More and more I notice people avoiding controversy. Folks treat disagreement like that song about the Grinch; they wouldn’t touch it with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole even if it means keeping silent on their strongest beliefs or most passionate opinions. Either that or people are having an all-out, F-bombed debate in the comments on YouTube. This has led me to question what America thinks disagreement is and whether we are using it properly. The longer I observe, the more I believe the current understanding and use of disagreement by our postmodern society is wrong.
In our culture, disagreement is mainly seen as something to be feared. But up until a few decades ago, this was not the case, especially in universities. The classical values of discourse, dialectic and rhetoric, were still being taught and modeled in society, whether in schools, churches, or the home. Dialectic is the art of questioning or understanding the given through logical argumentation and rhetoric is the counterpart, an art that trains the mind to see or discover the things we ought to write and say. Both are very important, good, and necessary parts of communication. Some might argue that people fear disagreement today only because dialectic is being neglected (it’s hard to research, build, or find strong logical reasons to support something). But both arts, dialectic and rhetoric, are being neglected because not only are people forgetting to back their disagreements up with good, logical arguments, they are not using rhetoric at all. They are not training to see the best means of persuasion. Instead of adapting their arguments to each unique situation and audience, they say the same things over and over, and when nobody listens, they begin name-calling in order to get people’s attention. Obviously, our postmodern society’s disagreement is falling short of the classical values of discourse.
Unfortunately, when our society ignores the classical values of discourse it leads to disrespect in our disagreements with one another. This is how disagreement is understood today as a result of postmodernism: a verbal confrontation where people are angry or offended and leave feeling more fed up with the other person and that person’s argument. Deborah Tannen, Ph.D., explained this kind of disagreement quite well: “In a word, the type of opposition I am questioning is what I call “agonism.” I use this term, which derives from the Greek word for “contest,” agonia, to mean an automatic warlike stance—not the literal opposition of fighting against an attacker or the unavoidable opposition that arises organically in response to conflicting ideas or actions. An agonistic response, to me, is a kind of programmed contentiousness—a prepatterned, unthinking use of fighting to accomplish goals that do not necessarily require it.”[1]
This “agonism” is exactly what our culture calls disagreement. Not the courteous exchange of ideas, the search for truth, the testing ground for one’s own opinions, instead, disagreement is a spiteful, ad hominem attack or scandalous accusation, a rude interruption, an inability to understand where the other person is coming from or what they are saying. Our society’s disagreement is inherently disrespectful because the people disagreeing do not listen to each other. They do not try to understand or give the other their undivided attention. They abuse each other with their words.
Why do we do this? Because we believe ourselves to be gods. Postmodernism is primarily the belief that there is no objective truth. Just as the Sophists believed that there was no truth, so does postmodern society. We believe everything is relative which leads us to think that it is better to stick with our own truth and our own kind and make fun of everyone else. It is certainly easier to do. There is less risk in name-calling and misinterpretation than there is in listening to someone, placing ourselves in someone else’s shoes, and respectfully responding to someone’s reasons. Besides, it is more comfortable. And far be it from us to forego our 21st century, American creature comforts; the right to call someone a homophobe.
Because Americans practicing postmodern society’s version of disagreement do not treat each other with basic dignity and politeness, their disrespect quickly grows into hatred. When someone is not allowed a word in a discussion or their reputation is compromised, it is understandable why they would have feelings of extreme dislike, resent, and bitterness towards the offender. Unfortunately, disrespect eventually ends with one or all of the parties in a discussion hating one another. Hatred does not open someone up to another person. It closes them down and divides households, churches, communities, and even the nation. They do not leave the conversation more educated or interested in what the other person has to say. They leave the conversation as bitter enemies.
And after disrespecting someone to the point of making them hate you, some people might even commit an act of violence in retaliation. One example of this is the deadly attacks on abortion clinics by pro-life citizens. How ironic that doctors, staff members, patients, and guests at abortion clinics have been murdered by those who disagree with the murder of the unborn. Mary O’Hara reported for NBC News that: “In 2015, U.S. abortion providers were targeted in three murders, nine attempted murders, and 94 reports of death threats.”[2] Not only is violence caused by those who disagree with abortion horribly wrong, it undermines the very argument of pro-life citizens that each life is sacred. This illustrates how people cannot look beyond an opinion or belief to the valuable human being behind it. We are not God. We do not have the moral right to determine who lives and dies based off of our preferences and standards. We have the right to speak about our opinions and beliefs and disagree with someone if done properly, and it is right to do so. But we do not have the right to physically harm others because we disagree with them, and it is wrong to do such a thing.
The understanding and use of disagreement by America’s postmodern society is wrong because it falls short of the classical values of discourse, is disrespectful, hateful, and violent. This imposter of true disagreement, which is necessary and good, has driven people to fear and even reject discussion, dialogue, and debate. Brett Stephens clarifies the situation well: “So here’s where we stand: Intelligent disagreement is the lifeblood of any thriving society. Yet we in the United States are raising a younger generation who have never been taught either the how or the why of disagreement, and who seem to think that free speech is a one-way right: Namely, their right to disinvite, shout down or abuse anyone they dislike, lest they run the risk of listening to that person — or even allowing someone else to listen. The results are evident in the parlous state of our universities, and the frayed edges of our democracies.”[3]
This begs the question: if postmodern society’s model of disagreement is so wrong, then what alternative do we have? How will we ever communicate with each other? The alternative is to encourage diplomatic discussion, disagreement, and debate. We need to train ourselves to listen first and ask questions next. We need to test our own views before jumping to test others. We cannot listen to someone and consider their viewpoint if we do not lower the defensive guards around our own opinions. We cannot understand where someone is coming from if we are not empathetic and cannot try to imagine what it would be like to walk in another’s shoes. Thus the key ingredients to changing how we disagree and how the rest of society will view disagreement are humility and love for our neighbor. Only after we have done the previous steps can we offer our own opinions and views about something. When having a discussion or disagreement, we must win the right to speak our piece, remembering that we may be wrong and might have something to learn from the other person.
The majority of America’s understanding of what disagreement is and the way they use it as a result of postmodernism is very wrong. If the correct and true art of disagreement continues to be rejected and uneducated in our homes and churches, our schools and universities, our media and public forums, then society will remain with the harmful results. Americans will either continue to shy away from disagreement altogether rather than discussing important issues with each other or we will continue to chew one another up and spit each other out, which regresses the discussion. Amy L. Wax, Robert Mundheim Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, concludes better than I ever could: “Disliking, avoiding, and shunning people who don’t share our politics is not good for our country. We live together, and we need to solve our problems together. It is also always possible that people we disagree with have something to offer, something to contribute, something to teach us. We ignore this at our peril.”[4]
