Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds. —Henry Adams
In an age of heightened political tensions, understanding the roots of divisiveness is more crucial than ever.
I have worried about political violence for some time. Our discourse has become a language of violence, with charged words like Nazis for conservatives and communists for liberals. People use the word hate when talking about others who have a different set of beliefs. We will never know what caused a 20-year-old youth to attempt to assassinate a past and potential future president. But were I to chance a guess, I would lay the blame on a number of factors that, if not addressed, may result in more political violence.
Our differing opinions, ideologies, beliefs, and political values sharply divide us. Over time, our news channels, social media, and politicians have led us to the place where we are two warring factions, destabilizing our society. Both sides accuse the other of destroying our country and risking our democracy. The real danger is political divisiveness.
The Rise of Political Divisiveness in the Media
In 1978, CNN started airing a political show called Crossfire where a liberal pundit, Tom Braden, and a conservative pundit, Pat Buchanan, faced off. While they argued over current events, they were polite, and it was clear they liked each other. This show was so successful that it was copied.
In 2006, Roger Ailes, the CEO of Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News, supposedly said: "We’re in the business of giving people red meat. We are not in the business of giving them broccoli." In that same year, MSNBC started launching red meat to the other half of the political spectrum. This was a business decision that would build a large, stable audience by speaking directly to their political fears. These channels encouraged people to see things as binary: us versus them. We have been manipulated this way for decades.
The number of people who say they are not religious continues to grow. Religion has been replaced by divisive politics. It is no mystery how we find ourselves here in the aftermath of a political assassination attempt. The last time this happened was 52 years ago.
Memes and the Spread of Political Ideologies
You might believe you know what the word meme means. If you think it’s about a viral image of a laughing baby or a cat climbing up the drapes, you may not know that a meme could best be described as an idea virus. You and I believe that we have ideas, but the truth is that ideas have us.
Let me make the case that you are infected with all sorts of ideas. If you can remember your childhood, you might recall a period when you explored every religion, after looking at Islam, Judaism, Catholicism, and a number of Protestant variations of Christianity. Most of us have the same religion as our parents, who adopted the religion from their grandparents.
You picked up your politics the same way as you picked up your religion and the idea that you would go to college, get married, have children, and infect them with the memes you are carrying.
I tell you this because I want to infect you with a more helpful meme. Just like you picked up the “conservative meme” or the “liberal meme,” the person who has the opposite meme was infected in the same way you got your politics. You have more in common than you might think with a person you don’t understand.
The Impact of Political Engagement on Health
You and I must find a way to turn down the rhetoric. I have a BA in political science and am a member of Pi Sigma Alpha, the honor society. I will never argue with you about your political beliefs. Hate is too heavy to carry. Politics can make you sick.
If you are not convinced, here is research to back me up. A longitudinal study analyzed sentiment and emotion in news headlines between 2000 and 2019. It applied Ekman’s six basic emotions (anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, surprise) and a neutral label to categorize the headlines. The results reveal that headlines across all news media became more negative over that time period. As the researchers state, “The chronological analysis of headlines' emotionality shows a growing proportion of headlines denoting anger, fear, disgust, and sadness, and a decrease in the prevalence of emotionally neutral headlines across the studied outlets over the 2000–2019 interval.” Consuming media that feeds your fears is the equivalent of consuming poison every day. You can check out the 2022 study, which is by Rozado, Hughes, and Halberstadt, here: http://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0276367Another study, called “Politics Is Making Us Sick” (K.B. Smith 2022) found: "Based on a 32-item survey specifically designed to measure the health-related impacts of political engagement, Smith estimated that 94 million Americans perceived politics as a significant source of stress, 44 million had lost sleep because of politics, nearly 30 million reported politics had harmed their physical health, and 11 million had suicidal thoughts because of politics. The full 32-item battery has four sub-scales: physical health, emotional health, regretted behavior (e.g., 'I have vowed to spend less time on politics but failed to follow through'), and social and lifestyle health." You can read that full paper at: http://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0262002.
These citations are found in The Negativity Fast: Proven Techniques to Increase Positivity, Reduce Fear, and Boost Success.
