Jacob Hess served on the board of the National Coalition of Dialogue and Deliberation and is Executive Director of the Council for Sustainable Healing. He has a Ph.D. in clinical-community psychology from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His research focuses on the implications of competing health and sociopolitical narratives.
Those who wrestle are not a separate category of humans. That describes all of us. If so, the key question is not whether we are “willing to wrestle,” but rather, where that wrestle ultimately takes each of us.
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Even after the killer in Atlanta’s heinous shooting recently spoke of his sexual addiction as a contributing influence. Some have taken this as an opportunity to minimize and even ridicule the idea of such a problem. The millions of men and women grappling with the same deserve better.
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How discussions are pre-loaded for failure.
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Conservatives are feeling singled out and targeted on social media. But the history of bans across major platforms confirms a more complicated picture.
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While most Americans love to talk about the high value of “pluralism” and “free speech” when push comes to shove they usually have a red line—an issue on which it’s NOT okay to disagree openly. At least not publicly. What’s yours?
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With public health messaging now emphasizing how remarkably effective COVID-19 vaccines are, it’s reasonable to ask what exactly that means? Based on the published studies of the leading three vaccine candidates, I dove in to better understand that for myself.
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This is the sixth in a series by Arthur Peña, Charles Randall Paul, and Jacob Hess called “Inevitable Influencers: Why (deep down) we all want—and need—to persuade each other of what we see as good, beautiful, and true.” Previous pieces include “Why Persuasion Should be a Sweet (Not a Dirty) Word”; “The Threat of Persuasion,” and “My Truth? Your Truth? No Truth?”; “The Virtues of Strong Disagreement,” and “Our Judgment Against Judgment.”
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Much has been written in recent years about what “Latter-day Saints believe” about LGBT issues – only a fraction of which accurately represents our true convictions. Tragically, even today, many are only familiar with these widespread distortions.
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If we want to cultivate public confidence in the election, condemning or dismissing entirely those with concerns about the vote won’t help us get there. And making space for a little suspicion and caution shouldn’t hurt either.
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Early this morning, President Trump stood before the American people on the verge of another astounding upset and accused his opponents of fraud. When will the mounting levels of mutual suspicion and accusation take us past our breaking point as a country?
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We don’t agree on the problems facing America, which is why our views of the solutions and answers to the mess we’re in diverge so widely as well.
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President Trump’s comments have been rightly scrutinized for their potential impact on America’s post-election environment. Far less attention has gone to certain themes of progressive commentary, which in combination arguably heightens the volatility of our post-election atmosphere.
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Most everyone agrees that the United States is in trouble. Like everything else, however, we don’t agree on what that danger entails.
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After years of studying contrasting health narratives and their correspondence with actual scientific data, I can’t help but say, be wary of the medical salvation story. It’s usually too good to be true.
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Being judged for being “judgmental” has become so commonplace we hardly think twice about it. But sound judgment says we should.
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Is science an oracle of truth—revealing what we should do and how we should think—or is it an ongoing, contested deliberation about that truth?
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If you have questions or concerns about the Black Lives Matter movement, does that make you racist—or suggest that you don’t believe “black lives matter?” Of course not. But if Americans were needing a reminder of why not, Jonathan Isaac just provided it.
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However nice it would be to feel unified in our response to COVID-19, there are many ongoing differences in perspective between thoughtful, good-hearted people. Could it help to map out fairly what those disagreements are?
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What those who scorn believers in Christ’s return don’t understand is how much hope these beliefs bring—far more than any fear for what is surely coming.
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We’re right to mourn slavery as a country. It’s not what “birthed” America though.
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