We seem increasingly comfortable shunning forums that allow advocates time to develop their contrasting views.
There is frequent talk about a sharp American divide, with polarized and partisan groups shouting at each other across a wide chasm. MSNBC analysts fret about the “MAGA crowd” in Congress. Citing “progressives,” Fox News returns the favor. Anger on both sides spills out on Twitter and comments to countless blogs, news sites and mega-media like the Washington Post. Even legacy news organizations of all sorts condense ideas to present facsimiles of what the other side has said on issues related to abortion, the behavior of our former President, or what our grade-school kids are permitted to read. Our cultural map looks like an endless chain of Tetons: a landscape of sharp peaks that leave little room to sit astride a place that would allow a view of all sides.
Part of our current dilemma is our withering sense of how to engage in a civil society. Various media platforms have made it easy to carve out connections with mostly like-minded others, leaving us underprepared for the work of making coherent arguments to those with different views. In place of the agora—an ancient place where the public met and interacted as one body—we now see others mostly at a distance, via the narrow shooting galleries of media opinion makers with platform-specific ideologies. In the process, we’ve lost all or most of our abilities to sustain a discussion made of fleshed-out arguments and counter-arguments.
As noted in these pages several years ago, an argument can take many forms. But its basic structure is simple, containing at least two parts: (1) An assertion or claim and (2) supporting evidence or good reasons. In schematic terms it can be laid out like this:
Claim: American Elections are Mostly ‘Clean’
(Evidence: Because. . .)
I. There are few documented cases of modern election fraud.
II. Nearly all recounts confirm the original result.
III. Election officials from both parties rarely find fraud.
That’s it. In its most basic form, an argument is an assertion supported with statements of proof to back it up: perhaps expert testimony, representative examples, solid research, statistical summaries, and so on. By itself, the asserted claim is not enough, unless it is so obvious that no one would disagree. But we are focusing here on consequential assertions that others have doubted or denied. For these, we must relearn a basic tenet of civil affairs that a claim by itself is insufficient. Repeating the same claim does not make it true.
For example, consider the claim that “the 2020 presidential election was stolen.” If someone stops there–using a formal term of argument—it lacks “force.” To be sure, we are only too happy to display our opinions like flags. They signal our attitudes and beliefs. And we have a knack for mistaking variation of the same assertion as “evidence.” But controversial assertions alone have no logic to bind the open-minded. That can only come when someone cites relevant evidence–logically tested by the insertion of the word “because”–using a source that is worthy of belief. When the assertion and the evidence flow together as a coherent argument, we are beginning to build a reasonable case.
It’s not enough to take aim on the true believers via the shooting gallery that fires out disparaging names. This short and convenient solution of using ad hominem language (i.e., “The fools who have made a career out of claiming election fraud are motivated by money and fame”) lacks force. Ad hominem comments attack an advocate rather than their ideas. While we get pleasure out of calling our ideological opponents clowns, the rewards are self-serving, substituting personal invective for ideas that should be able to stand up in a democracy’s ‘the marketplace of ideas.’
Ironically, we generally shun the obvious format that allows for adequate public testing of ideas. Simple debates where opponents speak, and then are given enough time for follow-up and offer refutations, can help those who want to understand what the preponderance of evidence supports. A true debate does not need a newsperson gumming up the works by turning the process into a joint interview. True debates only require two or three advocates, a moderator to keep things on track, and a clock that controls for equal time. Using this format, the debaters soon learn that they will have to add substance to their claims: they know they will need “good reasons” more than more repeated opinions.
Schoolkids easily learn and enjoy this format. They like to document their views with evidence. In past years, programs of straight debates used to run on PBS (The Advocates and Firing Line, to name two). But now we mostly choose to live in echo chambers that let us hear variations of our own views.
For most of us, the agora is electronic rather than physical. We now meet mostly online, missing the shared ‘witnessing’ known to early democracies and even early television viewers.
The idea of a central meeting place goes hand-in-hand with the idea of democracy. A location where leaders and citizens are can be heard and exchange ideas is an essential feature of a civil society. Of course it was one thing for the several hundred citizens of a young democracy like ancient Syracuse in the 5th century BC. They would gather in an open space. It’s quite another thing when the political unit is scaled up from a city-state to a nation spread over a continent.
The romance of a New England town meeting retains some of the aura of a simple agora. We have sentimentalized the idea even in classic television programs like Newhart or the Gilmore Girls. Yet there is still truth in the romance. Even if most of us live in larger cities, we can still interact with local leaders. And though most of us rarely exercise the opportunity, it can be empowering to put a municipal leader on notice with our grievances or occasional praise.
Living within political boundaries containing thousands or millions obviously changes how we can connect to each other. With regard to the federal government, most of us have only known the quasi-agora of national television news. Growing up in the 50s, my family mostly used one of three choices for connecting with the rest of the country. NBC, CBS and a weaker ABC beamed out seemingly urgent news, such as the 1969 landing on the moon. Life paused in most Colorado households in time to catch early evening newscasts narrated by Walter Cronkite at CBS or David Brinkley at NBC. The announced death of President Kennedy in 1963 came to most of the nation through the words of the venerable CBS anchor.
The agora is now clearly electronic not in real time. We now “meet” mostly online: a change from early live television, where limits on technology meant that Americans witnessed the same momentous events more or less at the same time.
We need to be careful about citing digital “advances.” To be sure, chatter in the culture has never stopped. We are engaged with others in an endless spectrum of online communities. But in no sense should we consider Twitter or Instagram as comparable vehicles for meaningful public “discussion.” If we need a comparison, the typical social media post more closely resembles a shout issued from a passing car.
At the same time, the idea of a common civic space has withered. Readership of the nation’s largest newspapers is in decline. Reliable online news (much of it aggregated from the remaining national news outlets) occupies less of our time. The resulting fragmentation of the nation into specific audiences means that it is less likely that Americans will pay attention to significant events, or even the same informational sources. If you ask friends what they are watching on online or via networks such as CBS or Netflix, the odds are good that “their” programs are not what you are watching. Neil Postman had it at least half right: we are “amusing ourselves to death,” but now with ever more esoteric ‘narrowcasting’ that satisfies personal rather than national interests.
I see this most dramatically in younger Americans, who have not only lost the newspaper habit, but the news-seeking habit as well. There are too many other choices that offer more immediate forms of gratification. Add in the double-threat of disinformation efforts from sources ranging from this White House to the Kremlin, and we are ill-prepared to enter any kind of agora as informed citizens.
Of course a national disaster brings lots of us momentarily back to CNN, NBC or Fox news. But many more of us stay in touch–if at all–through other online venues offering their own unique perspectives and agendas. Given these changes, its little wonder that the congressional Agora envisioned by the founders of the republic is now dysfunctional. No one looks to Congress for momentous debates on the issues of the day. In structural terms, it has always run a poor second to parliamentary forms of government for hosting spirited legislative debate. The mute Congress is a symptom of our problem, but our fragmenting media now also seem ill-equipped to bring us together to ponder great national issues.
