Cultivate curiosity, and really listen: how to persuade people whose politics you don’t agree with

The left wants to achieve far-reaching structural change - the sort of political reframing that requires coalition building. Are polarizing words throwing them off course?

When Karin Tamerius first started arguing with her elderly uncle about rightwing memes he was posting on Facebook, she surprised herself. She found herself launching personal attacks, making him feel he was objectively bad" for holding certain beliefs - behaviors she knew through her work as a therapist were unfair at worst, and didn't work at best. But she couldn't stop herself. She felt she had a moral imperative to act, a compulsion to make the case for her side.

In the lead-up to the 2016 election, Tamerius saw her uncle drifting into more extreme rightwing rhetoric thanks to his exposure to Fox, Breitbart and social media. They fought so much that eventually they stopped speaking.