Lets move past labels. As a school, we need to confront our radicalized political climate. It seems that with every major crisis, whether local, national or international, there is a tendency to throw around labels identifying where people stand. During the Adhan scandal at Duke, many immediately decried the administration as Islamophobic. After Ferguson, many immediately called people that voiced opinions against the violent protests racist. When it was announced that President Obama would not see Netanyahu when he visits the United States later this semester, I even heard people calling him anti-Semitic.
This tendency to point fingers, rely on ad-hominems and jump to radical conclusions does not foster dialogue. And I'm tired of it.
I'm tired of lumping someone in with a category of bigots because they disagree with you. I'm tired of looking past someone's arguments and trying to find their hidden agenda. I'm tired of hearing the same conversations over and over.
First, when you argue using labels, you inherently talk about an 'other'. Regardless of whether that label is conservative or liberal, it associates someone with a wealth of stereotypes and dehumanizes them. It makes it easier to see them in some sort of out-group, rather than as the complex individual who reached those decisions that they are. Talking about a 'them' means that there's an 'us' and the only result of this is that people retreat further and further into the identities that they've crafted for themselves.
Second, substantive debate derives from individuals treating each discussion as a fresh start. This means that the conversation should be made without pre-conceived assumptions about values and ideas, precisely because there are so few people who agree with every single talking point that a certain party delineates.
I think that more often than not, we agree more than we disagree. We have the same goals, want to see equality and representation and rights protected everywhere, but may disagree on what is the best way to get there. It's oftentimes surprising what exactly the 'sticking point' for many people are. Throwing around labels means lumping people together who may have reached the same conclusion using very different strains of reasoning.
Third, we've all come to Duke to be challenged. Someone I highly respect once told me that if you leave college with the same opinions you came in with, then you missed the point. The odds that somebody, at the age of 17 or 18, has come to all the correct conclusions about every issue are astronomically small. Hiding behind labels and categorizing dissatisfactory opinions as an out-group aren't constructive, don't challenge and only serve to create animosity as well as contribute to the increasingly radical discourse here.
The other day, I got into a heated debate with a friend. We started off on the coming showdown between Congress and the President, but eventually moved to our world views in general and covered most of today's topics. The more we spoke, the more I realized that our views weren't really that different: we wanted the same things. We just had different ideas about how to get there.
If dialogue is the gateway to learning, then we have to ensure that we are able to promote as much dialogue on campus. We need to rise above group-think and radicalization and facilitate conversation. We need to stop calling people whose opinions differ from us bigots and try to understand why they feel the way they do.
Calling someone a bigot, an "X-ist", a "Y-phobe" or an "anti-Z" is almost like calling someone a "heretic" in antiquity. These derogatory labels change the conversation from the substance of the issue, to whether or not the person is a blasphemer. This turns the conversation to the character of the speakers, and not the contents of the speaker's argument.
Now I will admit that this article seems to imply that I don't think anyone should ever be called a bigot. That's clearly not the case, and there are many hateful people out there who harbor prejudices that overtly cloud their judgment with a veil of anger and ignorance. However, by far I see strong terms thrown around on campus that strawmans opposing viewpoints. This sort of argumentative tactic helps groups win the argument, but lose out on fostering the sort of positive campus environment that challenges us.
This radicalized political climate is sweeping across university political issues across the country. We need to come together to make sure that we use words that carry strong connotations judiciously, and promote a campus culture where dissenting viewpoints can feel comfortable airing their opinions provided that they can reasonably argue their side. Let's move past unconstructive labels.
Tyler Fredricks is a Trinity junior. His column runs every other Wednesday.
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