June 12, 2023

When I was fresh from college and unsure what came next, I found myself in a career-counseling session that suggested I wasn’t very good at a great many things. Still, there was hope for me, given my instinct to connect. I was characterized as a “bridge-builder” and advised that a profession—like teaching—that featured plenty of human contact would suit me. It did, for twenty years. More recently, I leaned even more heavily into my bridge-building tendencies, writing a book called Learning to Depolarize and starting Middle Ground School Solutions to help prepare today’s students to ease tomorrow’s political polarization.

It is my job, then, to help educators reach across lines of divide and find the motivation and tools to help students do so because political polarization is an enduring challenge that awaits those students. This work animates people, although questions arise. One of the most vexing of these speaks to a quote widely attributed to James Baldwin but which is in fact the product of author Robert Jones, Jr. His tweet (since deleted) resonated with many: “We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.” At nearly every presentation I deliver, I am confronted with this question. How, people ask, am I supposed to empathize with, or even tolerate, someone who does not recognize my humanity or the humanity of those I care for? Is this not a bridge too far?

No one should, in the interest of political diversity or any other project, have to engage with, humor, or embolden someone who does not recognize one’s basic humanity. Still, we must face the enormity of our country’s challenges, and we must realistically consider the depth of the divides that separate those who might otherwise team up to solve those challenges. Some of the most essential bridges may in fact be those that reach the most alienated and angry among us. Could there be more than one answer to this central question of whether we engage with those who deny others’ humanity?

For a couple of years, in partnership with folks within and beyond the world of education, I have thought deeply about this question. This past winter I convened a series of conversations with school-based DEI practitioners to discuss the tension inherent in pursuing political tolerance in schools while simultaneously seeking to elevate historically marginalized voices. I turned also to Mylien Duong, Caroline Mehl, and Caroline Jany, whose Aspen Institute report considers a similar challenge, and during the National Week of Conversation this spring, Jahmad Canley, Cliff Kayser, and Karith Foster delivered an insightful presentation called “DEI in the Crosswinds” that raised the question of engaging—or not—with those who do not recognize one’s humanity. 

I also completed extensive research for my book, and I discovered that many people misread the political “others.” We often unfairly generalize, conjuring the most visible and detestable figure from politics or media and transferring our feelings about that person to the person—the parent or student, perhaps—in our midst. Research from More in Common has shown that many Americans from both sides of the aisle have a distorted image of what their political opposites actually think, and other research has shown that our meta-perceptions are out of whack; that is, we tend to believe the political “others” hold us in lower esteem than is actually the case. 

This includes the issue of dehumanization, which an organization called Beyond Conflict has studied closely. “Levels of dehumanization between Republicans and Democrats are concerning,” they write. “But what’s even more concerning are the levels of perceived dehumanization—the degree to which we feel dehumanized by members of an opposing group.” In fact, the researchers say, both Democrats and Republicans substantially underestimate the extent to which the “other” recognizes their humanity. 

In short, it is true for many of us Americans that our political opposites are not as extreme as we imagine, and they do not dislike us as much as we believe. They also recognize our basic humanity more often than we give them credit for. 

This is not to suggest that dehumanization is a myth. Again, I have come to believe that many people, when faced with evidence that they or others are being dehumanized, may simply need to end the conversation before it begins. However, even as we acknowledge this eventuality, can we also see a crack in the door? Given the research into our misperceptions, could it sometimes be the case that the premise of our statement—that we will not engage with those who dehumanize others—is worth interrogating? If so, we might consider: Who, exactly, am I referring to? What has happened that leads me to believe that person or those people do not recognize another’s humanity? We need not humor those who hate, but the research into misperceptions suggests that the “others” are often not as monstrous as we imagine them to be.

I would even question whether we should categorically cut off those who do display evidence of dehumanization. Dylan Marron, author of the book, Conversations with People Who Hate Me, and host of a podcast by the same name, engages in productive dialogue with people who have previously subjected him to dehumanizing online rhetoric. Derek Black, once an avid white supremacist, wrote in The New York Times that his exit from the world of white nationalism began with the outreach of “people who chose to invite me into their dorms and conversations rather than ostracize me.” Through the American Listening Project, Lisa Allen Ortiz tells the tale of the belligerent Nazi whose ire and energy softened in the fifteen minutes she devoted to him. In each of these cases, bridges were built in unexpected places.

The potential to disarm hatred through engagement is perhaps most astonishingly epitomized by a documentary called Stranger at the Gate, in which former U.S. marine Mac McKinney returned from military service to find his country infested with the very people he had learned to hate. McKinney decided to bomb a local Islamic center, and yet, against all odds, while scouting out his target, he was welcomed into that community. As Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai says in a PBS interview about the film, violence is bred by dehumanization, which can, as it was in Muncie, Indiana, be disrupted through loving engagement.

Temperamentally, I am suited to the work of bridge-building; the career counselor had it right. I am also cloaked in layers of privilege—as a white, cisgender, heterosexual male—that make it less difficult for me to engage in this work than it is for some. If I have a “red line,” some sort of criteria to determine if I will or will not engage with the “other,” I have not yet found it. I recognize, though, that for many reasons, in many circumstances, another person may feel differently. If the question, then, is, “How do you expect me to engage with someone who does not recognize my humanity or the humanity of people I care for?” my answer is, “I don’t.” 

Yet, I would hope that before drawing that line, we might ask each other, “What makes us say this person does not recognize others’ humanity?” And I would offer this to those who are receptive: “If you can stomach it, yes, please do engage, and know that in doing so you could be saving those whose humanity this person does not yet recognize.”

You may also be interested in reading more articles written by Kent Lenci for Intrepid Ed News.