“Fixing” Civility Won’t Start with Politicians — It’s on Us
Note: I moderated a conversation, sponsored by Braver Angels of Central Carolina, with Alexandra Hudson on her book, The Soul of Civility, on Wednesday, November 8, 2023 in Raleigh NC. Links to that conversation are here and here.
I was really excited to get my hands on a copy of Alexandra Hudson’s new book, The Soul of Civility. Finally, I thought, someone is going to lay out, in an organized way, the many ways our politicians are failing us. I had an outside hope that she would also give us a series of steps government could take to mandate good behavior on their part.
By the end of the book I had almost completely forgotten about those scoundrels in politics. Instead, I found myself looking at the man in the mirror – me.
I may point one finger at politicians for our declining civility, but three fingers point back at me.
There are a lot of different kinds of definitions of civility in Hudson’s book, but I like one of those that comes in the first few pages. Civility, she says, is “the disposition that comes from seeing all people as they really are: beings with innate dignity.” If we have that orientation, civility becomes “a set of sacrifices we make for the sake of our common journey with others.” Becoming more “civil” means moving away from our natural instinct to love and value our selves above everyone and everything and to “unself.” If we can truly unself, we have a shot at seeing others as worthy of our attention and honor and doing the true work of civility.
Before I get to what Hudson says that true work is, it’s worth looking at a few of the key points she makes along her 368-page way (link to buy it here):
1. Civility is not at an all-time low. Hudson’s book starts with a comprehensive review of 4500 years of other books on civility, starting in 2400 BC with the first “book” ever written, The Teachings of Ptahhotep, 37 pieces of advice on civility from an Egyptian statesman trying to get the future Pharaoh’s son ready to govern. Ever since, whenever societies – whether in China, India, Greece, Israel or countries across Europe -- seem to be degenerating, someone steps up with another manual on civility. We’ve always been uncivil because we have always been selfish.
Ptahhotep drinking, or maybe dictating his book of maxims.
2. Incivility happens when we convince ourselves that other people are not people. Hudson quotes Martin Buber and Martin Luther King Jr., who noted our tendency is to view the world as “I-it” instead of “I-Thou.” We try to make those we disagree with something less than us (an “it”) rather than human beings worthy of respect (a “Thou”). Technology exacerbates incivility by depersonalizing our interactions. Being able to criticize someone anonymously permits us to say horrible things to each other. The path back to civility comes when we honor those we disagree with enough to look them in the eye, listen to them, and to try to understand them.
3. Civility is very different from politeness – Politeness is an outward show we put on, often to appear to be something we are not and say things we don’t believe. The state I come from, North Carolina, has as its motto “Esse Quam Videri” – to be (esse) rather than to seem (videri). When our highest value is politeness, we prioritize seeming to be; our highest value is avoiding offending, even at the expense of honesty. Those who are civil value being authentic - what you see is who they are.
What would it take for us to be willing to do the work of “esse” instead of just “videri”?
4. Being civil does not mean being a wimp; does not mean compromising our principles. On the contrary, Hudson argues that we have an active obligation to resist injustice and unjust laws, and a rich history of civil disobedience to draw on to show us how to do that, from the Bible’s Shadrach, Meshach and Abedneggo to the Boston Tea Party to Henry David Thoreau to Mohatma Gandhi to Rosa Parks to Martin Luther King. In our personal relationships, we have an obligation to tell people hard truths.
5. Government is not the solution to our lack of civility, or at least not much of the solution. Hudson looks at some recent efforts – in New York City, in Great Britain and in Paris – and finds that government can provide some nudges toward greater kindness and generosity to others. But only so much of civility can come mandated vertically – from the top down. Most of it has to come horizontally – in our day-to-day relationships with peers. “We can’t change society,” she notes. “But we can change ourselves and how we operate in the world.”
Hudson’s fundamental “solution” is surprisingly small-scale, and realistic. And it hit me between the eyes. If we are going to make progress going forward, she says, it is going to be because we, one at a time, make our own personal commitment to civility. How do we do that?
We need to dethrone politics from our altars: Our democracy assumes that people of goodwill can negotiate differences through civil debate. Instead our political leaders have assumed that there is no value in listening to each other and that the other side is not just wrong, but less than human. And we have followed them. Hudson notes that as more and more people have strayed from traditional priorities such as church, family and community, they have filled the void by using “politics to derive their meaning in life.”
To find our way back, she argues, we need to ”desaturate our lives of politics and then fill in lifegiving, soul-enriching pursuits that will make civility, not our politics, both better and possible.” She recommends we consider prioritizing curiosity (about other people and life), friendship (it forces us to get outside of ourselves) and a new appreciation of beauty (helps us become more humble and grateful). Those are all a lot more ennobling than politics!
We need to cut other people in our lives breaks: When someone does something that incites small outrage from us (cutting us off in traffic, making a cutting remark, not saying thank you), we should tell ourselves a “story of exoneration,” imagining what must be going on in their lives that caused the behavior.
When someone does us a major wrong, we need to “unbundle” that behavior from that person. Instead of reducing them to “one aspect of who they are,” or defining them by their “worst trait or mistake,” we should show them the grace to permit them to be human and flawed. And then we should try to find a way to move forward with them.
“If you don’t understand how someone could possibly believe something as stupid as they do,” she quotes Donald Davidson as saying, “This is more likely a failure of understanding on your part than a failure of reason on theirs.”
We need to start practicing radical hospitality: It’s not a bad start if we commit to doing justice, seeking to “do no harm” in our relationships with others. And for years I’ve been trying to do that. But Hudson sets a much higher bar, encouraging us to practice “beneficence,” a commitment to go above and beyond in our interactions with others, to practice “generative generosity.” That means being generous to others even when you know there may never be a chance of their being able to reciprocate.
True civility goes above and beyond. It is proactively generous without expectation of reciprocity.
Hudson cuts me a break and gives me a chance to start small. Maybe I can start, she says, by just getting better at looking people in the eyes, truly listening to what they say and trying to understand why they see the world the way they do instead of listening just long enough to disagree with them.
But over time there is an opportunity for me to go from being a “do no harm” person to being an active force for civility in the world.
When we begin to do civility right, “there is no such thing as an ordinary, casual encounter.” Instead, “every exchange is an opportunity to bless others.”
What a challenge! But what an opportunity! We may not be able to change society, but each of us has the opportunity to change those we run into every day, just a little. And collectively, we can nudge this world to being a little more civil place to be. Who’s ready to get started?
-Leslie