How to disagree without biting someone’s head off
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Sharing an opinion on social media sometimes feels like walking into a trap. The online space is vast, and it's full of trolls who are ready to tear you and your ideas apart. It's not controversial to say that social media sites feel more polarized than ever, and people, well, they feel very attacked. You can, of course, just unplug or hit block and end these online conversations. It's harder to do that offline and in real life, especially if the people you disagree with are friends and family.

These disagreements can also feel toxic and threatening, and the stakes often feel way higher. With the new year approaching, we're all looking for a fresh start. So on today's episode, we'll be finding out how we can disagree without being disagreeable in order to have more meaningful conversations. I'm William Lee Adams, and this is What in the World from the BBC World Service. ♪

Let's have a chat with Bo So. He's an author and a two-time world champion debater and the former coach of the Australian national debating team. Bo, hi. Hi, William. Thanks so much for having me. So, Bo, you moved from South Korea to Australia when you were a kid, and you didn't speak any English at the time. And in the past, you've spoken about how joining a debate club helped give you confidence to speak and be heard. Now, that's literally a rule in debate. When you're speaking, others should listen.

So I'm curious, what's the foundation for a good debate and therefore a good conversation even when you're disagreeing? So for me, the opposite of bad disagreement, which is the problem that we're having, that the opposite of bad disagreement is not agreement, but it's good disagreement. And to your question, I'm not sure we have a very good idea of what that looks like.

So the baseline for me is that a good disagreement is one in which both sides walk away feeling like they would do that again. So it's not necessarily that it's going to change your life in one go. It's not going to immediately enrich the relationship, but it's a basis on which to continue the conversation. And when I think about the ingredients of that, one way I organize it

is that people should, before entering into a conversation, ask whether the conditions are there for a good disagreement. And one framework that I find helpful is to ask four questions. One is whether the disagreement between you and the other side is real. It's not an imagined slight or a misunderstanding. Second, that it's important enough to justify having the disagreement. And I think one of the great frustrations we often encounter is,

when it doesn't even really matter to us that much. But all of a sudden we're caught in this verbal spa and egos get involved and we have to get involved. So asking beforehand whether it's important to justify having the disagreement, whether the scope of the disagreement is specific enough so that you're going to be able to make progress on it within the time that you have,

That's the third question. And lastly, whether the two sides are aligned in their reasons for wanting to be in the disagreement. And it's not that you have to have the same reasons per se, but you have to be okay with the other person's motivation. So they're not in it just to hurt your feelings or something like that. And so that's one reason.

tool that I find useful. I call it the RISA checklist. It's a real, important, specific, aligned for thinking about whether, in your language, whether some of the ingredients are there for a productive conversation. When you see people shouting at each other online, I mean, we're seeing a lot of that right now, what do you feel? What do you want to say to them?

Not terribly much. Because I don't have a social media account so much. Look, what I see is a broadcasting approach to communication. And I think it's one way in which mass media and social media has changed how we raise our voice.

not only in the public sphere, but in the most intimate quarters of our lives as well, which is we have a fixed identity from which we speak certain truths, often out to an audience

bigger than just the person we are speaking to. So even in a conversation with our uncle, we can't help but imagine we are broadcasting our views, often having this conversation in public view so that we can make an example of the other person for the benefit of people watching on, often people who agree with us. And so for me personally,

A lot of good disagreement, a lot of these skills of debating, I think they can help us recover a certain privacy in our conversation that allows us to connect with one another, to afford each other grace in perhaps the setting where that's most difficult, which is the one in which we're disagreeing, the one in which our differences from one another feel most

alive and tangible and threatening. If you had to give someone a very short tip, the simplest tip possible on how to handle a difficult conversation, what would that be? I think it would be to start every disagreement with some amount of agreement. That's agreement about how it is that you're going to have the conversation, but it's also agreement about what the disagreement is about.

And often when we have an argument about the dirty dishes, it's only when we're pretty deep in, we realize this is actually about something else. So starting every disagreement with some agreement, that would be my short tip. Beau, thank you so much. Great to chat. Great. Thanks so much. Cheers. Thanks a lot, Beau. Okay, bye-bye. Take care.

Okay, so we've heard about what makes a good conversation and how to disagree well, especially with your own family. But what about people who feel a million miles away, either culturally, politically, or even economically? Where do you even start?

To help us answer that is Jason Lee. He's the founder of the YouTube channel Jubilee. Part of what they do is bring people together with opposing views. Jason, hi. Hello, William. Thanks for having me. Thanks for joining us. So I've been scrolling through your YouTube channel, getting tens of millions of views over there. Why did you start Jubilee Media in the first place? You know, to be honest, it was completely...

accidental. My 22nd birthday happened to coincide with a Haiti earthquake, but I had this overwhelming feeling that I had to go do something about it. And it was around then that I started something called Jubilee Project to raise money and awareness for various causes like clean water, Haiti. But it wasn't actually until 2016, the aftermath of the presidential election between Trump and Clinton, that I felt the

the world was more divided than ever. And I felt like there was, I was pretty frustrated by that. And I felt like there was this huge white space for content that might bring people together and not in the Mr. Rogers, everyone, let's be nice to each other, but

but in a way that demonstrates to us, hey, we might have way more in common than we might think. And particularly for young people, that we can actually have conversation that involves nuance, listening, empathy. And yeah, we might not always agree, but might we find a way to at least hear each other out? And that's when I decided to start Jubilee Media. That was about seven years ago now. And since then, now we've grown into one of the biggest teams

kind of YouTube companies, media companies for Gen Z that's all about provoking understanding and creating human connection. And I've been scrolling through your YouTube channel and I've come across videos like, can rival gangs coexist peacefully? And can Israelis and Palestinians see eye to eye? So it seems like you're bringing together groups

groups that don't always communicate in peaceful, open forums. Could you tell us a bit about the format? Yeah, one of our most popular shows is called Middle Ground. And what we do in Middle Ground is, on the onset, it looks like we are pitting or kind of having a debate between two opposing sides, whether it's, you know, rival gangs or Republicans and Democrats or even police and former felons.

Um, but actually when you watch the content, rather than saying, Hey, now go off, good luck. We actually have a series of prompts that we'll see if people will actually agree. So for instance, for Republicans and Democrats, a prompt might be, I think America is the best country in the world. Right. And I don't think that that prompt in particular is particularly a partisan one, right? It's not just because I have a red shirt on and you have a blue shirt on does not mean that we should disagree on these things.

Frankly, what we find is that people are often agreeing on so much. It's just they somewhat disagree a little bit about the approach. Or actually, what you'll even see is that, you know, one side that's all wearing blue shirts and one side that's all wearing red shirts, that even them on a series of topics and issues don't fully agree. And that's pretty common, right? Like, that's pretty obvious. But I think that that

kind of bucks against what we see in traditional media, which is on these 1000 issues, we are not able to agree, have nuance, have conversation. And that's something that I think we're starting to demonstrate with Jubilee and with this next generation is that there is room for nuance and that we want to have conversation and we want to be able to understand people who have vastly different experiences or points of view than ourselves. And what's the response been like from the public?

it's been incredible you know when i first sought out to start jubilee so many friends you know former colleagues even investors said this is a fool's errand why would young people

Watch this content let alone. Why would you be successful in doing it? And I think what we have seen is that there's just a hunger right now for more empathy and I don't think that you would necessarily see that when you are looking just in our echo chambers or you look at just that traditional media, but I think with our content it's demonstrating that there's a whole other desire for real human perspectives and

and real human conversations. So we've been really, you know, I'd like to say I knew that this was for sure going to be the case, but I don't think that's true. It's just gotten way bigger and we've gotten far more traction than we ever expected. So it's been really very exciting. I'm curious, what has Jubilee taught you about people and how willing they are to change their minds? I think I'm constantly surprised by

pleasantly surprised by people. You know, we have videos like rival gangs gathering and frankly, there's a lot of ideas or stereotypes or myths that even I'll believe that say, hey, is this okay? Is this too dangerous? Is, you know, X, Y, and Z going to happen? And when we're on set, and of course we take all the proper precautions, but when we're on set, we see overwhelmingly that people are

Are able to show kindness and generosity to each other so much so that you'll see videos between you know the most kind of what feels at times like a difficult conversation between two very opposed people and Afterwards is very common that they're saying hey Jason. I'm gonna go grab a beer after this. Do you want to come? and I think that that just gives me a lot more faith in humanity and

And, yes, sometimes on our platform you'll see difficult conversations or you'll even see people vehemently disagree. But I think that that's okay. I think that that's part of the process of us moving forward. I think a much bigger problem is when we're actually not talking with each other. Jason, thanks so much for coming on What in the World. Amazing.

Part of Jubilee's success flows from its attention-getting video titles, like "Is Being Fat a Choice?" and "Men's Rights Activists vs. Feminists." Critics say these titles are meant to spark outrage and maybe even divide people to encourage them to click on a video and boost engagement.

But as we've heard in this episode, recognizing what divides us and then being brave enough to talk about it, that's where good conversations often start. And that's one idea I'm going to carry into the new year. That's it for today. Thank you for listening to another episode of What in the World from the BBC World Service. I'm William Lee Adams. We'll see you again soon. Bye. Yoga is more than just exercise. It's the spiritual practice that millions swear by.

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