Sanity Principles for a Batshit World
The principles behind how we write about the news. Our articles cite these by number.
Jump to a rule:
Very few things in life are absolute. There are many shades of gray. If someone disagrees with you, they are not your enemy. They are people with different backgrounds, experiences, and opinions. While you may disagree with a specific idea or proposal, there may be areas where you are able to find agreement, if you don’t waste the opportunity to find out.
Not everyone who believes something does so for the same reason.
What have you truly learned in life by asking closed-ended questions? Ask questions that engage, challenge, and EDUCATE you.
People know when they’re being nudged or herded. You know when someone is doing it to you, and you don’t like it. Unless you’re trying a court case…and I can assure you that your Twitter argument is not the same thing…DON’T DO IT!!!
When you hear an idea that runs so counter to the common marketplace of ideas that it SHOCKS you, your job is NOT to run to the complete opposite (and equally batshit) end of the spectrum. Your job is to remain sane, reasonable, and HONEST. Continue to engage in good faith to help others see the sane position. Your rush to the opposite end of the spectrum undermines your ideas, and more importantly…your credibility.
Be the adult in the room.
Don’t jump to the hard ones because they’re exciting, edgy, or somehow burnish your bona fides with whichever “side” you most closely identify.
Go for the layups. Learn to work with people of differing opinions. Learn about the people who believe differently than you do. Learn to find common ground. Learn to build trust and faith with others…allow them to do the same with you.
Being seen as a person operating in good faith on the easier things allows you the opportunity to be perceived as an honest broker on the bigger, more difficult things. This affords you the opportunity to be taken seriously, and that is the only way we solve the “big things”.
Never engage in something for the sole purpose of being able to say, “well, I tried, they just refused to be reasonable, or to listen”.
If you’re not SINCERELY trying to learn, understand, or solve a problem…just walk away.
There are many things I believe, but will never say…but I will always believe everything I say.
To do otherwise damages your word as a person, and therefore, your reputation.
Ideas are beliefs you hold, NOT your identity.
A critique of your ideas is NOT an attack on you.
Questioning one’s ideas/beliefs ≠ an attack.
Respect the person. Confront the idea.
Never assign to malice that which is most easily explained by ignorance.
Ignorance: “the state or fact of being ignorant; lack of knowledge, learning, information” - dictionary.com
Every person you interact with is an opportunity to learn about a perspective different from your own.
This doesn’t mean you need to agree with, support, adopt, or accept these perspectives, but at least allow yourself the opportunity to understand a bit of these diverging perspectives.
If nothing else, you’ll learn to be a better communicator.
Allow yourself to be challenged by other thoughts and ideas. Socrates once stated (according to Plato’s Apology), “the unexamined life is not worth living”. I believe there to be a corollary to this, “the unexamined idea is not worth believing”. If you can’t pull your beliefs apart, put them back together, and still believe what you initially did…do you truly believe that thing? Is it truly a bedrock principle for you, if the idea can’t stand the challenge of scrutiny?
No audience. No ego. No bravado. No saving face.
Two people listening, engaging, asking questions, AND listening to the answers.
Challenge respectfully. Disagreeing agreeably. Being adults.
Groups of people are not monolithic. They are not all red or all blue. Judging the whole of a person based on a single opinion is what we called “prejudice” when I was a kid. It used to be a bad thing, and I’m pretty sure it still is…even if that’s unpopular nowadays.
You will NEVER know everything about a person based on a single interaction or opinion. Does anyone know all about who you are from one interaction? Would you want them to form opinions about your entire being based on your opinion about abortion? The First Amendment? The Second? Why do it to someone else?
No person is solely who they are at any given moment in time.
We are the sum of our experiences, our mistakes, and the lessons learned through those mistakes.
Whether we realize it or not, many have done the same for us.
This also applies to ourselves. Learn to give yourself grace, as well.
If it’s wrong if someone else does it, it’s wrong if you do it.
“They did it first” is EXACTLY as childish as it sounds, and is NOT appropriate justification for your actions.
Corollary: Don’t be shocked when someone’s justification for something you deem to be “wrong”, is based on something you previously did that they deemed wrong. Your exercise becomes their precedent.
“Choose your enemies well, for you will come to resemble them” - Sun Tzu
It is a means of dismissing a person whose argument you cannot refute.
Don’t do it.
It is not a tactic that lends itself to discussion, understanding, or problem solving.
If you are engaging in good faith with someone and they lurch to the absurd, end the conversation. Their goals are not aligned with yours.
Don’t turn people into caricatures, just to make them easier to dismiss.
Don’t search for offense where none is intended.
If all you do is look for something to be offended by…you’ll find it.
When you hear hoof beats, think horse, not zebra.
The lack of actual and immediate consequences has damaged our discourse, don’t be a party to the continued erosion.
Should I consider that people different than me have had different experiences than I have? Yes.
Should I assume what those experiences are? No
Should I treat them any differently based on any assumptions I may make? Again…NO
Anyone who suggests otherwise is simply trying to shut down debate or discussion about an idea they can’t refute with logic. Or, they’re attempting to justify their violent actions that are completely unjustified.
If your “principles” change when they conflict with your interests, they were never really principles…they were your interests masquerading as something more “noble” than what they really were…greed and selfishness.
Your principles are yours, and no one else’s. It is not your place to hold anyone accountable to your principles, just as it is not anyone else’s place to hold you accountable to theirs.
Beware of those who say some version of, “we don’t have the luxury of principles, right now”.
Supporting someone’s right to live/love/be as they choose does NOT mean you have to agree with EVERY choice they make.
Disagreeing with a choice does not mean you don’t support the right to that choice.
Requiring “allies” and “supporters” to be in lockstep with you 100% of the time, is the hallmark of one who seeks to dominate others…or a cult leader.
If I’m not allowed to speak about gender, because of my gender, we are not equals.
If I’m not allowed to speak about race, because of my race, we are not equals.
If I’m not allowed to speak about sexuality, because of my sexuality, we are not equals.
If I’m not allowed to speak about religion, because of my religion (or lack thereof), we are not equals.
We’re either equal, with everyone being free to share and discuss their opinions, or we’re not.
Each person’s experience is valid and important, but claiming it as truth diminishes the value of the word “truth”, and lessens the concept of truth.
Experience ≠ truth.
Experience does not supercede truth.
Being taught puts responsibility on the “teacher”.
Learning puts the responsibility on YOU.
Control your own destiny.
Seldom do the messages we NEED to hear have the messengers we WANT to hear. Ignore the message because of the messenger at your own peril.
“It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt” - Lincoln or Twain depending on who you believe.
- Ruth Bader Ginsburg