Do We Know Each Other?

November 20, 2017

I know you.  Do you know me? 

If objective studies and empirical data are to be believed, no.  We are divided in ways and to a degree not observed in modern U.S. history.  We are separated into vast rural heartlands and compact urban cores, with scant opportunity to interact.  And while geographic location has become the leading indicator of political preference, we nevertheless hurl derision at our fellow Americans as if we actually understand one another, simply accepting, prima facie, the chronically negative viewpoints our chosen pundits continually push on us.  Does geography itself produce this political gulf, or does it just enable us to more easily segregate ourselves into opposing tribes?

So, is that what this is all really about?  Where we live?

The inaccuracy of the regrettable caricatures we paint of each another almost goes without saying.  But red states, here’s the reality: we’re right there with you.  Recent studies show that blue urban cores really do live the values the red heartlands so rightly and so often preach.  The annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey finds that blue states have a lower incidence rate of teen pregnancy.  They have comparatively low rates of divorce, of prostitution, and according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, of opioid addiction as well.  Metropolitan areas, with their hard-working and productive populations, also contribute the majority of federal tax receipts, from which all benefit – red and blue states together.  Our widespread animosity toward one another may therefore be misplaced, as these data stand in stark contrast to popular rightward narratives about the welfare-riven and dystopian dens of iniquity that are our metropolitan regions.  But amidst the bright cold light these numbers shed on the fallacy of such storylines, none of us – unyielding as we are – seem to need much convincing of their veracity; a Pew Research study finds that we all believe the opposing tribe is an actual threat to our nation’s well-being.

The presumption of malice so rampant today among geographically disparate Americans is understandable.  Absent any substantive contact with one another, any daily interaction, even the occasional friendly conversation over a white picket fence, we can only accept the information we are fed.  How are we to know if it’s all a steady stream of contrived misinformation… especially if we also harbor an intractable mistrust and/or hatred of anyone and anything that is not of our tribe?  There are but two options remaining, then: either we moderate our course and attempt to seek mutual understanding once more, or our country and its system of government will eventually come apart, willfully dismantled and destroyed from within.  And I do not doubt for a moment there exists a minority percentage for whom this latter option is preferred.

For the rest of us, it is time to correct our course.  It is time to stop these insipid and tribalistic culture wars which allow our elected officials to distract attention from our myriad looming challenges and get away without really governing.  These capricious individuals are unworthy of the somber responsibility we have handed them, and it’s our fault.  But neither business nor government are inherently evil.  Neither Republicans nor Democrats seek to destroy America.  Says Nicholas Kristof in his recent New York Times article on these comparative measures of red and blue, “let’s drop the wars over family values… liberals and conservatives alike don’t want kids pregnant at 16, and we almost all seek committed marriages that last.”  Most of what separates us is simple geography.  To my red state friends, I say this: the reality of life in and among the opposing tribe is demonstrably different than what you and many more across this country are being told, and far closer to our shared values and principles than you imagine.  I’m a product of the red states.  And I’m also a proud Southerner, happily ensconced in a big blue city, embraced by my neighbors, safe in our Norman Rockwell-esque community, warmly supported in my Christian faith. 

Am I to be believed, or not?  Will these empirical, observable facts be accepted?  Will you acknowledge what I am saying?  If so, what does that speak about all of the “real news” commentary to the contrary?  It is unclear whether anyone out there in the heartland is truly listening, or whether they will believe people like me or the hot-house radio and TV news pundits screaming conspiracy theories at them, day after day, red-faced and angry. 

When history is written, what part will you have played?  Where will you have been?  Watching the pitchfork-laden and torchlit mob, hell-bent on some final apocalyptic clash?  Or standing above it, arms locked with your fellow citizens, proclaiming “Stop!”? 

The ink is not yet dry.