.
And while it is easy to claim that I am partisan, the statistics about Fox 'News' viewers goes a long way in backing up my argument, if for no other tactic, than the use of lies.
So, not that it can't be both, but I think extremism in "entertainment" is as much the cause as the result of incivility. This trend may not turn around until life gets a little better among average Americans.