Life-Affirming Cognitive Tribalism

Most of my Trump-supporter friends no longer speak with me.

But, just for a second, suppose we would share a few moments again. What would we say to each other? And, more importantly, how would we talk with each other and not “at” one another?

History shows that people who hold differing views seldom talk about them while together. In my mind, our current national predicament clearly shows that supporters of Pres. Trump and Sec. Clinton are reluctant to be seen with each other let alone talk about the issues we must solve in order to move our nation forward… or backward, depending upon your perspective.

A few articles and books have been offered that actually deal with the question: How do I change my brother, sister friend’s mind? I am right and she/he must be able to see my rightness and accept it themselves. Unfortunately, people, of any persuasion, do not believe based upon “facts”. Our affliction has been labeled “cognitive tribalism”*. The term reflects our world-wide problem: what we hold as our most cherished beliefs, that is, how we see ourselves as a person - politically, religiously, etc. - is our identity as a human. By trying to change someone’s mind away from supporting Pres Trump – and even worse away from our national drift toward fascism, which began a long time before Trump became president – is the real challenge of our lifetime.

For the sake of our children and grandchildren**, we must learn how to connect with one another, recognizing that we all suffer from our natural tendency to define ourselves in the ancient cognitive tribalism way. Perhaps, like alcoholics, we need to invent a Ten Step System in order to shed our addiction to our cognitive tribalism disease so that we can advance toward becoming life-affirming people and hopefully a life-affirming nation. Or, perhaps we can create a new cognitive tribalism disease so that we all can become addicted to a life-affirming world.

* This Article Won't Change Your Mind, JulieBeck, 13 Mar 2017 The Atlantic.
** Please visit: www.legacygrandkids.info