Don't Let Anyone Tell You Americans Are Too Polarized to Disagree Passionately but Productively

A report on our third Substack Writers' Meet-up

Event report

DON’T LET ANYONE TELL YOU AMERICANS ARE TOO POLARIZED TO DISAGREE PASSIONATELY BUT PRODUCTIVELY

A report on our third Substack Writers' Meet-up, Dec. 6, 2024

Jake Mackey

, Kimi Katiti, and Becky Murdoch

On Friday night, December 6th, ten writers got together at Epiphany Space, the Hollywood hub of a global community of creative types, to talk shop and, it turned out, to have a deep, impassioned, but also gracious and productive discussion about race in America. What might, if you believe all the talk about how polarized Americans are, have turned into an explosive fight turned instead into one of the most remarkable conversations many of us have had the good fortune to experience. Even more, a group of people, many of them strangers to one another, who spent over two hours exploring their political and ideological differences, parted not as enemies, in a spirit of mutual misunderstanding and distrust, but as friends, united by a sense that whatever their differences, they can discuss them honestly and with grace.

Jake (an editor of this journal), Kimi (an interdisciplinary artist), and Becky (writer of No Sex in the City and Community & Development Director for our venue, Epiphany Space) put the event on. We laid out a spread of wine, prosecco, beer, tea, coffee, charcuterie, cheese, and donut holes.

Then we waited for our guests. Unfortunately, FBT’s

Michael David Cobb Bowen

and friend-of-FBT and writers’ meetup regular

Winkfield Twyman

had informed us that they couldn’t make it, as they had hoped to do. They were missed.

Fortunately, however, we were blessed when old friends

Marissa Ward

,

Michellep

, and

Karina Wilson

arrived one by one, and were soon joined by new friends, whom we were delighted to meet—

Jeffrey Peoples

(whom we’ve published here before),

Miriam Thompson

(whom we’ll publish in January), as well as

Ashley Nicole Emerson

and Aaron Braxton (both of whom we hope to publish soon).

We all grabbed a drink and a bite and made our introductions…and then something spontaneous, electrifying, and beautiful happened, something that renews our hopes for the possibility of dialogue in our fractured and polarized country.

As you might expect at an event sponsored in part by Free Black Thought, several of the attendees mentioned in their introductions their dissatisfaction with mainstream narratives about race and blackness in America. Indeed, some of the attendees devote their Substack to precisely this issue.

One of the attendees, new to our meet-ups, listened patiently and then, when everyone had finished speaking, spoke up, firmly but calmly. He disagreed with some of the views expressed, especially the view expressed by some attendees that Affirmative Action was perhaps not serving black Americans as it had originally been designed and intended to do. What other mechanism, he asked, would you suggest to help black people catch up with white people, with their 400 year head start in this country? After all, black people had until recently had a boot on their neck, and even today faced unique challenges based solely on race. His words carried the conviction of a man who had grown up in tough circumstances in the Boston area, and was a former teacher in the Los Angeles school district, where he had seen more than most.

Instead of sparking a fight or a shouting match, and instead of creating ill-will or spoiling the vibe of the event, his powerful but good-natured disagreement launched our group into one of the most searching and honest, passionate yet productive conversations many of us have had the good fortune to participate in. No one appeared to feel attacked or defensive. And while no one backed down from stating their thoughts and responses candidly, no one attacked anyone else or impugned their motives.

It would be impossible to recount the order in which attendees spoke, the arguments that they made, or all the topics that were covered—subjects ranged from K-12 schooling, to college admissions, the work of Malcolm Gladwell, Glenn Loury, and Robin DiAngelo, police violence, socio-economic class versus race, white versus black poverty, the importance of the family in shaping a child’s future, and much more.

What we can recount here is that the conversation carried on for well over an hour at an extraordinary level of intellectual intensity, depth of commitment and feeling, and genuine mutual respect. At some point, without necessarily reaching an overarching resolution, our single, shared conversation spontaneously broke up into 4 or 5 smaller conversations, and we carried on for another hour or so, mingling, grabbing another drink or a bite of charcuterie, and exchanging contact and Substack information.

If ten of us—white and black, gay and straight, male and female—can come together in Hollywood and discuss one of the most polarizing issues in America and part as friends who look forward to doing it all again, then there is hope yet for our country. Don’t let anyone tell you differently.

---