Americans may be more divided than ever, but some say our disagreements aren’t causing the division, but what we do when we disagree. At this year’s Fall Sussman Lecture, Tim Shriver will discuss “The Dignity Index”, which was developed by his nonprofit UNITE, and share how it can be applied to solve the country’s toxic political and cultural divides. Shriver will also explain why dignity is the key to easing divisions, preventing violence, and solving problems.
About the speaker: Timothy Shriver is married, a father of 5, the Chairman of Special Olympics International and co-founder of UNITE – an initiative to promote national unity and solidarity across differences. Tim began his career as an educator and subsequently co-founded and currently chairs the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), the leading school reform organization in the field of social and emotional learning. Shriver earned his undergraduate degree from Yale University, a Master’s degree from Catholic University, and a Doctorate in Education from the University of Connecticut. He has produced 6 films, is the author of the New York Times bestseller Fully Alive – Discovering What Matters Most, and co-editor of The Call to Unite: Voices of Hope and Awakening.
About the Sussman Lecture Series: The Sussman Lecture Series hosts a notable public policy figure to discuss topical current events with a small audience. The series was established by Richard Sussman, AS’51, and his late wife Lila. Tickets are required and seating is limited to provide an intimate experience for attendees.
Here tonight I also want to thank Richard susman who established the susman lecture series with his late wife lla the susman lecture series is dedicated to studying issues that Define our public life and engaging students and citizens in constructive dialogue regarding these issues I think our
Speaker tonight will help us do that in that Spirit I’d like to point out that both the Iowa Republican party and Iowa Democratic party have been invited to send Representatives here tonight um welcome and thank you for being here as a reminder there will be a Q&A session
After the lecture if you have a question please text it to 515 346 8587 that number is on your programs and on the screen um we will collect the questions and pass them on to the speaker if you’d like to post about the event on social media please use the hashtag hashtag
Shriber susman which is on the screen in a moment I’ll turn it over to our undergraduate Chief of Staff Stephanie Keel Stephanie is a senior studying politics economics and law politics and societ she’s been working at the Harkin Institute since she was a sophomore and she’s instrumental to the work we do
Here along with overseeing all the work done by our student staff Stephanie is always willing to help with any task from organizing large scale events like this one to Printing and stuffing name tags we’re excited to have here to introduce tonight’s speaker please welcome Stephanie Keel thank you so much good evening everyone
My name is Stephanie Keel and I have the privilege of serving as the undergraduate Chief of Staff here at the Harkin Institute on behalf of the Institute we are thrilled that you could join us for the fall 2023 susman lecture dignity the foundation of a new patriotism with Tim Shriver Tim Shriver
Is married a father of five the chairman of Special Olympics International and co-founder of unite an initiative to promote National un and solidarity across differences Tim began his career as an educator and subsequently founded and currently chairs the collaborative for academic social and emotional learning the learning the leading School Reform
Organization in the field of Social and emotional learning Shriver earned his undergraduate degree from Yale University a master’s degree from Catholic University and a Doctorate in Education from the University of Connecticut he has produced six films is the author of The New York Times bestseller Fully Alive discovering what
Matters most and co-editor of the call to unite Voices of Hope and Awakening Americans may be more divided than ever but some say our disagreements aren’t causing the division but but what we do when we disagree at tonight susman lecture Tim Shriver will discuss the dignity index which was developed by his
Nonprofit unite and share how it can be applied to solve the country’s toxic political and cultural divides this evening Tim trial will share why dignity is the key to easing divides preventing violence and solving problems please without any further Ado please join me in welcoming our fall
2023 susman lecturer Tim Shriver to the stage thank you Stephanie wow wow I think we should just go to the Q&A right that was wonderful thank you Stephanie and thank you to everybody here at the Harkin Institute Matt thank you for hosting and welcoming Misha lorat who’s my colleague here has
Come with me thank you for welcoming us showing us this extraordinary building if you haven’t had the tour I highly recommend uh that everyone take in not just the purpose and the mission and the work of The Institute but the physical structure that’s been built here which
Is really quite extraordinary in that it speaks so powerfully whether you have a hearing impairment a visual impairment an ambulatory it doesn’t matter what your challenge is what your difference is what there’s some way in which this building has tried to say to you you’re welcome here and I’m very very honored
Uh to have learned that and to meet so many of the students Jennifer fear who helped so much I’m thrilled that the team from Special Olympics Iowa is here unless they oh yeah there the guys are thank you Joe and Stuart for coming um I have my by the way my Special Olympics
And de Mo Public School sweatshirt on just a I’m not running for anything but it does sort of it does give me some sense I want to thank Alex Batu I’m recruited already uh and of course I want to thank the Susans and I I want to thank uh Tom
Um and Ruth uh I Tom said earlier when he was speaking before Ruth told told him he had gone on too long which I admired tremendously uh he said that you know my mother used to go into his office and ask for something and he would try to say whenever he could yes
And I just want you to know that all the things that Tom did for the country the Ada the employ uh retirement security a whole series Decades of Public Service work that produced so many important gains the most important thing he did was say yes to my mother and
And I hope when this evening is over the family tradition continues because I have another ask that he doesn’t know about but uh to be in the presence uh of one of our country’s greatest senators of all time it’s something yeah I don’t know if if all of you in
Iowa U take for granted that you can see Tom uh at an evening like this or see Tom at the grocery store see Tom at a restaurant or hear from Tom and Ruth about their work uh but you’re you’re it’s it’s a gift and maybe it’s a gift
That our country gives to all of us that we raise people up from the citizenry and we bring them back no matter how great their accomplishments they’re still one of us uh but we have here a man who’s helped Define the country in all the best possible ways uh and if I
Were just to sort of look at it and say what’s the what’s the what’s the principle that’s Define the hearken Legacy I would say and I’m not just saying this I would say it’s dignity uh it’s treating people with dignity and I think his track record and this is important for tonight’s
Conversation his track record of treating people with dignity got things done and the question we have to ask ourselves is does the alternative actually get anything done it may feel good if you need to feel good I understand that there’s therapists in the room right that’s important uh but don’t let’s not kid
Ourselves that contempt and hatred make anything better uh you have a living example of the alternative here I’ll get to that a little bit more um so let me start with a bold statement I think we’re in uh in a period of uh a new cultural crisis
Almost a spiritual crisis I don’t think our crisis is economic I don’t think our crisis is largely political I don’t think it’s the economy stupid I don’t think it’s uh those things that are that are our greatest risk today I think our greatest RIS today is this issue the
Walls of fear and contempt and isolation and I think it’s an issue that has not yet been named specifically in our culture this picture uh is of the opening ceremony of the Special Olympics World Games in June they were held in Berlin J that young woman sa came from a small
Rural Village in Pakistan 18 months before that picture was taken every morning her mother got up and chained her with a padlock uh as a way of protecting her that was Child Care the best her mother could offer her uh and this is her carrying the first Olympic torch into that Stadium since
[Applause] 1936 and that track right there is the same track that Jesse Owens ran on and she’s surrounded by 7,000 people with intellectual challenges on that field all of whom would have been eliminated in 1936 you can’t miss the idea that this woman this young woman sa her bravery her guts her courage
Brought her there but the presence she brought to all of the rest of us was the idea that tribalism combined with competition combined with hatred combined with violence that formula has to be overthrown uh and yes uh she she did it there symbolically and with her life she
Continues to do it but I don’t think we can underestimate either the possibility of change there’s so many people say nothing’s going to change right academic institutions are dedicated to the alternative but we will hear from so sadly many of our young people there’s nothing I can do it nothing ever
Changes I love John Lewis’s line anybody that says nothing ever changes didn’t live my life and anybody that says nothing ever changes didn’t see this Stadium I stood where Hitler stood in the in the reviewing stand as athletes from the Ukraine Got A standing ovation from 60,000 Germans With Tears in their
Eyes cheering the president of Germany the chancellor of Germany standing there saluting people with intellectual challenges so look we don’t we we shouldn’t be overly discouraged let me tell you where my story starts Senator Harkin mentioned my mom this is my mom in 1962 uh six years before the founding of
The Special Olympics organization which I love so much uh mothers were calling her during the Spring and saying do you have any ideas about my child with an intellectual challenge where I could send them there’s nothing for my child there’s nothing for my child finally my mother said to the last one
They call yes there is something I found something for your child bring your child to my house and we will have a camp here for your child we will play games here with your child we’ll have pony rides here we’ll have swimming lessons this is a child from an
Institution outside of Washington in 1962 uh this is the example I’m very very grateful to be able to say I grew up with this is before the March on Washington if you’re looking for imagery and ideas about what was going on in this house my mother’s premise was simple everybody deserves
Dignity no exceptions no exceptions no walls no fear no contempt is going to stop me and all you know I won’t shouldn’t spend too much time on this because I can get going but when my mother about a year before she died and I said to her you know you should write
A book you grew up in a famous family you had all these brothers around you were in politics and getting influen and famous and all that kind of stuff and you grew up as a woman who had her own agenda her own passion and she said what
Would no one would want to read my book she said all I ever wanted to do was teach children with intellectual disabilities how to swim so this is as much a definition of her life the small Precision of her life that led to this catalytic change I want
To show you this one other picture partly because Misha is here this is one of the first group of departing Peace Corp volunteers my dad in the same period of time was leading and launching the United States Peace Corp and all of these people were getting on PanAm you can see in the
Upper right hand corner Clipper Peace Corp um and the message here is not what I think sometimes people service Americans going to serve but Misha can tell you who was a two-time peace SC volunteer recently the point of the peace score wasn’t to serve the point of
The peace score was to learn to listen to learn the language to live eye to eye heart to heart to build bridges of understanding so I’d like to say that these examples in my life are often misinterpreted but for me in some ways the question they left me
Asking is how do we create systems that cross boundaries how do we create probabilities that people who live in the United States and people who live in Benin or people who have been treated as though they’re less than human and people who have been treated with privilege how do we Bridge these
Gaps and I like to think of this question here the proph this is not a new question for those of you who are interested in biblical literature one of the great prophets of the Hebrew tradition writes this beautiful Beau F section on freeing the oppressed and
Giving your coat to those who are who are who are naked and feeding the hungry and caring for the child and at the end of that long Litany of gifts you’re invited to give the the the prophet writes you shall be called the repairer of the breach doesn’t say you should be
Called The Equalizer of mean goods and services he says you will be called a repairer of the breach and what I want you maybe just to join me in doing now is identifying I’m not going to call on you for this but I I’d like to bring your story into this discussion where’s
A breach in your life right now where’s a person a group an identity that’s on the other side of a gap that you’re not Crossing now or not being no one’s crossing over from you who’s the person or group or identity that is just too different it’s just I can’t ah they’re
Just he said thanksgiving’s coming up nah bring that bring that person or group into the conversation if if you don’t mind uh so you know my I’ve learned a lot from the Special Olympics movement here’s lesson one this is 1995 President Clinton was the president he came to the opening ceremonies this is
At Yale Bowl in in Connecticut the only time a seated president ever attended the opening ceremony sadly it hasn’t been repeated but anyway he’s on the top rung of the stadium because the Secret Service wouldn’t let him go down on the field all the athletes are down on the
Field and this is 95 so they all were given cameras single use cameras there’s enough people in here who remember what a camera is right so they had these cameras and one of the professional photographers looks over and he sees a group of athletes maybe from a African
Country doesn’t know where and they’ve all got their cameras and they’re all aiming their cameras up at the president and they’re but he looks closely and they’re trying to get a picture and they all have their cameras backwards so he realizes they’ve never used a camera before so they’re wasting
All their film and he goes over and says can I help you you know you’re trying to get a picture of the president and the athlete say he says you have to turn the camera around and then push the button and the athlete says oh thank you he
Says but if you look through the viewfinder backwards it works like binoculars and you can see the president perfectly clearly at the top of the stadium lesson one we get each other wrong we misjudge a lot a lot we judge books by their covers we judge people by their
Labels we assume the photographer wasn’t a bad guy vol volunteer professional generous wanting to help not a not a not a not a bad guy but he saw through a distorted lens he assumed think of the person on the other side of the Divide are you sure that they’re so different are you
Really sure that there’s no way you could bridge that Gap lesson number two this is a Jara Sila in her moment of Victory before every Special Olympics event these words are spoken let me win but if I cannot win let me be brave in the attempt every one of these
Athletes has to look at most of the people in this room and take a chance on us because every one of them has been scorned humiliated or overlooked by us so if they were to walk walk if if one of our athletes were to walk in here
Now they would be being brave in the attempt just to stand in front of us look at ajara look can you see what place she came in think she cares did her best that’s all not waiting for us someone else to tell her it you know that really
Great not waiting for someone to take picture and send it home to her mother most of us don’t take a picture when we come in seventh we’re like I don’t want to talk about it not ajara brave second rule of healing the breach is brave so all these experiences have led me to
This question that Senator Harkin alluded to before after 25 years in the Special Olympics movement I feel like these athletes these experiences have been my greatest teachers in life not the greatest place I’ve served the greatest teachers in life I know maybe that’s OB obvious but let me repeat it the greatest
Teachers so if the message is everyone deserves dignity isn’t there some way we could learn this lesson as a culture like it’s not impossible we took people there were 200,000 Americans and institutions in this country in 1968 for Life 14 foot high concrete walls barbed wire in 1968 today they’re almost
Completely empty we can change it’s it’s not impossible so I’m going to skip this that’s why I don’t want to spend too much time there we go uh so here’s the premise and I’m going to go through this pretty quickly and hopefully we’ll have plenty of time for conversation and
Challenge the problem is a new issue in American political and cultural life a spiritual crisis has led us to a to an cultural addiction to contempt if we don’t solve that problem we can’t solve any others argument number one number two it’s not an accident uh I won’t force you to read
All this stuff but here’s Matt Tai’s analysis of what he of what Arthur Brooks calls the outrage industrial complex there is a business model designed to make you afraid of people who are different from you uh systematically Pride families apart that’s the goal devotional anger does this does this sound
Familiar devotional anger is the business model right so when you pick up your phone and you scroll and you pause on something that has a high level of hatred and contempt you’re paying the purveyor of that hatred and contempt and the more you pay more I pay the more the business model
Works right so this is not an accident it’s not an accident it’s a design and I’m sorry to say senator Harkin not withstanding here because half of my family’s in politics politicians have cooperated with the business model there is not one single politician I hope Tom maybe you maybe
You’ll prove me wrong on this who has not said to me when push comes to shove I had to go negative it was either go negative or lose so I went now they’re not saying they wanted to go negative I’m not saying they had a desire but I’m saying
They cooperated with getting paid raising money by stoking devotional anger against their opponent these are just recent quotes Abigail spanberger this is just talking about former speaker uh of the house and this is a mik Le fundraising letter we are under attack the fight is it is in our homes
They’re coming after us right this is this breathes a kind of devotional anger I won’t spend time I have two slides on this on Republicans and Democrats here’s what you just the ma major conclusion we don’t have that many differences of opinion and when you see these gaps for
Instance this all this is trying to say is this is what Republicans think Democrats point of view is this is actually the same question asked to Democrats so if you ask a republican the US should have open borders do you disagree what do you think uh Democrats think well Democrats
Don’t disagree with that only 30% of them uh will will disagree with that the actual number is almost 75% of Democrats right so we have this gigantic perception Gap because the devotional anger has been so stoked we haven’t actually stopped to think do we actually would would immigration reform is immigration
Reform possible based on the issue I’m not going to put Senator Harkin on the spot I’m GNA say I’ve spoken to so many people in the Congress even right now no problem politics won’t let us I spoke to a congressman not too long ago who was went to his speaker and said
I want to be on the immigration a republican in this case I want to be on the immigration committee why do you want to be on the committee I’ve studied the issue for four years now in Congress I think we can make a deal with Democrats if you
Want to make a deal with Democrats I’m not putting you on the committee anyway we’re not going to spend too much time on this here’s here’s here’s the the clear uh outcome uh contempt incites violence okay one plus one equals violence contempt and speech leads to increases in anti-Semitism by the way
This slide is a year old so just don’t think I just put this up there because of the last two weeks I could have put it up six years ago but we just put this together Amanda Ripley has studied this all over the world terrific journalist by the way
Political speech if I say horrible things about my opponent I lead some people to feel licensed to be violent not everybody but it’s an inciting factor it’s not just violence one in four Americans have broken off a relationship in their own families now I don’t know if everybody
Noticed the one line you guys giggled at was when I said Thanksgiving because probably at least half of us in this room are like I don’t know what’s going to happen when they come home or when he comes over or when she speaks to him this is our
Families being torn apart not by differences of opinion by contempt and hatred one in three Americans PLL Republicans and democrats favor secession have you heard that one 28% of Democrats 30% of Republicans the last time around 31% of Republicans say their state should secede from the union okay uh mental health issue look
At these numbers 8th 10th and 12th graders uh if you look at this period you know when I was teaching in school well actually over there but we would report to the school board that we thought that one and four one and five of our children had significant mental health
Challenges uh and it was leading to drop that it was leading to attendance problems it was leading to violence in school and so on look at the number now I can’t do anything right half of our kids think that way this didn’t just happen by accident and you can’t tell it’s the
Kids that oh we’ll treat you out of this we’ll medicate you out of this you can’t we I’m all for treatment very important where my clinicians here where where did you guys sit the McDonald’s yes all for treatment all for medication absolutely necessary more is needed support for parody and the
Treatment of mental health issues is necessary but you can’t treat half you can’t you can’t put half the population in therapy no chance no chance so we either have to look at the cultural factors that are contributing to the sense of isolation and defeatism or we’re just going to Destin ourselves
To a generation that on is on the verge of completely checking out here’s the political version of this the first time in history that Pew has measured answers to this question can Americans solve their own problems the first time in history more than half of us say
No we can’t solve I mean I grew up those pictures of the United States with that of my childhood and many of your childhoods and the stories from my parents generation and my grandparents generation and my great-grandparents the only thing we agreed on was when America finds a problem we
Can solve it even when it’s internal we can solve it we no matter how bad things are we can do it not anymore so you say well this is just human nature so this is a quick summary uh our premise here is that things have changed that the combination of the
Algorithms which exaggerate contempt social media which never leaves you alone especially if you’re 14 years old no Escape right politics which is now rewarding demonizing the media which is monetizing it and the decline in religious and Civic institutions results in increases in violence social and emotional pain failing institutions of governance Civic
Life and faith so that’s all the bad news here’s the good news the good news is we can do something about it Donna Hicks has studied the Post aparte South Africa the post troubles Northern Ireland has worked with people who have been on the opposite sides of deep divides and says
In conclusion from her work and her work with Bishop Archbishop Desmond Tutu that the most important thing in Human Experience is the desire to be treated with dignity uh from a more spiritual perspective if that’s your uh comfort zone uh Richard Roar writes that we’re moving in a direction where nothing less
Than an inherent original goodness and a universally shared dignity can get us through if we’re in a cultural shift moment the premise of both political science here and spiritual or or religious guidance is we’ve got to find a new Foundation you can’t just be Ians against missourians or Catholics against
Protestants or Jews against Muslims or black against white it’s not going to work anymore so here’s my favorite quote from the Archbishop he I was in a thing where he was asked isn’t it clear that evil is more powerful than good and his answer was no it’s not more powerful than good
But it is better organized so we’re up against a big organized I don’t want I to say evil but uh so so here’s Emanuel cleever a former colleague of your Senator uh who gave us this Challenge and effect fact he didn’t he doesn’t know it but this is the
Challenge that uh Congressman cleever gave us no agencies or organizations excuse me there are agencies that score us on everything if you want to know what Harkin how Harkin voted on the environment on taxes on education on immigration on NATO you can find out his vote on every one of those things and
You can CH call him up and leave a message saying you didn’t meet the scores of the uh you know the nature conservancy or the reproductive freedoms Group whatever it is there’s no score on Dignity no score on civility people just sort of say oh well you know that’s part of the
Business I’m not going to score him on that so Cleaver left us with this challenge so we took it on SIMPLE premise no America without democracy no democracy without healthy debate we don’t have this now and there’s no healthy debate unless you treat other people with dignity you can say it’s not rocket
Science and you’re right uh so here’s what we built and uh you’ve got you’ve got this in your hands and we’re going to play with it just for a minute here before we go to questions here’s what we built we built a scale that doesn’t measure that we disagree but
How so the premise here is that there’s a very precise question in play which is not what do you think about the border wall or open borders not in play uh what do you think about the mill rate for property taxes in De Moy not in play what do you think about
Capital gains taxes not in play what do you think about the Ada not in play the only thing in play is how do I talk about you when we don’t agree so we set out to reveal to people the options about how to characterize the person you disagree with at the
Bottom they’re not even human they’re animals unfortunately you can find a lot of ones today they’re dogs all this language that’s the lowest of the low as you move up you’ll start to see slight tempering of the hatred and contempt it’s us or them moves up to
It’s US versus them and as you move up you start to hear the other side is a right to be heard we talk to the other side and when you get to the top what I call what Misha and I just labeled today Club 78 uh you start to hear people using the
Language you heard from Harkin earlier we find ourselves at our best when we see the best in the other no matter remember this no matter what I know I have Democratic and Republican leaders here and I can’t wait for you guys to tell me I’m wrong about
This uh so let’s do a little quiz if you have it in front of you we’re gonna we’re going to just do a little test uh here’s the first test uh we the people are obliged to take responsibility ourselves to wipe out this scum this is leyon mugera in Rwanda and here’s Hinrich
Himler where the Nations live in prosperity or starve to death interests me only in so far as we need them as slaves for our culture what do you give it a zero or a one that’s a one that top quote I mean I’m almost could say well I’ve seen it in the news
Recently that’s where it leads it leads to a genocide that kills a million people in three weeks all right that’s a one oh there’s your answer uh you go from violent words to Violent action uh the other side is less than human no longer does deserve to live it’s our duty to destroy
Them okay NE test number two your former colleague uh Senator uh John McCain uh Ruth would you mind reading this out loud just for fun starting from the top sure why not we try to way win ACR the a what have we to lose by trying to work together these Solutions we’re not
Getting much done apart I don’t think any of us feels very proud of our incapacity merely preventing your political opponents from doing what they want isn’t the most inspiring workf resp differ good faith that help improve lives and protect the sen isable of that we know that
We’ve seen it I’ve seen it many times involved response toal problem or threat are the proudest moments of my career and by the satisfying beautifully r okay you’ve had five minutes of instruction uh check your scorecards it’s an open book quiz what do you think pretty good it’s a
Six it’s a six level six sees it as a welcome Duty finding common ground is part of who you are all right we got to go fast here here uh who wants to read uh uh Mrs Clinton do I have a volunteer or do I have to pick on
Somebody will you read for us thanks you know to justly you could put half Trump supporters into what I call the basket ofor right the racist sexist homophobic xenophobic isob you name it and unfortunately people like that and he Has Lifted them up he has given voice to
Their websites that used to only have 11,000 people now have 11 million he tweets and retweets their offensive hateful meped roric now some of those folks they are irredeemable but thank thankfully are what do you think scoring panel four what else three two two it’s a three we’re the good people they’re the
Bad people and nobody thinks they’re saying things with contempt because they think what they’re saying is in principle they’re the bad people I’m the good person right so you don’t even notice and I I hope it’s clear that we’re not picking on Senator McCain or former secretary Clinton or any of these
People we’re just using these as examples right so this is not meant to in any way support or detract from a political agenda we can’t do that here and I it’s not our goal but you start to see that uh how this starts to work last one one last reader one last volunteer
We’re at a university I’m a teacher I have patience who will read yes there were times when I look at some of those who are described as monsters and I honestly believe but for the grace of God go I I do not say this because I am
Some singular I say this because I have sat with on I have spoken with former police officers who have aded inflicting the crest torture I have visited have and I have recognized of scorecard that’s an eight I can see myself and every human being he doesn’t say he excuses the
Behavior doesn’t say he agrees with what they did doesn’t say they shouldn’t be in prison doesn’t say any of that he just says I see in you the same Humanity that I see in myself imagine in the in the midst of conflict if we had if we were strong enough to Marshall that
Energy so quickly we piloted this index in Utah uh last year we graded the senate race four Congressional races we got a ton of coverage in the Utah uh news I won’t bore you with all this but just to say that you can start a conversation and people are interested
This is to say there’s a market you know sometimes people think that’s all nice and it’s fine and well and we’re in this nice room and Tom and Ruth are here and they were great but it’s not realistic no one really cares that’s not true it’s
Not true it’s a big market for this out there uh Politico covered our colleague Tammy Piper a huge piece on uh her presentations to this of this work in the Republican circles Republican women very inflamed settings and how she presented the index and how it moved people uh Whatchamacallit the bullwark
Covered it the uh Dallas Morning News has covered it this was just after the state of the union and by the way just to be clear we we’ve developed this and we’re promoting it but we don’t have a PR person who pitched any of these stories these were all done by
Journalists picking it up so to speak seeing that there might be a story worth covering here here’s here’s what we’ve learned three quick things and then we’ll we’ll we’ll shift pretty quickly uh when people learn this you did you got a three minute overview when people
Learn it it has what we call an electrifying effect people immediately get excited almost now you can prove me wrong and say well not tonight not me uh but we have found that people find in this a Clarity that enables them to understand themselves and what’s going on that they
Didn’t see before not because we’re Geniuses but just because it’s so simple you know therapeutically it’s so simple right the same second thing was a surprise we thought we would use this to try to change political discourse most people take it and they want to use it for their
Family and their friends and their uncle and their girlfriend and uh their Professor who treated them so badly the other day and all that kind of stuff they they’re kind of interested in using it for politics but they really want to have it for themselves they want to I I
Presented this once to a group of USC students a couple uh well about three months ago and halfway through this girl raised her hand said you know I just realized I posted yesterday that this blankety blank blank Republican I’m defriending on my Facebook I she said
I’m gonna go take it down I don’t need to do that I didn’t need to say that it’s not necessary this is I didn’t say to her you know clean up your social media posts um uh and then this sense of agency remember we talked about how despairing
People are how discouraged they are what we have found is with young people especially but also with the governors I’ll say a little bit about that a real sense of agency so here’s the summary uh the building blocks of the new culture following SAA we get each
Other wrong we got to be brave name the problem welcome the solution measure manage and mobilize people that’s our goal so I’m here Senator with a request we want Drake to be part of this building block we want to have students for dignity on this campus uh Misha leads our national
Effort on this we have chapters starting potentially at the University of Pennsylvania at the University of Utah at Brigham Young at the University of M of Michigan we want Drake to be on the Forefront of this why not it’s a it’s a it’s a state where there’s a lot of yeah
Let’s yeah do we have a do we have a student going to pick on people so we we have this this students for dignity group and this is like all new for me here’s your QR code Misha just gave me this slide so if you’re interested in this or if anyone
We’ll obviously give you you have this also on the handouts you’ve got uh we think there’s a Grassroots movement here to be built around this simple premise that everybody deserves dignity we don’t think it has a republican skew or a Democratic skew we think it has a human
Skew that can change the way we treat each other other in politics we’re also working with the governor Spencer Cox the head of the national Governor Association is leading he’s the chair this year and his whole initiative is what he calls disagree better and we spoke there at the first meeting of the
National Governor Association initiative on this I’m going again in two weeks to Boulder uh we hope to get five or 10 Governors to commit to the pledge and to commit to meeting with their opposing party just sit down if you’re a Democrat sit down with the leadership of the Republican Party vice versa
Read the index read The Pledge commit to trying to raise your score this is what Spencer does the guy on the left here Jal poles is the governor of Colorado both of them are on board with this so it’s not just Grassroots it’s grass tops as well we’ve got
AI uh Berkeley the center for human compatible artificial intelligence is building we’ve got about 1500 scores in it’s already about 98% accurate we’ll be able within like about a month or two to take every speech Harkin ever gave and score it like that and we’ll see like any speech I
Ever gave or anything any not not speeches but anything you ever posted you’ll be able to see your threes and your fours and how many sixes you got and you could pull your Facebook feed for the last five years and score it it’ll not only score it’ll find the
Places where you characterize someone else so it won’t re it won’t it doesn’t score you it just scores the speech where you point you say my friend George is and then you fill in the blank and it’ll score that it’ll give you the score tell you how many so we’ll be able
To do this at scale and we hope to be able to do this during the during the presidential campaigns this is the school stuff I’m so I’m I went too too long so I don’t have time to go through all this but just suffice to say that in
The Salt Lake City School District on their own they’re building classroom instructional modules uh that teach some of these skills these are some of the skills that help you move up so when somebody threatens you or somebody uh disagrees with you how to be curious not Furious you can teach this
To fifth graders don’t have to be a PhD I mean we’ like phds but we don’t have to be one self-regulation take a deep breath when you’re under attack not not rocket science no most people don’t do it but I’m hoping you’re seeing some almost like CBT like things
Here right so ackn knowledge the ideas of people the challenge ideas don’t attack people I vehemently disagree with the principles the conclusions the data uh the point of view you’re bringing uh and here’s why you don’t have to say you’re a blank you don’t have to say that it’s not necessary doesn’t
Help so we don’t have time to do this uh let me let’s see if can we this is can can we can we can we rewind this I can’t hate this person pause pause just for one second is that possible I just can’t so the the slide you’re about to
See was is on social media today Misha just found it a couple of hours ago so we just plugged it in here this is a dad of someone who lost his son in Lewiston maybe you’ve seen it already on the way over uh but we have a lot of Role Models
Gang we have a lot of role models of people who know how to treat other people with dignity we got to elevate them we got to elevate them look look at look at this Dad I just can’t hate him I guess we can’t make our choices on people
But I can’t I can’t hate this person i’ I’ve been taught different than that I hope anyways and uh I believe in the Lord and I and I have to feel that way if you hate and they hate drives you crazy you’re going to hurt people and
I’ve had my ups and downs in my life and uh I don’t want anyone to hurt me and I don’t want to hurt anybody and I’m sure this man whatever happened to his mind I’m sure he wasn’t born to be a killer and he’s got a I’m sure a father
And a mother that would have never believed this would have happened with him hate will never bring my son is it too much to ask a United States Senator a United States Congressman a mayor media executive really too much to ask them not to perpetrate hate for money for
Votes for power for Prestige for attention is it really too much to ask it’s not too much to ask but they’re trapped we’re all trapped we got to break out that’s our message last slide I’ll show it to you again so anyway I’m sorry I went over a little bit too long
But thank you for your attention and I now welcome open the floor and invite [Applause] you thank you thank you Sam um as mentioned earlier we’re using Google we have a couple to start with so first um what strategies can we use to treat people we fundamentally disagree
With such as perpetrators of War violence and genocide with dignity yeah I mean it’s obviously a very current topic uh I think you know the uh the first message is if things are unsafe or there’s violence or there’s risk you have to try to stop it you don’t have to excuse violence I
Think you also have to recognize that when people have experienced violence they’re going to be deeply wounded and deeply angry and deeply full of contempt that’s not unnatural it shouldn’t be judged I think the question we have to ask ourselves is in moments where violence and fear and
Enormous pain are present is it best to act upon that to continue the cycle the premise of this work is continuing the cycle is not likely to produce good outcomes uh evidence of that our view is is quite uh strong so introducing even the littlest bit of dignity we’ve seen
This in the conflict right now in the Middle East where you hear people on both sides saying I don’t agree I I what they’ve done is this you see you saw it in this man right here it’s not acceptable it’s not good it’s broken my
Heart I’m G to try at least a little bit to treat the in particular the innocent people with dignity and there’s no formula for knowing exactly where that leads us but there there’s a pretty clear conviction that the more we can introduce dignity into the into the equation even in moments of enormous
Pain and anger and frustration and violence and terrorism uh we make we make better decisions and more likely to end it second question uh second audience question how should academic institutions respond to some of the concerning interactions we see on college campuses between pro-israel and pro Palestine
Students well I think you know I think I think the the question often centers on what is hate speech and what is what is provoking violence versus what is free speech and what is provoking what is inviting opinions uh I think college campuses like everybody else has to
Figure out where that line is I think too often cancelling the other group leads to what I would call a cycle of cancelling I just don’t think that gets us very far people that complain about cancel culture on the left are now trying to cancel people on the
Left and people who have been cancelled on the right and the left try to cancel back it’s it’s not particularly productive um so I think the question we have with our students and with people who speak on these issues is to try to define the parameters of open discourse set boundaries for the
Capacity to disagree I think one of the things that’s not that’s been lost on this is when you hear you know when one side hears something that feels like terrorism to the other they don’t feel licensed to actually disagree with the merits they only want to resort to an ad
Hom homonim attack on the on on the purveyor of the opinion so that just reduces the chances that anybody will actually understand a pro Palestinian or a pro-israeli position at any level of depth I don’t think anybody has to condone terrorism God willing everybody in the world condemns it or at least
Almost everybody can condemn it condemning it is the easy thing figuring out how to respond to it in a way that doesn’t make it worse is the tough business thank you um what can Drake’s students or students in general do to get involved with this organization and this movement
Do I go back to that QR code slide this is the first time in my life I’ve ever made a pitch that didn’t include please give me money now really we would just like students to to to email us and we’d like we’re starting chapters this is a small
Movement it’s Grassroots it’s just getting started we’ve got a handful of young people in their teens and 20s who have gotten excited about it we’d like to find a hand here and we think if we organize small numbers of committed people I I love the some of you may be
Fans of Margaret me you know never doubt that small group of committed citizens can change the world it’s the only thing that ever has uh so we’re looking for a small group of committed people who just want to work like crazy with the conviction that we can make a difference and uh
Email QR code take a hand out um I’d say text DM me but I don’t know how to do that do you DM but no I mean this is an immediate thing we would like right now like next week to start students for dignity here and
We’d like one of the first things they do after they’re trained is to request a meeting with the head of the democratic party and the head of the Republican party and we’d like them after that to ask for a meeting with the governor and then maybe with the Senators and the con
To explain to them from the kids here’s what we’re trying to do help us join us I don’t know whether you know and again don’t feel free not to agree cuz we’re this is a sausag making movement we’re in the we are in the we’re in the
Creative period of of what we hope will be a movement yeah is there any evidence that higher dignity scores might win elections I would say uh that well if you look at the presidential uh elections I don’t know that there’s much evidence uh I think you know except 1960 of course uh
I mean you know um but I think actually I I you know it would be a good study for a political scientist uh student to look at this I think you know Harin wins in this state because he’s got a level of decency and dignity that resonates
With the majority of the people in the state I think you see that a lot I think there’s a lot more people in Congress and in the Senate and in elective office at the state and local level who carry a good deal of this dignity and a good deal of this uh
Uh Civility and uh passion for their issues without being hateful that do win they just don’t get the air time so I don’t I think there’s plenty of examples where the more contemptuous person won just full disclosure I I I’m we’re not naive here um but I think there’s plenty
Of examples where the more uh the person with the higher level of dignity has W too and uh you know I don’t know where people feel about the the last election but I think if you’d scored by we we have scored Biden and we have scored Trump and you’d be surprised at how
Diverse the scores are maybe maybe you won’t be surprised but both candidates can are can move up the ladder and both candidates both both presidents are capable of moving down the ladder I would suspect if we scored the last election that the candidate with higher
Dignity scores won but I don’t I I can’t say that for a fact maybe just make sure if there’s anyone in the audience because I’m dying for someone to say you’re wrong come on while we wait for the next audience question I’ll ask one of my own could
You speak a little to what we had talked about earlier about contempt in the context of marriages and divorces and what you found there well what we’ve what we’ve what we I’ve talked to a lot of clinicians and I welcome you guys to jump in here if you’d like to uh we’ve
Talked to a lot of clinicians about this trauma clinicians systems therapists uh marriage therapists last week I was just talking to a very prominent marriage therapist about how dignity figures in mediating and heal trying to heal disputes in in in in marriages what we’re hearing I’m not a clinician myself
Uh what we’re hearing is that the a lot of the therapeutic project is to first try to help the individual find their own dignity what’s your own deepest and and one of the things you T when you teach kids is you got to find your own strength in order to give an accord
Strength to other people but encouraging people in a conflict to hear and see the Dignity of the other is often a breakthrough moment in in clinical experiences but I yes please we as practition yeah and I probably speak for most practitioners we have the luxury of a controlled setting right where we have
The two persons who are really angered disillusioned disappointed and hostile at each each other there’s a common kind of initiative that they want some healing at some level or other and we have that privilege of being invited into that context right so it’s more of a an open setting and because of that
Attitude with goodwi and with a lot of hard work people ReDiscover the goodness of one another I use an axiom that says if you want to renew a marriage you move to the level of good communication and you move to fascination with the Beauty and the Dignity of the other and it renews
Things that’s often been lost yeah in the political Forum you don’t have that luxury I don’t know how you would do that because it’s you model well that’s the question the question is you know when I started on this and people said well you have to change the culture I
Was like I had worked like 10 years to try to change fifth grade you know like where everything is controlled right where you have you know you have 10 10 months and you have all this control so a culture has a lot of levers of change
And I’m not an expert on this I’m not like a social scientist in this area but I do think that we see in recent times levers that can move cultural discourse quite quickly we see it over long periods of time a lot I mean let’s be blunt people would
Go to a lynching in their Sunday clothes a hundred years ago that’s not that’s not accepted today right the culture changed the meaning making changed the value system changed the capacity to see and communicate and hear each other uh the lgbtq story is a very rapid change where
Wherever you are on the issue it changed a lot in a short period of time like five seven 10 years now yes there was tons of work and pain and struggle that led up to it but it changed pretty quick uh couple of things couple of levers a
Couple of things and all of a sudden what was once normal is now scorned right that’s what we’re looking for here we’re looking for can you create in a almost like a quasi therapeutic sense a communication pattern that all of a sudden unlocks for people some fascination with the other
Almost exactly the the trajectory you just described that makes you go at the end oh my God I can’t believe I ever said that like I almost like it’s no longer cool to call people names that’s not cool anymore don’t you know we did this in a small way in the Special
Olympics movement with the RW if I were in an audience like this 15 years ago when we started this I’d say how many people have used the RW the word and you know one or two hands would go up and I’d say okay come
On and then you know if I gave it time every hand goes up now I’m not saying we eradicated it but it’s not as cool to call someone that word as it was so I I think there are levers of change in a culture some people say influencers you
Know if you oh if you only get Taylor Swift or Beyonce or something like that then it would be great if you could get the president and the you know if you get Donald Trump it would be great all that matters influencers matter in terms of creating the context for that
Communication that you have in this controlled setting but I think there’s a lot of different ways to do it and I think the bottom up way is is a big part of it and that’s why honestly that’s why I’m here because I we’d love to have
This place be a hub you know help us build and maybe create the communication here and all of a sudden people will say you know at Drake they handle the next conflict really well and this is how they did it they have a code of conduct they have a freshman orientation where
They teach people how to disagree with dignity professors challenge people when they disagree to use these codes I don’t know that’s our hope yes in the back um do you think dignity um this mindset would positively or in any way affect the American the American education system in any way yeah I think
In so you know mentioned a little bit that I was in the field of what we call social and emotional learning so that whole field was designed to train people in empathy and perspective taking and self-regulation and and it’s being taught well and it has a huge effect on
Test scores has an effect on sense of safety in school it has an effect on Dropout rates when people feel safe when people feel Hur when people feel like they’re not going to be attacked they learn better this is one this is a new Tool uh that I think what we’re hearing
From Educators now this is not me and again a lot of this is a Utah based example because that’s where we’ve been in uh the Salt Lake City superintendent came I was we were there 10 10 days ago and she came on her own with 15 teachers because she’s creating the Salt Lake
City a dignity School District initiative and the student government groups are all you know one of the things that’s nice for teachers I don’t know if there’s any teachers or former teachers here like oh I can teach this right ready to go on the back
There’s a website I can pull down I can drop down boxes I can give examples that’s teachable right it’s not like I got to go do research it’s it’s sort of done so I think it can make a difference in schools and I think it can make a
Difference you know people say what about Free Speech if I were to ask you in this room have you had your speech constrained in the last week have you not said something you wish you you wanted to say almost everybody would say yes and almost everybody would say the reason
They don’t say it is because they’re afraid of the contempt they’ll experience if they say the wrong thing so our kids are feeling that and there’s nothing worse for learning than fear nothing nothing constrain from the brain science from the developmental science from the mental health science nothing constrains learning worse than
Fear and stress uh at least to toxic levels so if we can make it feel safe to ask a question about something that’s sensitive sexual orientation gender race culture all these different things make it possible for kids not to feel that if they ask the wrong question they won’t
Get treated with oh my God you idiot how dare you how could you you better get out of here No One’s Gonna like you I think it could make a big difference yes sir the um this will be our last question I didn’t get my Republican and
Democrats fighting that’s what I a lot of what you talked about is uh one democ one uh politician attacking another politician but what you implied with some of your quotes that you did at the end was really the attack about the other right you know the attack about
The other group and I think that is what’s really is the most toxic in politics today is uh the attack about the other group and how how do we really handle that uh aspect in our politics today because I think that’s what’s really driving most of the divide uh in
Our society yeah they have this opinion they’re doing this to us they’re going to attack us they’re the problem they whatever they is uh so I think disaggregating it is is really it’s I I don’t think it’s that different than just actually realizing that contempt about a group is a particularly varent
Form because it actually I don’t just say Tom is evil I know Tom I met Tom I’m related to Tom he’s evil that at least implies some degree of knowledge Republicans are evil or Maga people are evil Or democrats are evil or woke people are evil or Urban dwellers
Are evil or Jews or Muslims or that’s that’s a level of cognitive dissonance and disorientation that is on its Nature by its nature absurd right you can’t there’s no way you can’t how would you know can’t know a million people so the the premise here is that that simply
Asking people not to characterize other groups with contempt Like You can disagree with Republicans it’s fine I was raised to disagree with Republicans it’s not that big a deal I mean I and actually to be honest I know we’re out of time I’m not proud
Of a lot of the ways which when I look back I mean I’ve learned a lot just speaking for myself I’ve learned a lot through this process I mean last comment I won’t pick on him because I love my father to death and he’s not here anymore but he told me
When I was about 12 years old that the one person who could never go to have him was Richard [Laughter] Nixon and like we were on the way home from church when he told me that I was like I don’t think that fits with what we just heard and he’s like oh
No oh no if you get to heaven you’re not going to find Richard Nixon there I’m telling you so look there’s plenty of guilt to go around on these things but I I do think that the basic premise of group hate is not that different from Individual and I think the same thing
Could apply Josh do you want the last word or you’re sitting politely in the back newly elected representative of the no you you want nothing to do with this topic thank you for coming thank you all for coming thank you all for coming