Civility vs Dust-ups

My friend Mike Hodin from New York city sent along an essay in The Atlantic magazine titled: A Republic, If We Can Keep It - The government set up by James Madison and the other Founders requires a virtuous public and virtuous leaders—or the whole system will fail (link).  I am a huge fan of the quality of thought and writing in The Atlantic.  The article emphasizes the importance of virtuous conduct.  It got me wondering whether being virtuous means the same as being civil.

Indeed, I wonder if the call for civility is politesse for one group to say "shush..." to another group?

I canvassed several friends about their thoughts on this and I got a wonderful array of replies that included the following (edited for brevity):

My friend in Michigan with a philosophical bent posited: I believe that, when faced with injustice, we should sometimes get somewhat angry. Such anger is not “pure” and entails submitting oneself to (some degree of) moral corruption, but the alternative, acquiescence, is often even worse. The point I want to emphasize, however, is this: just because the moral corruption of anger is our best option doesn’t mean it is not corruption.

From Philadelphia my friend warned that incivility could degenerate into bullying.

My Boston friend wondered whether we are wired as humans to fight and perhaps it is one way to allow society to blow steam off.

My friend from Chennai calls for a combination of candor and civility in public discourse.

Another friend from Philly posited: There is a role for controlled "dust-ups" - whereby people defend their position with passion, but avoid denigrating the other party.    Creative tension is the key to growth - but it has to be constrained and moderated by civility.

Mike Hodin weighed in as well:  I re-read Alan Bloom's The Closing of The American Mind, which over 30 years ago noticed an anti-American trend. The recent closure of the Art, Literature and Western Civilization course at Yale is the most recent evidence of this trend.  Civility suggests expansion not narrowing of our minds.

For good measure I got myself a quick refresher on what Emerson shares in Self-Reliance and Thoreau in Civil Disobedience.

Here are 3 observation I have on this topic:

1.  Diversity & Inclusion: The framers envisioned a diverse society, but wrote for land owners of that time.  From that point on each step towards diversity and inclusion was a fight.  Civil war, Suffrage, Civil Rights, LGBT marriage equality, healthcare.  So today's cultural ferment is against the diversification of our society, and when we look back in 20-30 years we will have moved past this discomfort.  However, 20-30 years from now we will be engaged in a new battle for diversity and inclusion.  So when fundamental rights are being fought over, I wonder about the role of civility.

2.  Technological Disruption: The framers did not anticipate this level of technological change and even Artificial Intelligence (A.I.).  The level of disruption that A.I. is going to wreak on our society is going to be immense.  We know from the 2016 experience that Facebook has already impacted a US election!  Deep fakes, cyber security etc will enhance threats to civil society.  Thus there is urgency for policy makers to attend to this.  And I would imagine being civil is second to addressing this pressing problem for the greater good.

3.  Generational Change:  We are probably one or two elections away from Gen Xers or Millennials taking reins for Mayorships, Governorships and the U.S. Presidency.  Just as swiftly as LGBT became mainstream, several issues that are now entrenched might become mainstream.  Meanwhile we have to keep our eyes on the trend-lines of demographic change.

My take therefore is that civility is either a luxury or something that is practiced within groups that are non-diverse.  Real problems being solved by really diverse communities of today will necessitate dust-ups!

A final word from another friend in Philadelphia, who took a step back to ponder the nature of conversation itself: It all depends on who you are and who the others are, he says.  As has been pointed out, for some civility could mean "stay in your place".  There are lots of kinds of conversations.
 
I am thankful to all my friends who weighed in on this topic and Mike for prompting this thought in the first place.

Thinking through all this, I wonder that, perhaps each of us needs to tend to living our individual lives charitably and engage sincerely with helping our respective communities; and take a stand when the occasion calls for it.