Different Ideas Aren't Offensive Ideas
When I was in 11th grade, which wasn’t too long ago seeing as I’m 19 years old at the time of writing this, I was in my US History class, and the topic of Presidency and Trump arose. When politics is involved people tend to get really emotional and hostile and it was no different when it came to this discussion. There was a kid in my class, he was a student of color, and he expressed his support for Trump in the class and as soon as he did the entire class was ready to argue. Now this student was a very intelligent kid, and he didn’t support Trump just to be controversial, he clearly understood what he wanted in a president and he believed that Trump aligned best with what he believed. There was one girl in particular who was against Trump, and as a result against this student. She wasn’t the only one opposing him but she was definitely the one who got the loudest and the most emotional. She was yelling at him, saying things that were clearly only driven by emotion. He was ready to give his points, and actually have a civil conversation of his opinions, and was definitely open to hearing what the others had to say, but obviously in a civil manner. In the end, no discussion was able to occur, they kept on yelling and he was tired of waiting for them to stop so that they could actually share ideas.
The point of this little memory was just supposed to be an example to a situation that occurs far too often. We see it all the time these days where conversation is no longer held between people who hold different ideas, because it always creates a hostile environment. Many times we’ll find people get hostile with just the sound of an idea, and they have no intention of listening to their point of view, and understanding why they believe it. People have been trained to hold on to ideas without having any explanation to give themselves and much less anyone who questions it. Since they have no grounds for what they are believing, then of course the easiest response to someone without a different idea is to yell louder than anyone in the room.
This is such a poor way to live, all this is really causing is people who coupe up in their own heads, and holding on to their own ideas without any explanation to themselves. The first person that you need to convince of your own ideas/beliefs is yourself. Many people skip this step and are holding on to empty ideas with no foundation or reasoning. They aren’t even sure why they hold so strongly on to their own ideas and they sure wouldn’t dare to even question themselves. The easiest thing to do is to play the victim when I have no response to someone questioning me.
Why it’s important to discuss differing ideas.
I used the last couple paragraphs to explain the state in which we’re living in, but now I want to take the time to explain why I think we need to open to listening and discussing with people who have different ideas. Even for those people who do fall into the category of holding onto what they believe no matter what anyone tells them would still benefit from a conversation of this kind. So what can be so beneficial about having these conversations? I would say it’s the following:
- We learn to better defend ourselves for future conversations
- We get a better understanding of other stances
- It improves our ability to communicate our thoughts
We learn to better defend ourselves
When you become open to listening to the stances of other people you will be shocked with how little you understand why you even believe something or hold on to some idea. You’ll feel exposed, and this is not to say you should feel offended, because questions might be asked that you’ve never asked yourself. I’m not saying either that because you don’t know a response to a question, that there isn’t one, or that your stance is wrong, but I am definitely telling you that your first goal following the conversation is to find the answer to that question. This will help you be more secure in what it is you believe and helps you defend yourself the next time a question of this sort arises again.
Having these kinds of conversations will encourage you to take a deeper dive into learning more about your stance, belief, or idea. Through this entire process you will have gained a great amount of knowledge and a clear understanding of all the aspects of your stance.
Something important to mention is that your time spent seeking to increase your knowledge on an idea shouldn’t be spent solely looking for responses to individual questions. This will limit your understanding, and will only become an exercise for memorizing. The goal isn’t memorizing. The goal is a clear understanding, the ability to thoroughly explain your belief to someone who doesn’t grasp a simple answer to their question. That will only come if you have an expansive and in-depth understanding of what is being discussed. Seeking to learn the whole will give you the answers to the questions on the bits and pieces.
We get a better understanding of other stances
Better understanding the ideas of other people is more than just a way to equip yourself better against those ideas, like the last section explains. Even though you may not like the sound of it, you never know, you may be one conversation more from hearing an idea, stance, or belief from changing the way you see things. I hope as a whole, everyone who is reading this seeks truth, and strives to find what the truth is. And when we speak in these terms of truth, then there must be such a thing as a lie, and this is very important when speaking on our beliefs. If our beliefs can either be true or false, you are standing in one of those camps. You either believe a truth or a lie, and with the ideas we hold, we should think that what we believe is truth, which is why we hold on to them. But if you were to have a conversation tomorrow with someone who sees different than you, and as you listen to them, you realize that what they are saying is true. Would you not be grateful to have heard the truth, and shift away from a false belief that you had grasped tightly? It will always be better to put pride aside and listen. It’s better to come to the truth in humility than to having lived a life believing a false idea.
On the other hand, assuming you didn’t come around to the other persons beliefs, having an understanding of their beliefs will give you the ability to spot the flaws in what they believe. Yes this does help in putting the pressure on what they believe, but deeper than that it can help you reach more people that think this way. You can give them questions that they should ask themselves, to see if they have an answer that their belief provides. As someone who cares for the truth, you should also seek to show others the truth, help them see it.
Improving Our Communication
Unlike the last two points, that help more build on one’s own knowledge, this deals with building a skill. This is no less important than growing your understanding. I also feel like too little people, especially the youth, know how to communicate properly. And I am not talking about doing a speech to a group of people, I’m simply speaking about a one-to-one conversation that you have with your uncle, aunt, cousin, old friend, etc. What use is it to have all the knowledge in your brain but no ability to share it to others. Everyone should learn to speak with structure and confidence. The best way to learn is jumping in the deep end.
Having conversations with others will force you to speak, at the very least out of sheer awkwardness of the silence that lurks in the room. Learning to speak clearly is a very important step. Better than to ramble and say very little with many words, is to say very little with maximum clarity. In other words, get to the point. Say what you want to communicate and cut out all the useless lingo and distractions. Communicating this way will improve how seriously other people take you. Nothing worse than speaking to someone who tries to drive the conversation away from a question they can not answer.
Communicating is a skill that goes much beyond just the focus of this article. Good communication will most definitely improve many of the areas in your life such as your relationships, job, school, etc. It’s a basic skill that everyone should be familiar with, but recently we’ve seen more and more people, especially those under 20, unable to articulate a good conversation, and much less a good argument. Good communication is a great indicator to someone who actually cares to think once in a while, sometimes an indicator to someone who’s intelligent. It seems that talking to others, specifically about deeper topics, has become obsolete in the past couple years with the rise of social media bringing on the addictive features of mindless swiping apps.
To return back to focus here, improving your communication will make you come off as more intelligent when it comes to speaking about your stance, belief, or position.
Don’t Get Offended and Learn
If you are to find someone who is going to question your beliefs and thoughts, don’t see it as an attack to what you believe, see it as an opportunity to learn. The person might raise questions, or present a view where you could learn from, just as you can do the same to them. Most of the time, the people who are actually willing to have a conversation about subjects that really matter aren’t going to get offended when you reciprocate the questions or the sharing. Civil discussion and discourse between two people who think differently is far and wide these day. You might have more luck spotting big foot than spotting a conversation of this sort.
Never reject it, invite it. Even with people you love, having these conversations with them will show the respect that you have for one another even when you don’t see eye to eye. The first couple times, it may not come so easily to you, but nothing is gained when you aren’t challenged.