This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - How To Talk Politics Without Being An A$$hole with Lindsey Cormack | 242

Episode Date: October 14, 2024

We’re doing something a little different on this episode, and throughout this month, as we approach a major and divisive election in the United States. We’re going to talk about politics from a neutral and curious place. No ranting. No calling you an idiot if you don’t share my beliefs. No name-calling, period.  I’ve invited Lindsey Cormack back to the show, because she’s one of the few people I know who can genuinely deliver on this type of political discussion. We recently released an episode together called How to Raise a Citizen, and I was so impressed with her approach that I asked her to come back. I don’t know Lindsey’s political beliefs and she doesn’t know mine. We’re going to have a conversation about politics that is likely very different from what you’re used to. I hope it’s refreshing and that it gets you thinking. Because it’s critically important that we practice the hard skills of listening, learning, curiosity, and empathy right now more than ever.  It takes no skill to foam at the mouth and call someone names. True leadership, and true citizenship, is about understanding, listening, and engaging in meaningful dialogue. Let’s be an example of that. Let’s model the behavior we want to see— let’s behave better. Connect with Lindsey: Website:  https://www.lindseycormack.com/  Book: https://howtoraiseacitizen.com/  IG: https://www.instagram.com/howtoraiseacitizen Like what you heard? Please rate and review

I am Nicole Kalil, and on this episode of This Is Woman's Work, we're going to talk politics, which, friend, was an opening line I never thought I'd say, for a few reasons, starting with the fact that, like many citizens, I'm embarrassed about how little I actually know. Politics is an incredibly divisive topic, and since we're still trying to grow this podcast, talking about something that's likely to piss a bunch of people off seems like a pretty risky move. And because the way I see most people talk about politics hurts my eyes and my heart, and mostly, I guess the reason to end all reasons is because I have no interest in telling you what to think or what to believe, which is challenging given that I do have very strong beliefs and a tendency to communicate them fairly

directly. But I also know that confidence is when you trust yourself firmly and boldly, and deciding what's true and real and right for you is an imperative part of building an authentic and purposeful life, and it's ultimately how I define woman's work. So we're going to do something a little different on this episode and throughout this month as we approach a major and, yes, divisive election in the United States. We are going to talk about politics from a neutral and curious place. No ranting, no calling you an idiot if you don't share my beliefs,

no name calling period, and absolutely no foaming at the mouth because friend, and I really shouldn't have to say this, that is a never attractive quality. I've invited today's guest to join us because she's one of the few people I know who can genuinely deliver on this type of political discussion. We recently released an episode together called How to Raise a Citizen, and I was so impressed with her approach that I asked her to come back. Because after we finished recording that episode, I told her about how much

I appreciated her neutral approach to our conversation. And she responded by telling me that one of her favorite, I don't know, survey responses that she ever got was from a student sharing that after all the classes they'd had with her, they still didn't know if she was a Democrat or a Republican or who she would vote for. Think about that for a second. To teach politics without revealing personal beliefs, to create a space for learning instead of convincing, to allow others to make up their own minds. So that's what we're going to do here. I don't know Lindsay's political beliefs, and she doesn't know mine. We're going to have a conversation about politics that is likely very different from what you're used to. I hope it's refreshing and that it gets you thinking. Before I get to my 1 million questions, let me quickly introduce her. Lindsay Cormack is an associate professor of political

science and director of the Diplomacy Lab at Stevens Institute of Technology. She earned her PhD in government, serves as the Secretary for Community Board 8 in Manhattan, and created and maintains the digital database of all official Congress to Constituent e-newsletters in the DC Inbox Project. She recently released the book, How to Raise a Citizen, a must-read for all parents, and also authored Congress and U.S. Veterans, an eye-opening book about the history of veterans programs. So, Lindsay, thank you for saying yes when I asked you to come on the show again. And I'm basically going to rapid-fire questions at you because I have so many swirling through my brain since we last connected. Sound

good? That sounds great. Let's do it. All right. So my first question is piggybacking a little bit off of where we left off in our last conversation. And it's this acknowledgement that there is political polarization in the U.S. today. And my question is, what do you see as the primary drivers of political polarization? And is there any effective strategies or anything that we could be doing to help bridge these divides? So it's a great question. A lot of political scientists will say that political elites have been polarizing at least since the late 1960s. And so when we have a media environment that focuses on political elites increasingly, like we do, it's not surprising that we sort of get these trickle down effects.

And what I mean by that is in the 60s, 70s, 80s into the 90s, we have sort of like three media channels that convey all of our politics to us. But we also have a much more robust set of like local newspapers and state papers. And now a lot of stuff is really streamlined to focus just on federal politics. And so when we see stuff is really streamlined to focus just on federal politics. And so when we see, you know, Democrats are fighting Republicans in the Congress, that sort of bleeds into the way that we approach our politics. And for most of the things, it's not really partisan for like school board stuff or for like stuff that's happening in your municipal government. It's like, do we need new pipes? Do we need new paved roads? There's not

a Democratic or Republican response on that, but it just sort of bleeds into everything. There are things we can do. And something that I really think is helpful is if people kind of understand the systems better, because then they're much less likely to be inflamed by something. They'll be like, I don't think it works like that. And so I think if we all like do a little more homework, do a little more research, understand it a little bit more, the temperature can come down. Okay. So great answer. And it triggered two follow-up questions. The first is this belief that I have that we fundamentally mostly want the same things or similar things, but we just disagree or see different ways of getting there. So like you said, my guess is people aren't arguing

whether or not they need more pipes from a political perspective. It's something, you know, we all want the same thing. We all want clean water to drink and healthy environments and working facilities, whatever it might be. So A, do you agree? And if that's true, how do we hone in on policies or conversations that brings us all to the table based on our agreements versus our disagreements? ask people, you know, like different policy questions, there's far more overlap than there are distinctions. And so people have pretty similar goals. You know, there's always variation, but people, people mostly agree on some of the basics. And I think that the way that we kind of

get to a politics that looks more at those basics versus at extremes is if we make sure the voices in the middle are heard, because right now, a lot of times, because people get turned off from politics, you only hear the extremes. You hear like who's willing to yell the loudest or in online spaces, sometimes it's like who's willing to share the most negative thing or the meanest thing. And so we have to kind of like stay in there and make sure that moderation is heard and understood. And that's hard because a lot of our online spaces, they do not prioritize that. They don't incentivize it. But I think when we're doing interpersonal conversation, it's making sure that even people who don't feel

comfortable by it are able to like say their opinions, let it be out there. Because if they're not, then we're only going to have extremist policies. Agreed. And like, I couldn't agree more about the idea that whoever is like yelling or ranting the loudest or has the most extreme conspiracy theory, those are the ones who tend to get the attention. It's really interesting and prepping for this, I thought the fact that we're having a more moderate, neutral conversation is what is so different in today's day and age. And I'm hoping that something about that will be appealing. So is there any value in starting the conversation with people on what are some of the things we agree on? So I'll give an example that is a very political topic that has an extreme divide, but I believe

we all have the same starting point of we want our children to be safe in schools, right? I just, I don't know that I, I mean, there are a couple, I'm sure, extreme, crazy people who would disagree with that statement, but I think we all agree on that. So then how do we start, what are some of the questions we can ask or things that we can bring up that start us in that place of what we agree on. Yeah. I think you're right that nearly every parent I've ever talked to would agree with the statement that children should be safe in schools. If we send our kids somewhere for seven to nine hours, we would appreciate that they come back whole, happy, and safe. And I think when we

talk about how can we ensure that that happens, instead of just asking people like, well, what do you think should be the thing that happens? I think in that specific question, trying to figure out where the harms are and then going after them. So I think if you ask teachers, they might say, well, you know, social media is really a harm because it's influencing the way they see themselves, the way that they're interacting with each other. And so it's like, okay, if that's the number one harm in this school, then maybe we talk about not having phones in schools. You might have other schools where they say, you know, there's physical violence in our school. Sometimes the kids are like hitting each other in the lockers or the buses can get kind of dangerous. And it's like, okay, we have to find the harms instead of just thinking like, here's what the solution should be. It's make sure that we know what the harms are in the first place. Sometimes people probably think it's gun violence, but it's something where we really have to look at what the community is dealing with and start there because kids are better if they feel safe. They learn better. They treat each other more nicely. Everything's better if they're safe. And so I think we probably do agree. We just have to figure

out what those harms are so that we can eliminate them. Okay. So great example. Let's take that one step further. Now we agree on what the harms are. We've identified what some of the harms are. We've got people who have very different solves for the harms, right? How do we, again, hone in on policies that could be both effective and feasible. I mean, you know, my goal is not to get political, but the idea of eliminating every gun seems not feasible. And the idea of putting metal detectors in every school and armed guards in every school also doesn't seem feasible. So I'm trying to figure out, out, how do we get to this place where we're talking in realities and focusing on effective solutions for these harms? Yeah. So the gun question is really hard because you're right that we're not going to a place where

we're not going to have guns in the United States. That's just not a realistic expectation. And the idea that our kids feel like going to school is going to prison probably doesn't feel good either if they have to get checked before they go in. But the communities that face gun violence do owe it to themselves to talk about the routes of how these guns get into schools. And so I think something that we're seeing at the national level is parents being held to account if their children have firearms, because there's no state that say like 14 year olds should be able to bring guns to schools. And so I think part of that is sort of like a courts driven solution that is sort of recognizing it's hard to get this done politically. It's hard to say we're going to change, you know, the policies on who can register, who can own

these things in the first place. But if we can have liability checks in place, that's like, that's a way that you can kind of get at this. I think maybe an easier way to think about that question is through something like social media policy or phone policy, because a lot of schools are going to grapple with this this year, like the Surgeon General's warning about it. There's Jonathan Haidt's book about the anxiety generation that people are talking about. And I'm seeing it in my own school community where some parents are like, well, I want to be able to contact my kid. And others are like, well, I want to make sure that they're not on TikTok all the time. And I think that's going to just involve a lot of hard

conversations. It's going to involve people who care about these issues coming together and say, what are the benefits? What are the harms? How can we mitigate these things? Are there ways that we can do this that like both honor your desire to be connected with your kids, but recognize what they're really supposed to be doing here is learning. And there's not a solution that we can get to without talking about it. So it's going to be having to is learning. And there's not a solution that we can get to without talking about it. So it's going to be having to have those hard conversations. Yes. And acknowledging that it is hard and it's going to require us to show up at our best and be open and curious and like all the soft skills. And I put soft in air quotes because they're the hardest ones, right? Like and maturity and care.

And I think it is imperative that we go into these very difficult conversations, acknowledging that they're difficult. And then like really connecting with ourselves. Who do we want to be and how do we want to show up and what actually is going to help solve the problem? Righteousness typically doesn't. Any reactions on that? Yeah, I think that's right. And I think that's something school boards and PTAs are going to have to face. And really it's important that you set the table well. It's important that you say like, you know, here's the sort of outcome that we want is our kids are doing better in school. They're nicer to each other. Their mental health is better,

whatever those sort of outcomes are. And then make sure that you give people the platform to have the conversation in a way that feels productive versus yelling or something that just devolves. And that takes practice. That's hard. That takes having like, you know, maybe you only get a minute each. Maybe you have sort of rules at the outset instead of just whoever raises their hand and then talks louder and longer than anyone else. That's stuff that we're going to have to deal with though. These are the way that politics happens at the smallest levels and we have to get a little bit better at it. I wonder if it might just be a great way to practice for us to get involved in some of these smaller, local, not so world-changing topics and develop that skill. I know, again, we talked on the last

episode about how local politics tends to impact our lives, our day-to-day lives the most. And as you said, with schools, different areas have different harms and different top concerns. We get a lot of focus on the national politics, but a lot of our opportunities to impact, but also to practice what you're talking about, it could happen on the local level. Yes? Absolutely. And I think, you know, something else that we need to think about in our schools is this idea that like kids are doing too much homework. That's kind of an easy like one where you're like, okay, you know, we all have teachers who want to make sure the kids do well in those classes, but we have to balance this in a greater way. And, and, you know, it's hard

for any one teacher to see what everyone else is assigning and think about this holistically. But those are sort of these like lower stress items that have big consequences that can be decided at a very small level. And yeah, I think you're right. We can practice on these little ones and it will probably make us better when we have these bigger conversations. a two-party system contributes to the divide? And maybe I should reframe that. Not do you believe, because I'm not asking your personal beliefs. What do the studies and research say? Would we have less division if we had more options in the U.S.? How does that contribute or does it to this sort of feeling of us versus them in this divide? Yeah. So having two parties undoubtedly fuels an us versus them because it's like, you know,

it's looking at like a football game. It's like, who's going to win? There's two teams. It's sort of built for that. The thing that I don't lose a lot of sleep over in U.S. politics is this idea that we're going to be able to build a multi-party system here because the way that we conduct our elections kind of dictates that you get a two-party outcome. And this is due to social science research that looks at political systems in a bunch of different countries. And sort of the root of how we get this is in the United States for nearly all political offices, other than the president, there's like a voting system where you cast a vote and one person can win that for a geographical area and that's it. And when you kind of have that as the setup for how your electoral system works

throughout the world, you get to two parties because a third is always taking away from another party. And so you just sort of coalesce around two. Now, would it be better if we had more parties? That's something you can kind of look at primary elections and see that like there are systems that do have more quote unquote viable parties or active parties at primary levels. And the social science research on that isn't clear that it means that people like politics more or that they feel like they're, you know, not on the outside or the inside based on who wins. And so part of the thing is it's just hard. It's a winning and losing sport. It's a pendulum. Sometimes you get the top, sometimes you get the bottom. And the two-party system might sort of exacerbate it, but it's not something that we

can kind of get out of here in the way that we do our elections. And I don't see the way that we do our elections changing anytime soon. Even things that are like ranked choice voting, people are like, oh, if we get ranked choice voting, we're going to have a much more commendable politics. That's not strictly true. We have this in New York City for our municipal elections, and that wasn't our experience here. And so these algorithmic solutions just don't solve the problem that one person wins for this whole geography, you get to two parties. Okay. So that's not changing anytime soon. And yet there is a lot of conversation about people who choose to vote third party about how they are helping or hurting or impacting or taking away from.

Any thoughts on that? Yeah. I mean, I've lived through a few elections where there are third party candidates who siphon votes or we call it siphoning votes, you know, like take votes from someone else who would have been one of the major two party candidates. And I don't quite think about it that way. Like, we have a system that permits you to vote for whoever you want. The challenge is if people see a third party candidate as a spoiler, where like, let's take, for, um, 2016 where it's like Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump and Jill Stein's in the race too. Some people would say, well, if you voted for Jill Stein, you probably wanted Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump, but you didn't get Hillary Clinton because your vote went to Jill Stein, which took one away from her. That's maybe not true. Like it's really hard to say to those voters that that's what they wanted. If they wanted Hillary, they'd pick Hillary. And so the way that we think about people who vote for third party candidates, I think, is usually negative, but in a way that I don't share that viewpoint because our system permits

this. If we didn't permit it, it wouldn't exist. Yes, it randomizes elections to a degree, but that's kind of what we're doing. You mentioned this, and it's very much on my list to make sure to talk about is women in politics and where gender plays a part and where it doesn't. And I'm very passionate about the idea of women in politics, not as a replacement of men, but as an equal opportunity candidate to anyone running. So how do we think about women in politics? Because I think on one end, it's the, I'm going to vote for women just because they're women. On the other end, there's like, I've never voted for a woman, never will, because whether consciously or unconsciously, I have a problem with women leaders or some version of that.

And then there's like whole hosts of things that are happening in between. What research, data, information is out there about women in politics? Yeah, so the data is really sort of stark in the sense that there are not as many women in politics, full stop. When we look at the US Federal Congress, it's about 29% woman. That is not 50-50. It's not even close. When we look at state and local politics, the ratios typically go lower. It's only in the last 10 years that we've had state chambers or city chambers that have more women than men. So it's very new. When we think about how people characterize women as politicians, that research has really changed in the last 10 years. I did a paper, two papers a few years ago

with a colleague of mine named Kristen Carl. We were looking at a hypothetical election and we were asking people in a survey to consider a male or a female candidate. And we varied whether they were sad or angry and whether the issue was an education issue or I think a veteran's issue. And what we found, kind of contrary to our belief, is the only people who were penalized for being sad were men. And so it was like when men displayed this counter-stereotypical emotion of like, I'm sad about this, voters were like, ooh, I don't like that. That doesn't look like leadership. Women could be sad. Women could be angry, but men had to be angry. And so it's a really evolving part of our like sort of political psyche right now on how people think about women politicians, where it used to be, they don't like him as much. They like men. Now it seems to be

that there's more constraints on men. And really since the 2016 election, we have seen such an increase in women who are taking on the task of running for different offices. And really since the 2016 election, we have seen such an increase in women who are taking on the task of running for different offices. And so people are kind of having to accept it because there's more candidates available to them. It's confronting us more. And for the most part, men and women fundraise about the same amounts. Once they've gotten nominated, they win in similar rates. And so there are challenges still. There's like pipeline challenges, you know, who's in local politics dictates who gets to state, who gets federal politics. But there are increases happening. The data shows there's not a lot people right now, not a lot of women right now, but it's on the upswing.

Yeah, definitely making progress in that. But I guess then that leads me to the next question about how we define or perceive leadership. My belief is that it has been dictated and determined for a very long time by the masculine. And so when we think about leadership qualities, we have a tendency to over-rotate towards more masculine qualities. I do believe that's changing and I do think it's becoming more balanced and I'm here for it and super excited. And does that impact women as they run for office differently? Are there things they need to be very mindful of or that work against them? And I appreciate too, you mentioning that there are some things that are working against men, but what role is gender playing in how women run or

what they need to be mindful of when they think about how constituents think of leadership? I think you're right that there is a changing viewpoint on leadership where it used to be very masculine favored. And then we kind of said like, actually, there are some things that women tend to do better. In politics, women tend to do consensus better. And we see that at the federal Congress where the women legislators tend to agree more on what they're going to co-sponsor. In committees, they tend to do work a little bit faster. They're more likely to share with their constituents how they voted than men are. And so there's just some more consensus building that tends to happen for women who are at that level. I think something that's particularly

difficult for women candidates, and it's not just I think, there's very good research on this, which is if the political media environment has things like war as a big focus on the agenda, we sometimes have a hard time seeing a woman as like a commander in chief or someone who's going to like lead troops into anything. That is a vestige that we hold over where we aren't as comfortable with women candidates when those sorts of threats are looming. We are going to face that, you know, where we have international conflicts throughout the globe right now. And we have a decision that's coming in November, that's going to be a man versus a woman. And we're going to see what it, how it shakes out.

But we know that those backdrops generally are harder for women candidates because people don't trust them as much as they would a man, even if that man didn't do military service, whatever, there's just sort of something that's wrapped up in, in manhood that's, that seems that they're more capable of that. Yeah. I mean, I could see that and just offering a different perspective. I feel like I would trust a woman more in that situation, which by the way, is just a perspective. It's probably just as made up in my mind as the perspective that women aren't commanders in chief or whatever. But I feel like women would be more likely to make that decision, thinking about all the factors and with respect of life at the highest. Whereas in my experience, I sometimes think men can be a little bit too reactive and too quick to anger and kind of that

bar fight mentality of like, I've got to prove myself tougher and stronger. And again, I'm not saying that's right. It's just a different perspective of kind of that same idea that gender might contribute to how we see somebody in a particular role, as opposed to outside of our genders, we are all wildly different people, regardless of our gender. Some people are more wired and more better equipped and prepared for that role than others. Yeah, I think that's true. And, you know, we see this, of course, it's essentializing. You know, not all women are the same.

Not all men are the same. Yes, true. But we see this when we put like women in the boardroom or women in the C-suite that we see that companies perform like there's like a little bit more risk aversion. They tend to do a little bit better. And you know, whether or not that's because the woman's there is maybe an open question, but the correlative evidence is pretty good there. And I think the thing is, we just sort of have different lived perspectives and lived experiences. And something that I like to talk to my students about is if someone said, Hey, Lindsay, I'd like you to go design a men's bathroom. I'd say, that's going to be really hard for me. I've never been in a men's bathroom. I don't know what you need in there.

It's not how I experience space. And we, for most of our history, said, you know what, for all of our politics, let's just let the men figure it out, despite the fact that they live very different lives than women in some really important ways. And so we have different strengths. We have different experiences that we can bring to the table. And there are differences in outcomes when we have men doing things versus women doing things. It's not really necessarily that one's better than the other, but it is just true that there are differences. And it's okay if we experience some women leadership and see like, oh, here's what they tend to be good at, which might be different than what men are good at.

Yeah. No kidding. And if you look at even things like parent-teacher councils, so much of our local stuff is run by women who are like, let's just get this stuff done. They have these sorts of skills that doesn't necessarily always translate into the political sphere because we have many reasons why women choose not to get into that. But they do have skills of organizing, getting things done, and doing it so that a bunch of communities stand to benefit from it. It's something that they're trained for in a lot of ways that just don't tend to get into politics properly. Okay, so my next question is about things that are really important to consider when we vote for our president. I think that we have a tendency to, when we're talking about presidents or thinking about voting, to blame them for everything or give them credit for everything, as if the presidents literally impact everything that's going on in our day-to-day lives.

And my belief is that mostly happens more on the local and state level. And yet the president holds a very powerful and key role. And I think about it, and this could be way off base, but I think about it a lot like if I were hiring somebody for a job. What are the skill sets that are required to do this job well? What experience do they need? What are the critical skills and requirements for success? When we think about the job of president of the United States, what are we actually, what should we actually be evaluating when we make the decision of casting our vote?

That's a really great and a really hard question. I think we all have our own internal barometers of like things we like and things we don't, and they usually work pretty well for us. It's like how you pick friends, it's how you pick spouses, it's how you pick employees. And that's usually, you know, something that you kind of understand, even if you can't put words to it. It's just like how you feel about that. A lot of people will approach presidential elections in a similar way, and I don't really have a reason to fault anyone for doing that. I'll tell you something that I tend to prioritize is that I want it to be someone that my kids can look up to. I want it to be someone that I can look up to because I, as someone who loves political science and really likes focusing on politics and government, I want it to be

aspirational. I want it to be something where I can say like, yeah, you could be that someday. That could be something that you want to do. That's the style of leadership that you want in your kids. So that's been something that guides me. And I think when we talk about skills and experiences and successes, that's like all rolled into leadership style. And there's not like one thing like, oh, they had to have been a house member first or make sure they were a governor or something. That's probably not the sort of decision criteria I would use, but it's someone who can like agenda set and sort of project the face of America to other countries in a way that we're proud of, in a way that we look up to. When we get into like, you know, they're going to do this policy or they're going to do

that policy, that's usually not the president. It's usually Congress. It's usually people who are elected in all the House seats and all the Senate seats who get to decide those big policy questions. The president gets to execute things. They can do executive orders. They have a little bit of leeway to make things, but they are a thing to look up to. They are the agenda setter. They are the people who like sort of frame how we're going to think about the United States, not necessarily what are we going to get done, despite the fact that we usually talk about the race that way. It's the Congress that supercharges or checks a president. So that's where that focus should probably be.

You have said, I believe you said it, came up in my research that women often play key roles in their communities and play key roles in their communities and play key roles in social movements and act as the glue that holds things together. How does that translate or not into political power? What can be done to better leverage the influence? And what does that mean to us as women voters? So what I mean by that is when we look at, again, school communities, PTAs, or local organizations that are doing like park cleanups or sort of like services for homeless, those are usually run by women. That's like sort of the social glue that a lot of the United States is built on. Those types of people tend to be good at things like collective action

and fundraising. These would be great things for politics. But what the research on how people get into or don't get into politics finds is that a lot of women don't want to do it because they find that it's overly negative. They find that people are going to be harassing them. That harassment is more dangerous for women than it is for men, just in like the physical bodily stature. There's more concern for if they have like young kids at home, whereas men with young kids, they'll run. Women with young kids usually feel constrained because they have some sort of additional like caretaking responsibilities, which is just, you know, it's not legally dictated that that's how it is, but de facto, this is like how it shakes out. And so we do a lot of this work. We do it at the very small

local level, really important for communities, but translating that into political power is something that is harder because of these other constraints that we face when we try to like step into that next level where men just have a little bit easier time getting into it, especially men who are coupled with someone else who can help with like that child care bit. And it's hard for women to do that. It's hard in a bunch of different industries, but politics in particular. All right. My last question is, you know, we are coming up on a very big and contentious election and I struggle a little bit with a few things. First, I think we all have? Like everything in your it's like, listen, we're just never going to see eye to eye? Is there reasons to cut people out of your life because of their political beliefs? What are your thoughts about the conversations,

the communication, the personal relationships that are being impacted by a presidential election? I think this is very hard. I walk around New York City sometimes wearing a shirt that says, let's talk politics. And I had a conversation with a door woman down the street. And she said, the reason that she doesn't like to do this is because she has to play the buffer between her dad and her brother who see things really differently. And she was like, I'd rather just not play in between them because I want them to like each other, but they both try to get me on their sides. And so I think it's painful. It's something a lot of us have to confront and we have to deal with. Are there reasons to cut people out for sharing political beliefs that you disagree

with? Maybe. There are probably a few red lines that we all have. If someone said, you know what, I don't think women should be able to vote. Let's overturn the 19th amendment. I'd have a hard time being like, Oh, that's a reasonable way to live. Like that, that's just a hard one for me. Other people might say, you know, if you believe in abortion and that's a hard line for me, I can't get behind that. And so I don't fault people for having these sorts of things, but I don't think it's the way that we should primarily connect with others. Like, it's okay. If you say like, look, there's this, this, and this that we agree on. There's this piece that we're not going to see eye to eye on. If this relationship matters to you and I, I think we're going to have to put

that one down and try to focus on where we do have some overlap. But if it's something like, really, I would have a very hard time if someone was like, women shouldn't be able to vote. I'd be like, okay, we're not going to be reasonable conversationalists. That's not going to work for me. And I just think a lot of our politics isn't that though. A lot of it isn't, what is this one extreme thing that I hold? That's going to be my total identity. And I think some things that people kind of like say against me is like, oh, you're too Pollyannish and you think everyone can get along. And it's like, no, but I do think there are points that we can get along on, not everything and not with everyone, but we can't just let the like hardest parts of our politics dictate everything. And instead,

we have to go to those middle or softer or moderate pieces and find common ground. Lindsay, I so appreciate your moderate and neutral approach. I so appreciate your commitment to education and encouraging people to get involved politically from a very young age. And your advice to us as parents, if you haven't already, make sure you get Lindsay's book, How to Raise a Citizen. And you can find more information about her and her work at lindsaycormack.com. But Lindsay, thank you for being here again and for creating a space where we can talk about something that's really hard to talk about. And Nicole, thank you for taking this on. It's brave of you. It's a subject that's hard, but it's not going to get better if we don't do the conversation. So we have to start somewhere.

I hope so. I hope so. Thank you. All right, friend. I think it's critically important that we practice the hard skills of listening, learning, curiosity, and empathy right now more than ever, because it is so easy to believe that you're right about everything. It takes no skill to foam at the mouth and call someone names. And leadership isn't about telling people what to think. True leadership and true citizenship is about understanding, listening, and engaging in meaningful dialogue. So let's be an example of that. Let's be somebody that our kids can look up to. Let's model the behavior we want to see.

Let's behave better. And when you vote, you should be driven by your values and what matters most to you. But a reminder that it's also a decision that impacts all of us. Voting is an individual act, but its consequences are collective, which is a nice way of saying to you and to me that it's not just about you. Your vote matters, your choices matter,

and others are depending on us. And that feels like woman's work to me.