We’ve all been there: a family gathering, an outing with friends — and then politics comes up. Cuts to the safety net. Guns. Abortion. Climate change. Fault lines run deep. So do emotions.
In the past, you may have avoided these topics. But President Obama’s former speechwriter David Litt concludes that’s an unwise strategy in a recent essay entitled “Is it time to stop snubbing your right-wing family?” for The New York Times (NYT). He spoke with KPBS.
David, you focus on your brother-in-law, an electrician, in your recent NYT essay and your new book, "It's Only Drowning: A True Story of Learning to Surf and the Search for Common Ground." Tell me about the transformation that relationship with your brother-in-law underwent from the pandemic until now.
LITT: Matt, as you say, is an electrician who deals with violent shocks for work. And I'm a writer who deals with carpal tunnel for work. So we're just — we're very different people. And, you know, it really extends to all kinds of different things. And I think in the pandemic, at least for me, those differences started to feel like more than just differences. They started to feel like every detail — what kind of music we like, what kind of exercise we do, what kind of sports we follow — they all were identifiers. And it felt, and this is how I put it in the book, that we’d been drafted into opposite sides of a culture war. You know, it wasn't something that either of us chose, but it felt like there were sort of forces beyond our control saying, "nope, you all belong to different teams now." And I think, to some extent, what that piece was about and also what this book was about was I think I fell — you know, I think I kind of fell for that. And I think it took me a long time to realize that that doesn't have to be that way.
You say shunning as a strategy has been ineffective. Why do you think it doesn't work?
LITT: If you look at, you know, ancient Athens, which is where the word ostracism comes from, right? It was sort of — this was a way that society would get together and say, "we're going to essentially exile people for having views that the rest of society deems not acceptable." It doesn't tend to work because people can find people who agree with them. People can find, you know, sort of social scenarios that fit their beliefs online. And so, when you put all of that together, it means that on one hand, we're all more inclined to live in information bubbles. And that's true regardless of who we voted for or what we believe politically. But it also means that getting out of those bubbles is more important, both as a sort of personal matter, but more than that as saying if we want to try to uphold those norms, then maintaining relationships is actually far more effective than cutting them off at the first step.
So then for people who find themselves related to or friends with folks who hold opposite political views and things get bitter, but at the same time, they don't want to end those ties — what do you suggest beyond what you just said?
LITT: When you have that foundation of mutual respect, then it's possible to have conversations about those divisive issues. But they're not arguments, they're not debates — they're undertaken in a spirit of curiosity. And sometimes minds change and sometimes minds don't. I've certainly learned a lot from Matt, you know, but at the same time, when you're not saying "I'm only doing this in order to change your mind," I think that makes a big, big difference. So that's a long way of saying that if you're listening to this and you feel like there's a relationship in your life that you're worried might be fractured because of politics, then I do think finding that neutral ground can be really important.
How vital is the search for common ground — neutral ground — to the country's well-being and perhaps even survival?
LITT: In a democracy, we have to figure out how to co-own this country together. It can't be a sort of scenario where we say we're on the — actually, I was about to say we're on the right side, but actually people feel passionately that they're right. I certainly have lots of opinions that I hold where I say this is a matter of right and wrong, and I think I'm right. But in a democracy you don't get to just say, therefore I won't listen to somebody else, or therefore we won't let their votes count, or we won't, you know, find a way to listen to people even if we don't agree with them. You have to figure out how to live together. And there is this sense that you see people who are behaving in a way where it's clear that they think their power or money or influence comes from being divisive. And I wish I could say there's a magic wand we could wave and end that — we can't. But I do think that we can each do a little bit to push back on it, and that when we do, it's not a Kumbaya thing, but it is this sense that we are much less divided as human beings than the people who make money or gain political power from that division would like us to believe.
And what is your brother-in-law's reaction to your essay and the book about your bond with him?
LITT: Well, he really liked the book, which made me — you know, like I was nervous obviously about reviews, right? You're always nervous about a review. But the one I was by far the most concerned about was Matt, and so it makes me really happy that that's how he's seen it.
