Time Is Running Out

I’m going to do my best to be blunt but kind in this message.

I’m sharing this publicly because I suspect others may feel what I’m feeling and, if that’s true, naming it might help us reflect on why things feel different now than they did even a few months ago.

If you know me personally, you know I’ve long been a proponent of civil discourse, not just in theory but in practice. I regularly gather with friends whose views span the sociopolitical spectrum. We’ve done this for years, and until recently, those conversations were productive, even when they were hard. Even my social media feeds, thanks to a diversity of backgrounds for my connections, reflect divergent views that I’ve always welcomed and considered.

But something has changed.

Over the last few months—and especially the last few weeks—I’ve noticed a shift. Even when I believe I’m being respectful and measured, I’m far more likely to provoke hurt, anger, or worse. And I feel it internally too. I’ve gone from processing disagreement dispassionately to feeling sadness, frustration, and, for the first time in my life, the impulse to walk away because of a sense of disdain. These feelings are not over policy, but over dignity.

I find I can no longer summon patience in the face of crass language, cruelty, or dehumanizing rhetoric, whether in person (rare in my world) or online (becoming much more common of late).

So what’s different?

My working theory is that several cognitive biases, long present but now unchecked, have begun to fracture the foundations of our conversations. When our foundations diverge, civil dialogue becomes nearly impossible.

Psychology gives us a useful vernacular here. Three cognitive biases stand out:

1) Naïve realism: the belief that my perception is simply reality, and that those who disagree must be biased, ignorant, or malicious. We’ve reached a point where people can watch the same video or read the same article and reach entirely different conclusions. I never appreciated the degree to which this was possible.

2) Confirmation bias: the pull toward people and sources that reinforce what we already believe. Instead of seeking truth, we seek reassurance. We’re all familiar with this one, I suspect, so I won’t belabor it.

3) Hostile attribution bias: the growing assumption that those who disagree with us are acting in bad faith. Even familiar challenges that, in the past, would encourage dialogue now feel like attacks. This bias seems to have grown exponentially more common in our society of late. It feels that it’s this bias that is beginning to take over.

Let me be clear, as I’m still an evidence-based scientist underneath all of this social reflection.

I do believe objective truth exists, even if we only access it subjectively. I believe misinformation, fear, and deflection (away from the real causes of societal challenge) are real and powerful.

And I believe none of us are fully immune.

We cannot let this deteriorate much further. There must be a bottom. For me, that bottom is dignity—which precludes cruelty and hate.

We can argue fiercely about policy without surrendering our humanity. But once dignity becomes optional, discourse collapses, and so does the possibility of progress. I believe we are unfortunately at this dangerous point now.

I call on those with outsized influence (political, business, and media leaders) to recognize this risk and stop normalizing it. The rest of us need to slow down, cool off, and give ourselves time before we can do the harder work of repairing what’s been damaged. We will need to converge our realities (battling naïve realism), reject the rhetoric of fear and hate (battling confirmation bias), and give more grace by assuming good intentions from those with whom we disagree (battling hostile attribution bias).

We have far too much to lose if we don’t. And we don’t have much more time to do something about it.