#a bit wordy rn but it's late at night so forgive me

[kingofthewilderwest]

Sometimes speaking to people with opposing viewpoints shouldn't be to change them. That's the mindset of posts I come across online, but I believe that default can breed dangerous narrow-mindedness. Sometimes speaking to people with opposing viewpoints should be to collect data. Sometimes it should be so you're made aware where you have incomplete information. Sometimes the result should be you practice humility, learn how to change your mind, increase your ability to handle and produce nuance, and grow.

Sometimes it should be learning to coexist and grow with people who have different philosophies, and learning they are neither the cardboard cutout villain media makes them out to be, or the more complex villain internet discourse says they are.

You aren't a missionary to those who think differently than you. If you go into every conversation believing you're right, you're never going to grow yourself. Realize the valuable complexity people truly are. Learn to listen and understand.

Anyone who says, "Yeah, except X group of people" isn't going in the direction I want to reflect upon in this microcosm of a thought, and isn't engaging with the meaning and intentions I want to focus on right now. Of course there are "excepts." We wouldn't be wise if we had no "excepts." But when we categorize everyone into "excepts," we run into that dangerous breed of narrow-mindedness.

There is much we can learn about people with challenging perspectives. It's valuable. I encourage you to enter conversations with an open-heart instead of a desire to convert. They are people with knowledge and character, just as you. And you don't know everything - not about them, and not about the world.