By Shannon Kolman
Although I missed the Colorado Health Symposium last month, I did catch some of the recorded presentations. One that caught my attention was a keynote talk by the columnist and political commentator Sally Kohn. She put forth a call to action to stop hate. Her fundamental belief is that there is too much hate in the world today, that it is spreading like a virus, and that it will keep spreading if we each don’t do something about it.
Sally touched on the fact that there is a human tendency to define “us and them.” The human brain is wired to make distinctions and to note differences. It is part of our survival mechanism. I recently attend the Center for Health Progress luncheon which featured Rinku Sen, an activist and former president and of Race Forward and publisher of Colorlines.com. She spoke about the fact that although the idea of being “racially color blind” (e.g. disregarding racial characteristic, or saying race doesn’t matter as a way to address discrimination) sounds like a good thing, it isn’t possible. Our brains are not wired that way. In researching this idea of being color blind, I ran into an old (2011) Psychology Today article that suggested rather than being color blind, what if we became more multicultural by recognizing and valuing difference, by learning about differences, and by fostering alliances. Sounds good, but how do we do that?
This suggestion is similar to the three tools that Sally Kohn noted for becoming aware of and putting a halt to our own hate. The word hate seems harsh, and an easily Googled definition states that hate is an intense or passionate dislike for something or someone. So, I would have to agree with Sally that we all hate in varying degrees; we all have implicit and explicit biases, especially given the current political climate, that cause us to feel intense dislike toward certain groups of people or ideas. Sally suggests we use 1) counter networks, 2) counter speech, and 3) counter spaces to bridge the divides hate creates and to breakdown the “virus of hate”. So how do we do that?
Sally gave concrete examples of how we can break down our hate barriers. She is calling for each of us to become extremely self-aware of how we perpetuate our own thinking and ideas, and to step out of our comfort zones to at least consider the ideas of other groups we hate. She gave some compelling statistics such as the fact that three-fourths of white Americans have no black friends, and that most Americans do not have friends on the opposite end of the political spectrum. She also noted that we use “narrow-casting” with our own news stations to reinforce our own beliefs. What we need, Sally says, are real life social networks that counter our in-group out-group divides – and that doesn’t happen by accident, we have to make it happen. Just by getting to know the people you hate, stereotypes start to be challenged and the divisions we’ve created start to break down.
Counter speech requires us to respond to ideas and people we hate by being nice – listening, connecting, and humanizing. When we hate we dehumanize people and counter speech can help to humanize those with disagree with. The idea of counter spaces challenges us to not only build networks of people unlike ourselves, but to step into spaces with people who have ideas and beliefs unlike our own. This is supported by research that shows that children who go to racially integrated schools do not exhibit unconscious racial bias, much less conscious bias. These kids are not color blind they just don’t dislike or hate the other kids who look different than themselves because that has become an accepted difference in their minds.
Sally’s suggestions are no easy task. Stepping outside of our comfort zones is uncomfortable and our survival parts of the brain do not like being uncomfortable. She is not the only one offering this challenge though. The August 28th edition of Time magazine featured a collection of articles by leading thinkers called Hate in America. In one portion of the article, Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota state representative and first Somali-American Muslim lawmaker, says “when we interact with those we fear and hate, we will find commonality.” He suggests that to bridge the divide that hate creates we must: 1) realize that most of our differences are exaggerated nuances exacerbated by uncompromising ignorance; 2) see others’ struggles as our own, and their success as our success so we can speak to our common humanity; 3) build a more connected society, using our resources to uplift one another so we collectively benefit. There’s certainly a challenging theme here. The question is, are we up to the challenge?
Although I missed the Colorado Health Symposium last month, I did catch some of the recorded presentations. One that caught my attention was a keynote talk by the columnist and political commentator Sally Kohn. She put forth a call to action to stop hate. Her fundamental belief is that there is too much hate in the world today, that it is spreading like a virus, and that it will keep spreading if we each don’t do something about it.
Sally touched on the fact that there is a human tendency to define “us and them.” The human brain is wired to make distinctions and to note differences. It is part of our survival mechanism. I recently attend the Center for Health Progress luncheon which featured Rinku Sen, an activist and former president and of Race Forward and publisher of Colorlines.com. She spoke about the fact that although the idea of being “racially color blind” (e.g. disregarding racial characteristic, or saying race doesn’t matter as a way to address discrimination) sounds like a good thing, it isn’t possible. Our brains are not wired that way. In researching this idea of being color blind, I ran into an old (2011) Psychology Today article that suggested rather than being color blind, what if we became more multicultural by recognizing and valuing difference, by learning about differences, and by fostering alliances. Sounds good, but how do we do that?
This suggestion is similar to the three tools that Sally Kohn noted for becoming aware of and putting a halt to our own hate. The word hate seems harsh, and an easily Googled definition states that hate is an intense or passionate dislike for something or someone. So, I would have to agree with Sally that we all hate in varying degrees; we all have implicit and explicit biases, especially given the current political climate, that cause us to feel intense dislike toward certain groups of people or ideas. Sally suggests we use 1) counter networks, 2) counter speech, and 3) counter spaces to bridge the divides hate creates and to breakdown the “virus of hate”. So how do we do that?
Sally gave concrete examples of how we can break down our hate barriers. She is calling for each of us to become extremely self-aware of how we perpetuate our own thinking and ideas, and to step out of our comfort zones to at least consider the ideas of other groups we hate. She gave some compelling statistics such as the fact that three-fourths of white Americans have no black friends, and that most Americans do not have friends on the opposite end of the political spectrum. She also noted that we use “narrow-casting” with our own news stations to reinforce our own beliefs. What we need, Sally says, are real life social networks that counter our in-group out-group divides – and that doesn’t happen by accident, we have to make it happen. Just by getting to know the people you hate, stereotypes start to be challenged and the divisions we’ve created start to break down.
Counter speech requires us to respond to ideas and people we hate by being nice – listening, connecting, and humanizing. When we hate we dehumanize people and counter speech can help to humanize those with disagree with. The idea of counter spaces challenges us to not only build networks of people unlike ourselves, but to step into spaces with people who have ideas and beliefs unlike our own. This is supported by research that shows that children who go to racially integrated schools do not exhibit unconscious racial bias, much less conscious bias. These kids are not color blind they just don’t dislike or hate the other kids who look different than themselves because that has become an accepted difference in their minds.
Sally’s suggestions are no easy task. Stepping outside of our comfort zones is uncomfortable and our survival parts of the brain do not like being uncomfortable. She is not the only one offering this challenge though. The August 28th edition of Time magazine featured a collection of articles by leading thinkers called Hate in America. In one portion of the article, Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota state representative and first Somali-American Muslim lawmaker, says “when we interact with those we fear and hate, we will find commonality.” He suggests that to bridge the divide that hate creates we must: 1) realize that most of our differences are exaggerated nuances exacerbated by uncompromising ignorance; 2) see others’ struggles as our own, and their success as our success so we can speak to our common humanity; 3) build a more connected society, using our resources to uplift one another so we collectively benefit. There’s certainly a challenging theme here. The question is, are we up to the challenge?