Respectful Communication Technique: Ending with a Shared Activity
Thu 2017-10-12
Summary: Ending political conversations with an invite to participate in a mutual activity together seems to take the edge off.
Quick cross-partisan recommendation: Ask how their policy will work.
Mon 2017-10-09
Questions are one of the most powerful tools for mind-changing conversations. Asking someone why they believe in something, encouraging them to list the reasons (so you can argue with their reasons) is not typically effective. Instead of asking someone why they believe in a certain policy, especially a complex one, ask them to explain how their policy will work.
Tension: Isolating Trolls and Keeping Your Voice
Stephen CataldoMon 2017-10-02
Two recommended communication techniques are to isolate trolls and to stick to your frame and values. These ideas are often in tension:
For example when neo-Nazis and white nationalists grab torches and march through our streets, we can isolate them and their supporters relatively easily, or talk about institutionalized and unconscious bias — where we have a lot of work to do before there is near-universal agreement.
But how do you frame the conversation?
Stephen CataldoWed 2017-09-20
George Lakoff talks about framing the issues: "protections," not "regulations." This article expands on George Lakoff's advice on framing.
Values and Pragmatism: A False Conflict Within The Democratic Party
Stephen CataldoTue 2017-09-05
What would it look like if the Democrats were more idealistic and stuck to their values with more oomph? What would it mean if they were pragmatic and tried to succeed even when we don't all agree about everything?
Framing Exploration: Nazis in America
adminSun 2017-08-13
A variety of flavors of American white nationalism are on the rise. The Republican President has waffled about how evil Nazis are, often comparing them to the people protesting them. The racism-apologist frame is that this is a free-speech fight. That people giving Hitler's sieg heil salute and Americans who oppose them, if they get into a brawl, are equally at fault.
Reframing “A Better Deal: Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages”
Stephen CataldoMon 2017-07-24
The Democrats's new slogan is here, "A Better Deal: Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages."
Let’s break this down: What is the frame? Who is the implied speaker? What does it assume about the audience?
Write Your Rep: Please Frame!
Stephen CataldoMon 2017-07-24
Most of the time we write congress to push them on a particular issue. With so many party-line votes, this is usually pointless in my district. What the Democrats are doing wrong is failing to put resources into developing and cooperating on messaging. Let's ask them to. I don't want to push my congresswoman to use the frame I prefer, but I want to hear why she chose the frame she did, to hear that someone bothered to run it past focus groups, and who she is cooperating with.
Framing that Aims to Lose: Reinforcing the Partisan Divide despite agreement on Civil Asset Forfeiture
adminFri 2017-07-21
If conservatives believe one thing, it’s that government shouldn’t be able to take your property arbitrarily. At least, that was when conservatives believed in something.
—Robert Reich, a post going to thousands of progressives, on civil forfeiture.
This act by the Trump administration is a moment when conservatives distrustful of government just might be ready to have had enough. But our progressive leaders encourage us to assume the worst right from the beginning, to reinforce and remind and conservatives that we are on two teams and our team just scored a point. This is a moment when we can instead come together, act together, be one team again, across the partisan divide.
Understanding the Rise of Hitler, and pondering why we act like voting for Trump is worse.
adminTue 2017-07-11
A lot of my motivation for activism comes from stories of Nazi Germany.