The contempt strategy can change

On Sept. 17, I went on Fox News to talk about a “dignity strategy” that I designed with my Dignity Index co-creator, Tom Rosshirt. We think it could make a difference for any candidate willing to take it up. What do you think? It is a late-game strategy that could help either candidate win the White House, but it’s something neither has tried before because it’s the absolute opposite of the typical political playbook. The standard playbook is the “contempt strategy,” and it’s based on the principle that “if you don’t agree with me, there’s something wrong with you.”

The contempt strategy demands that you look down on the other side, make fun of them, call them names, question their motives, attack their character and mock their values. The point is, you demonize your opponents to energize your supporters. The campaigns use it because they say it works — but how can you say it works when both sides are using it, and neither side is trying the opposite?

The dignity strategy: The dignity strategy turns the old playbook on its head. This is not just a softer version of the contempt strategy — turning off the contempt, toning it down or targeting it more narrowly. It’s not even doing more positive ads. The dignity strategy is purposefully treating the other side with dignity — making your case with facts and numbers, not insults or sneers. It’s showing respect for the other side — not respect for every view they have, but respect for their right to have their views, and respect for the struggle they face to find a better life for themselves and their families. It means not just talking about the other side with understanding, but talking to the other side — addressing opponents directly in speeches, telling them you’re paying attention to them, that their views matter, that they are Americans and they deserve to be heard, not mocked, and that you will always treat them with respect.

“I know you disagree with me,” a candidate might say. “But let me at least tell you why I think the way I do.” It’s easy to make an ethical case for this kind of treatment. But there is also a political and practical case as well. First, Donna Hicks, the international conflict resolution specialist and author of the book “Dignity,” says that along with our survival instincts, the desire to be treated with dignity is the single most powerful force motivating our behaviour.

She adds that “a desire for revenge is the instant response to a dignity violation.” In other words, when you treat people with contempt, you make enemies for your cause. The second practical argument for dignity is that when you treat others with contempt, you’re turning off people whom you’re not even targeting — people whose votes you need! In 2018, the research group More in Common published a report called “Hidden Tribes,” which addressed polarisation in the United States. The report found that two-thirds of the country belongs to what it called the “exhausted majority” — people who are disillusioned and frustrated with the state of our politics.

Compared to the left and right wings of the two major parties, members of the exhausted majority are more flexible and more open to compromise. They are worn out by our politics and feel left out of the political debate. It stands to reason that — in a close election — a significant number of people in the exhausted majority are not sure who they’re voting for, or if they’re going to vote at all. Which candidate is going to win the voters who are sick of division?

It may depend on what the candidates say to the people not on their side. The voters who are looking for more dignity range beyond swing voters. Early this year, we worked with More in Common to assemble a panel of 80 Americans who make up a representative sample of the country. We call them the National Citizens Panel and, since March, we’ve been asking them to use our tool, the Dignity Index, to score on an eight-point scale the way candidates talk to and about their opponents. Do they use dignity, or do they use contempt?

In surveys of the panel that we’ve done since then, we’ve made a number of findings. First, panelists were quickly able to call out the contempt in political speech and note its divisive effect, even when it came from their own side. Second, panelists became better able to see their own contempt and the damage it does to their relationships. Third, we’ve found that panelists from opposing political viewpoints can agree on the presence of dignity or contempt in a speech, regardless of who is speaking or what they’re saying.

Overall, the panel is teaching us that we can have a cross-partisan conversation about our divisions with a common vocabulary based on the shared value of dignity for every person. And, with a little practice, we can see that contempt is not what it pretends to be — a passionate call for a noble ideal — but is actually a political tactic to pit us against each other so others can gain wealth and power.

Six years ago, I joined others in founding an organization called UNITE to help ease divisions in the country. “Unite?” some people asked me disdainfully. Unite around what?” Unite around the idea that we should treat each other with dignity, not contempt. It’s a more powerful idea than it seems — because, actually, it’s not our disagreements that cause our division. It’s treating each other with contempt when we disagree.

When contempt tears us apart, dignity can bring us together:  When people see contempt for what it is, it backfires. And the best way to make contempt backfire is to expose it, and the best way to expose contempt, is to offer people a chance to compare it to dignity. This election may come down to who deploys a sound dignity strategy. There are many analyses on who will win, but everyone agrees that swing voters matter. And no one thinks swing voters are energized by contempt. They’re in the middle. They’re in the exhausted majority. They’re looking for something new.

Meanwhile, with just one month left in a deadlocked US presidential election, Donald Trump urged supporters on Sunday in battleground Wisconsin to get out the vote, as Kamala Harris kicked off a week-long media interview blitz with a focus on reproductive rights. Polls have the Republican and Democrat candidates neck and neck, fueling a high-cost, high-intensity scramble for each and every wavering voter in the seven key states that are likely to decide the outcome on November 5. Trump lost Wisconsin in 2020 and this was his fourth visit in eight days. Harris was there earlier this week, holding a rally in Ripon, birthplace of the Republican Party, where she appealed to moderate and disgruntled conservatives. “I’m only asking you to do one thing,” Trump told the crowd in the town of Juneau. “Just go out and vote.” Trump also repeated false allegations that the Biden-Harris administration had redirected relief funds for areas devastated by Hurricane Helene and spent it on migrant programs. Harris, he said, is “someone who steals your wealth and abandons your family when the flood waters rise.”

Agencies