Talking with Conservatives: New Possibilities Emerge Across the Political Divide

The Partisan Divide in Our Country Worsens

The first signs of the current partisan divide occurred during the 2008 election.  I hoped that division would go away once candidate Obama became President.  That didn’t happen, and within months the divisive ranting grew from a rumble to a roar.  How did the joy of the victory on election night turn so quickly into dark and vicious rhetoric?

From the birther movement to the Tea Parties to the popularity of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, I tried helplessly to understand what was going.  Mostly I was just scared.  The notes of hysteria in the rhetoric, the barely suppressed racism, and the ever-present possibility of violence terrified me.  Having lived through three assassinations in the 1960’s and seen a nation divided by the Vietnam War, those bitter days were and are still vivid for me.  I did not want to see blood in the streets again.

A Win-Win Solution Appears in the Transpartisan Alliance

I was familiar with the Transpartisan Alliance, a group that has been working for several years to unite Americans across political divides. TA seeks to include all positions and points of view with the underlying premise that all perspectives are needed in order to find win-win solutions. Our current politics is completely saturated with a win-lose, attack/fight approach that is exhausting to participants and to the public.

Having focused their work on the national level for some time, TA is now shifting its attention to grassroots political organizing.   When the first Seattle TA meeting was held in October 2009, I was present. To our dismay, all those at the first meeting identified themselves as progressive, liberal or independent. No Republicans, Conservatives, or others on the right were present. Our challenge was obvious.  Go out into the community and find those citizens and bring them in.

Conservatives and Libertarians Are Not the Enemy

As I did not know any Conservatives or Libertarians, I set myself the task of going out into Seattle to meet some.  I hit pay-dirt when I found a Conservative group meeting at a coffee shop on a Saturday morning.  I had no intention of converting anyone to my political point of view. All I wanted was to establish human relationships with the people there.  I wanted to understand why they were conservatives and what had led them to embrace this way of thinking.  I decided to be completely honest with these folks. I told them why I was there and about TA.

I had a remarkable experience that morning. I was warmly received and the people there shared generously about why they had embraced their conservative beliefs. They felt disrespected and unheard by most liberals.  They felt powerless about what was happening to their country and their way of life. They said they were looking to the Constitution for a way to make sense of what was happening in Washington D.C.

Standing in the World of the Other Changes You and Perhaps Them as Well

These folks, I discovered, were not my enemy, but simply people I had never bothered to deeply listen to before. When I left that meeting, it was on a cloud of joy. I no longer have any fear of conservatives. A few days later I met with a group of Libertarians and helped them put their newsletter together. Once again I was treated like an honored guest.

To see the world differently, as others see it, is one of the greatest gifts a human being can receive.   I had changed and my experience of the world had shifted.  It’s clear to me that all human beings, whoever they are, long to be heard and understood in some fundamental way.  We may not agree with each other about the best way to solve problems, but we all yearn for the experience of being acknowledged in the fullness of our humanity.

When we see the other this way it opens a path to working productively with each other.  Of course problems will always arise.  If we start however, by creating a foundation of trust and mutual respect as human beings, our ability to solve the multitudinous problems we face can only be enhanced. A human politics, a truly civil politics is, I believe, truly possible.