Juno News - Is civility dead？

00:00:00.000 I wanted to pivot to another issue here, and this is one not connected to any news of the

00:00:14.020 day, not connected to politics, but as well, I shouldn't say not connected to politics,

00:00:18.640 not directly connected to politics and political news, but I think it underlies

00:00:23.860 a lot of the problems we see in our political system.

00:00:26.900 One of the biggest trends of the last 20 years, I'd say, has been the proliferation of cancel

00:00:33.040 culture.

00:00:33.980 We have this great political divide where people on the left and right no longer wish to talk

00:00:38.400 to each other.

00:00:39.180 We have a fair bit of nastiness about that, not just in the House of Commons when politicians

00:00:43.800 are lobbing their rhetorical grenades across the aisle at each other, but in civil society.

00:00:49.440 We have people that are getting torn apart in their family dinners because they are unable

00:00:54.400 to discuss things in a civil manner.

00:00:57.360 But what is civility?

00:00:59.320 This is a topic that I, again, I've heard a lot of people call for civility, but I've

00:01:04.260 never heard that underlying discussion from a philosophical and spiritual and cultural

00:01:08.940 perspective of what it is and why it's so important until I read a book that came out

00:01:13.880 in the fall called The Soul of Civility, written by Alexandra Hudson, who I am very pleased to

00:01:19.460 have joining me right now.

00:01:21.100 Alexandra, good to talk to you.

00:01:22.280 Thanks very much for coming on.

00:01:24.280 Andrew, thanks for having me.

00:01:25.640 Thrilled to be here.

00:01:26.840 So why, I kind of gave a political lead into this.

00:01:30.260 This is not a political book, but I certainly think it's applicable to the political climate

00:01:34.920 in a lot of ways.

00:01:35.920 Why did you decide to delve into civility first and foremost?

00:01:39.180 I came to my interest in this topic, honestly.

00:01:44.100 My mother is called the manners lady. 0.99

00:01:46.460 So I was raised in this home that was very attentive to social norms and social expectations.

00:01:51.100 I am constitutionally allergic to authority, Andrew.

00:01:54.440 That might not surprise me.

00:01:55.540 I hate rules.

00:01:56.800 I hate being told what to do.

00:01:58.700 And so I remember always questioning these rules and expectations.

00:02:02.040 My mother always asked my brothers and I to comply with.

00:02:05.620 Why do we do things the way we do them?

00:02:06.980 And is the way that we're asked to do them, is that the best way?

00:02:10.000 Is it just because some self-appointed authority at some point in history said we should do it?

00:02:13.780 And I just like hungered for a why behind our norms and expectations.

00:02:17.820 But my mother said that they would lead to success and work, school, life.

00:02:21.720 And if I followed them and she was generally right until I found myself in federal government.

00:02:28.360 I actually served in the prime minister's office in Canada and in Washington, D.C.

00:02:33.640 in a presidential administration there as well.

00:02:35.460 And I saw and experienced this kind of a challenge to this conventional wisdom my mother had raised me with.

00:02:44.120 In both environments, I saw these two extremes.

00:02:47.300 On one hand, I saw people who were hostile.

00:02:51.480 They had sharp elbows.

00:02:52.720 There were no secrets about, you know, that they were willing to dispense with anyone, step on anyone to get ahead.

00:02:58.480 On the other hand, I saw people who at first I thought they were my people.

00:03:02.120 They were polished and poised and polite, yet ruthless and cruel.

00:03:07.980 And this second contingent really threw me because at first, you know, they disarmed me.

00:03:13.500 I thought they were my friends.

00:03:14.600 But one thing my mother had said to me growing up was that manners mattered because they were an outward expression of our inward character.

00:03:20.860 And yet here I was surrounded by people who are well-mannered but ruthless and cruel.

00:03:25.320 So part of the argument is that there's this essential distinction between civility and politeness, that civility is more than just manners.

00:03:31.700 Because as I learned, you could smile and be polished and well-poised but not be respectful of others.

00:03:38.480 So part of the argument of the book is disambiguating, disentangling these ideas, arguing we need actually less politeness, less the faux respect, the tone policing, the worrying about saying and doing the right thing, and more actual respect, more the disposition of actually respecting others.

00:03:54.980 That sometimes requires telling a hard truth, offending people, engaging in robust debate.

00:04:00.760 Yeah, and I found that politeness, civility, contrast to be a fascinating one because we see it.

00:04:07.380 I'm glad you used the word tone policing because we see how civility or appeals to civility are used as a tool to quell dissent, to quell challenging certain ideas, behaviors, whatnot.

00:04:21.420 And I think young women are probably particularly susceptible to this, young women and girls, where you're told to be civil.

00:04:28.520 But the issue is not actually one of civility.

00:04:32.500 No, you're exactly right.

00:04:33.840 So I was raised in Canada.

00:04:35.740 I grew up in Canada and I am a strong woman and I'm from a family of strong women.

00:04:41.220 And that often rubbed people the wrong way.

00:04:43.300 Canada prides itself on being this polite society.

00:04:45.520 I mean, I have friends that, you know, wear Canadian pins when they travel abroad because they, Canadians are beloved.

00:04:52.760 We're so nice, you know, but there is such a thing as too much of a good thing, you know, that actually being niceness, being nice is not all it's cracked up to be.

00:05:00.320 Like there were times where I was told, like people didn't, you know, male figures in my life didn't know what to do with me because I spoke my mind.

00:05:07.440 And like I didn't fit their mold, their norm of what and how a woman should, Canadian woman should behave.

00:05:13.260 And actually, so it's possible to, to that, that, to, you know, value, you know, tone.

00:05:19.880 And as you, as you mentioned that these norms can be a tool of, of silencing, of repressing.

00:05:26.340 And that actually, if we want a society of, of openness, of tolerance, of pluralism, it's actually essential that we make these, these norms of propriety matter less in order to have open, honest discussion and, and to have an open, an open society.

00:05:42.760 How universal is this idea in your research of, of civility and how much does this change from a North American context to a European context to say an Asian context?

00:05:54.380 It's a great question.

00:05:55.280 And so what I found in my research, and I did approach this question from a global perspective, a universal perspective.

00:06:02.300 And, and what I, what I discovered is that, that, that, that the norms of politeness, the manners, the etiquette, the technique, the external stuff of manners and etiquette, they tend to be very changeable across history and across culture.

00:06:15.200 And even within a culture between classes, often manners have been used and they are still used as a way to define in group, out group, you know, keep, keep the nouveau riche, the outsider outside.

00:06:28.060 It's a way to distinguish who, you know, we're okay as long as we're doing and doing and saying the right things.

00:06:32.320 And this is actually an all too human tendency that we see across history and across culture.

00:06:37.820 Whereas the timeless principles of civility, restraint of the ego so that the social can flourish, that we can become fully human in friendship and relationship with others.

00:06:46.960 Because that is, those norms are remarkably timeless.

00:06:51.120 And in fact, I opened my book with the Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest story in the world, in my chapter one, and then moved to the oldest book in the world, which is a manners book, a civility handbook from ancient Egypt, given to us 2400 BC.

00:07:06.260 And so I really try to do justice to this subject matter.

00:07:09.940 This is, my book is about the most important question of our day.

00:07:12.200 How do we flourish across difference?

00:07:14.620 Even when we deeply disagree.

00:07:16.220 But as I learned, even though it's the most important question now, it's also the defining question of democracy, of the classical liberal project.

00:07:23.860 Also the defining question of our species.

00:07:26.840 We've been trying to do this thing called life together across difference as long as we've been around.

00:07:30.980 And I bring to bear the wisdom of the human tradition to help us do life better together now.

00:07:36.260 Well, just thinking of Asia for a moment, I think it's Japan where I learned of this.

00:07:40.840 I've never been, but a friend of mine, his wife is from Japan, and he's been there many times.

00:07:44.900 And he had said that there was a culture there where it's considered rude to not have the answer if someone asks.

00:07:51.220 So if you, say, ask for directions in some context and someone doesn't know, they'll give you the wrong directions because they think that's the polite thing.

00:07:59.000 But that's not actually helping you in any way.

00:08:00.940 They're just pointing you down some random street.

00:08:02.800 So you are right about how manners and civility, I mean, and that's an extreme example of your being done a disservice in the interest of being polite and respectful.

00:08:12.940 And I think that's one of the areas where I would say is the core distinction and that manners is how you behave.

00:08:19.360 Civility requires a respect of other people that manners doesn't.

00:08:23.380 I mean, being well-mannered in any context is just something you do.

00:08:26.500 So can you have civility without respect and how do you get to the point where there is respect, which also seems to be in short supply, certainly in politics, but I'd say in society in general?

00:08:38.200 It's a great question about the relationship between civility and politeness.

00:08:41.780 You know, can you have one without the other?

00:08:43.120 And I think at its ideal, the disposition of civility, the inner orientation that honestly respects others, the dignity and irreducible value of others out of that disposition will flow kind actions, you know, polite actions that are that are actually other oriented.

00:09:00.220 But they come, they are an outgrowth of that earnest respect and esteem for the other.

00:09:06.940 But the problem is when as a society, we value just the external, just what we do and say, and we insufficiently seek to cultivate that inner disposition of really respecting others, really respecting the gift of being human.

00:09:22.260 That's a problem.

00:09:23.420 It sets us up for hypocrisy.

00:09:25.540 It sets us up for, you know, disingenuousness.

00:09:28.140 And so as a society in the West, as Canadians, it's essential that we, you know, care less about the norms that make us seem good and instead shift our focus to what actually makes us good and what is actually truly respectful of others.

00:09:43.880 One of the things, if we were to take a more forward looking view on this, that a lot of people will struggle with is the how do we get there?

00:09:53.480 Because civil people engaging in a civil discussion like you and I are, and I hope our audiences can say, oh, yeah, this is great.

00:09:58.700 This is a good thing.

00:09:59.460 But that doesn't deal with the shortage of it.

00:10:01.920 So, I mean, you talked about your experience in politics and government where you have people that are very ruthless, maybe they're ambitious, maybe they're sociopaths, whatever it is.

00:10:10.060 But clearly they don't have or tap into in themselves what it is that they need to be more civil.

00:10:17.620 So how do we as a society deal with this without just pointing the fingers and saying, well, I'm not the problem.

00:10:23.080 He is or she is.

00:10:24.060 No, it is the most human and natural thing in the world to want to blame, you know, our public leaders, the other side.

00:10:31.760 And my book is all about the power that we each have to be a part of the solution, that we can't blame media.

00:10:39.520 We can't blame, you know, who's prime minister, who's president, what's going on around the world that we can all we can control is ourselves.

00:10:45.120 And we vastly underestimate the power we each have to be part of the solution.

00:10:49.640 So I call myself a refugee from federal government.

00:10:53.560 So when I was in Washington, D.C., I fled.

00:10:55.520 I came home from work one day and said to my husband, I am done with government.

00:10:58.580 I'm done with D.C., done with politics.

00:11:00.620 Let's move to Indiana.

00:11:02.320 And my husband's from the Midwest, from Indiana originally.

00:11:04.980 So he was thrilled to hear this.

00:11:06.220 He said, OK, sounds good.

00:11:08.300 Let's do it.

00:11:09.060 No take backs.

00:11:09.980 And that was almost six years ago.

00:11:11.360 We've been we've been in Indiana since then.

00:11:13.300 And one of my first friends here, her name was Joanna Taft.

00:11:16.580 And she came up to me after church one day and said, hi, I'm Joanna.

00:11:19.980 Would you like to porch with us sometime?

00:11:23.400 And I never heard.

00:11:24.080 I didn't know that was a verb, by the way.

00:11:25.860 That's right.

00:11:26.700 I never heard.

00:11:27.440 I didn't either.

00:11:28.380 I'd never heard that before.

00:11:29.440 But we were curious to know many people.

00:11:30.940 We went to her home one afternoon and I realized that she was staging this quiet revolution against our atomized and divided status quo from her front porch.

00:11:40.120 That she had curated people across class, race, ethnicity, politics, just to inhabit a shared space, not to, you know, have a curated conversation across difference, but to build trust and friendship that is so lacking today in our public life.

00:11:53.400 And is, in fact, one reason why we're not able to have conversations across difference well at all if we don't have that basic respect, trust, affection for our fellow citizens, our fellow human beings.

00:12:02.840 And I actually had the privilege of studying and researching and visiting people like Joanna across North America who are doing the exact same thing.

00:12:12.140 They're saying, I can't control what's happening in my nation's capital or around the world, but I can control myself.

00:12:18.900 And I'm going to double down and make my community better, my family stronger.

00:12:22.960 And there's tremendous power in that.

00:12:24.980 I met people who were doing that with and without a porch from their local coffee shop, from their, you know, hosting supper clubs, dinner parties, from using a front stoop or front lawn that is not about, you know, big city, small town.

00:12:36.400 It's just about a way of engaging others in the world with civility, with hospitality, which is a high and noble expression of civility and wanting to transform the outsider to the inside of the stranger into the friend.

00:12:49.120 And this is something that is too important and too sophisticated and complex to be left to our public leaders to be, and it can't be scaled either.

00:12:56.720 It's only something that can be individual, micro, at the one-on-one level.

00:13:00.840 And it's a decision we have to make every moment of every day.

00:13:03.200 Are we going to make the world a better and brighter place for future generations to live in?

00:13:07.700 I mean, that's why I wrote this book for my children.

00:13:09.660 Or are we going to be part of the problem in how we live our lives?

00:13:13.360 And I hope that readers come away encouraged that, again, we have far more power to be part of the solution of restoring the soul of civility in our world today than we realize.

00:13:23.500 Well, and you even got the title in there.

00:13:25.380 We'll put the cover up to augment that in people's minds.

00:13:28.760 It is called The Soul of Civility by Alexandra Hudson.

00:13:32.340 People can catch it on Amazon or elsewhere.

00:13:34.740 And you've actually had quite a bit of critical acclaim for this now that's been out a few months, which is quite good.

00:13:40.180 So congratulations on that, Alexandra.

00:13:42.220 Thank you so much for coming on.

00:13:43.880 Such a pleasure, Andrew.

00:13:45.000 Thank you for having me.

00:13:46.140 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:13:48.500 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

Juno News - January 07, 2024

Is civility dead？

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