First, let’s be clear: there are limits to how much you should indulge fools, especially those so given to conspiratorial nonsense as to be beyond reason.

And especially at the holidays, when you’re trying to enjoy quality time with family, rather than re-litigate the election, debate the political and aesthetic merits of the QAnon Shaman, or complete a deep dive into the pharmacological benefits of Ivermectin and inhaled iodine as cures for COVID.

For people like that, unless you have the chance and inclination to spike their holiday turkey and mashed potatoes with Thorazine, there isn’t much that I can suggest you do.

Frankly, I would recommend not inviting them to your Thanksgiving table at all.

Or, if they’re going to be at whatever gathering you’ve been invited to, perhaps turn down the invite and create your own holiday tradition with persons who still have reasonable ownership of their faculties.

Surely there must be a better way to spend several hours of your life than dealing with people who think Barack Obama is a Kenyan-born Muslim who seeks to impose Sharia law on America and currently assists Hillary Clinton in running a Satanic, cannibalistic pedophile ring.

But hey, if you’re up to challenging such folks between helpings of cranberries and stuffing, go for it. And let us all know how that works out.

This piece isn’t really about how to deal with people like that, or, for that matter, family members who’ve gone so far down the rabbit hole of racism that they’ve come out the other side like Alice in Hitlerland.

The first rule of political fight club is simple: you can’t save everyone.

But if you’re like a lot of folks, just dealing with that problematic uncle who spends a bit too much time watching FOX or Newsmax and who thinks Facebook posts are every bit as authoritative as footnoted books and scientific research, read on.

I might be able to help.

Knowing what NOT to do is the first step

When dealing with politically problematic relatives, it’s best to start by knowing what not to do.

And the thing you shouldn’t do is probably the first thing you’re going to want to do.

I know this because it’s always been my default position, too — to demonstrate how smart you are and how much more you know than your stupid-ass uncle.

Don’t do this.

If you treat these interactions like actual debates and believe them to be about facts and knowledge, you’ve already lost the opportunity to engage in productive discourse.

So do not, under any circumstances, bust out the “what I learned in my Intersectional Feminism seminar up at the college” material.

There is nothing a 50-something or older American without a college degree likes less than a 20-year old sophomore telling him anything about anything.

We all see what we see based on the colors we wear and the teams we rep

His whole persona is wrapped up in his “real world” knowledge. He’s that guy who likes to tell you how he attended the “school of hard knocks,” which taught him practical stuff.

Meanwhile, at least in his mind, the rest of us were contemplating post-modern epistemologies and taking classes like “From Emily Dickinson to Nicki Minaj: The Poetics of Womanhood Under Capitalist Patriarchy.” (Which actually sounds like a fascinating idea for a class, but don’t mention it at Thanksgiving).

Guys like this — and it’s usually guys, though not always — devalue scholarship by definition. They don’t read academic material and think professors are pointy-headed intellectuals who don’t have real jobs.

So to engage on that level is a non-starter.

Instead…

…Start with a sports analogy

I know it’s cliche, but it works.

Ask him about the Houston Astros.

In 2017, as your uncle will likely know, the Houston Astros won the World Series, defeating the Los Angeles Dodgers in seven games.

Two years later, it was revealed that the team had been engaged in an elaborate form of cheating — stealing signs from the catcher to the pitcher with cameras placed in the centerfield stands.

The camera would zoom in on the catcher’s signals, allowing the Astros to know what kind of pitch was coming next.

A player or coach in the dugout who was monitoring the camera would then let other players know, at which point they would bang on a trash can to signal to the batter what kind of pitch to expect.

This provided a considerable advantage to Astros’ hitters and became the biggest scandal in Major League Baseball since the steroid era of the late ’90s and early 2000s.

And much as with the steroid scandal — or accusations that the New England Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady was deflating footballs to get a better grip on them a few years ago — how fans saw the debacle depended on more than the facts.

It depended largely on which team you rooted for.

For most Astros fans, it was much ado about nothing. You’d hear them say things like, “Everybody does it; we’re just the only ones who got caught.”

Or, “Just because you know what pitch is coming doesn’t mean you’ll be able to hit it.”

Or, “Our pitchers still had to shut down opposing batters when we were on defense.”

Translated, all of these mean the same thing: “Who cares if we gamed the system a bit?”

Meanwhile, if you were a fan of any other team — especially the ones the Astros had beaten in the playoffs and World Series to become champions — you probably took a different view.

This is a direct analogy to how we look at political issues.

No one comes at them purely objectively. Not your uncle, not you, not me — no one.

We all see what we see based on the colors we wear and the teams we rep.

The “why” question is more important than the “what” question

So having raised the sports analogy, you can pivot into a discussion of politics, not focused on what you or your relative thinks, but why you think it.

And if this can help your problematic uncle see that you’re not attacking him for his views, but simply noting that his — and yours — come from a place that isn’t necessarily objective, this will change the conversation for the better.

Now you can explore why two people (or millions) can look at the same events or news stories and see very different things.

At that point, you’re no longer debating what is and isn’t true.

You’re not debating at all.

You’re discussing how decent and rational people can see things so differently when looking at the same phenomenon, whether that’s the Astros, the Deflate-gate accusations, or the events of 1/6, last summer’s racial justice protests, or the election.

By making this the focus, you encourage your relative to think more deeply and critically, without saying, “Hey, think more deeply and critically, Uncle dumbass.”

If your uncle can begin to see how his views stem from team identity more than facts and evidence, just as your views do, it makes it harder for him to claim such certitude about the day’s issues.

It also bonds you by creating a new team to which you both belong — the team of the un-objective. So now you have some common ground, even if only for the sake of the conversation itself.

Don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying there is no such thing as truth. I’m suggesting that how we see, interpret, and understand the truth is selective, and if we can all realize that, it makes for more productive (and far less tense) dialogue.

Answers to “why” questions allow humility — and humility is the enemy of authoritarian politics

What this approach also does is signal to your relative that you’re genuinely interested in exploring his experiences and values — the things that bring him to the place where he finds himself. And by sending that signal, it will almost always lead your relative to reciprocate.

After all, if I listen to you tell me why you think what you think and explore the things you value, you’ll look like a real asshole if you don’t extend the same opportunity to me.

So now, we can get into some of the specific reasons — from upbringing to the experiences we’ve had — that have deposited us in our respective political camps.

Humility makes authoritarianism impossible

For instance, if I’m discussing systemic racism with someone who is having a hard time seeing it, I can bust out all the data and research in the world to no avail. But when I’ve shared what I’ve seen with my own eyes — the way Black friends and colleagues have been treated by police, for instance, and how I’ve been treated by comparison — I’ve seen it make more of an impact.

Does it convert them to my view on the spot? Well, of course not. That’s not how things work.

But did it lower the temperature? Yes.

Did it at least get the other person to consider a different perspective in that moment and in a way that might stick with them? Yes.

And it did all that without being judgmental or coming off like a know-it-all.

What makes the “why” approach work is that it injects a degree of humility into the process of political conflict.

If my uncle and I both have to think about why we believe what we believe and admit that in large part, it’s because of subjective influences as much as objective reasoning, it becomes harder to be a smug asshole to each other.

And what you want to avoid at the holiday table (and most other times, too) is smug asshole-ness. It never makes things better.

Not only is humility good for the family dynamic, but it’s also inherently capable of tamping down the rancor that threatens our nation.

Think about it. Humility makes authoritarianism impossible.

As the famous Judge, Learned Hand put it: “The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right.”

To admit one’s subjectivity, even as we strive to determine the truth on a subject, complicates the attempt to destroy democracy or subvert one another’s rights.

The problem now is that so many people are locked into our truths without a willingness to reflect on how we arrived at them — and that’s a recipe for the kind of certitude that makes democracy break down.

Or, in the case of the right, seem like something not worth fighting for in the first place.

So when you’re inclined to rise up on your Trumpy Uncle, instead, do like Kendrick said.

“Be humble. Sit down.”

And in this case, ask questions that allow you both to discuss issues like adults rather than fight like children.

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Previously Published on Medium

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