Understanding the Abortion Standoff

A reader from Chicago named Mike McGillicuddy sent me these two wise quotes on the dynamics of polarization. They're enormously helpful in understanding the intransigence of both extremes in the abortion fight -- although they still don't tell us quite what to do about it, or even whether anything can be done. But hold them in mind, and let them shine their light on the trenches.

From Public Conversations Project, a Massachusetts-based organization dedicated to "Constructive Conversations that Reach Across Differences":

Polarized public conversations can be described as conforming to a "dominant discourse,"…the most generally available and adopted way of discussing the issue in a public context. For example, the dominant discourse about the American Revolutionary War defined the war as one of colonial liberation. It is not usually described in the United States as a conspiracy of tax dodgers led by a multi-millionaire from Virginia.

Dominant discourses strongly influence which ideas, experiences, and observations are regarded as normal or eccentric, relevant or irrelevant. On a subject that has been hotly polarized for a long time, the dominant discourse often delineates the issue in a win-lose bi-polar way; it draws a line between two simple answers to a complex dilemma and induces people to take a stand on one side of that line or the other…Most people who care deeply about the issue yield to this induction.

Being aligned with one group offers benefits. It gives one a socially validated place to stand while speaking and it offers the unswerving support of like-minded people. It also exacts costs. It portrays opponents as a single-minded and malevolent gang. In the face of such frightening and unified adversaries, one’s own group must be unified, strong, and certain. To be loyal to that group, one must suppress many uncertainties, morally complicated personal experiences, inner value conflicts, and differences between oneself and one’s allies. Complexity and authenticity are sacrificed to the demands of presenting a unified front to the opponent. A dominant discourse of antagonism is self-perpetuating. Win-lose exchanges create losers who feel they must retaliate to regain lost respect, integrity, and security, and winners who fear to lose disputed territory won at great cost.

…Carol Becker et al., From Stuck Debate to New Conversation on Controversial Issues: A Report from the Public Conversations Project.

By Jonathan Haidt and Matthew Hersh from the Journal of Applied Social Psychology (2001, 31, 1, pp. 191-221):

Realize that all combatants are morally motivated. It seems to be part of the nature of moral argument that one’s opponents are seen to be motivated by evil….But such moralization and demonization obscure the true nature of the conflict and make moderation or compromise into a moral failing – one should not negotiate with the devil. It is more accurate, and certainly more conducive to cooperation, to acknowledge that both sides are driven by their moral commitments…The two sides differ in their conceptions of the good, not in the goodness of their motivations.

Recognize that American morality is plastic and pluralistic. American morality has, from the very beginning, been woven out of two strands, which Bellah et al. (1985) call the republican and the biblical strands. It has always struggled to grant independence and autonomy to individuals within a society that believes strongly in Christianity and in some elements of Puritanism….If history is any guide, neither side can ever win the culture war and eliminate the other.

Recognize that moral discourse is an ex post facto product. One of the most frustrating aspects of moral argument is that the other side is not swayed by one’s arguments, no matter how good they are. The failure to respond to reason makes the other side seem unreasonable, and invites charges that their "real" motivations are hidden and sinister. But this inference is based on the naïve idea that moral reasoning drives moral judgment, so that one can change people’s minds by refuting their reasons. The present findings are more compatible with an intuitionist model of moral judgment in which moral judgments are based on gut feelings and emotional intuitions. People then create moral arguments by drawing on a priori moral theories, which they put forth as social products, required by the discourse of an argument (i.e., one must provide reasons for one’s judgments.) The refutation of such arguments does not cause people to change their minds; it only forces them to work harder to find replacement arguments.

Thanks, Mike. Great stuff.

Comments

[Tom Strong]

That is terrific - particularly the last piece. Although I think Haidt and Hersh fail to follow their own advice when they write:

It has always struggled to grant independence and autonomy to individuals within a society that believes strongly in Christianity and in some elements of Puritanism…

I detect a whiff of partisanship here.

[AmbivaBro]

Gonna use this in my talk tonight at Village Books in Bellingham, WA -- because this, in part, is what the Shema prayer might be about . . .

[amba]

I hope you'll let us in on that reasoning afterwards . . . tomorrow.

[Pooh]

Fantastic post (as with pretty much everything you have mentioned recently). This is pretty much the only blog I read regularly where I feel unworthy of commenting, please keep it up.

[amba]

Good heavens! Please comment.