Podcast | Ready to Be Strong Ep. 21

Show links:

Hands Off Toolkit: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-Eh5ulVjWt1psjm-HwwLyJ1EAHYJHFdO4MBgq3lp4HY/edit?tab=t.0

Join or Die: https://www.joinordiefilm.com/

Transcript

Scroll down for the transcript:

Tania Israel:: Welcome to Ready to Be Strong. I’m Tania Israel: Israel.

Elizabeth Scharf: I’m Elizabeth Scharf

Tania Israel: Together we’re broadening our minds, opening our hearts and strengthening connections to face the challenges of living in a divided world.

Elizabeth Scharf: In this episode, we’re talking about the 1,400 hands-off protests around the world that happened on Saturday. Organizers said that they had three demands: an end to the billionaire takeover and corruption of the Trump administration, an end to the slashing of federal funds for Medicaid, Social Security, and other programs working people rely on, and an end to the attack on immigrants, trans people, and other communities. Big stuff.
Tania Israel:, what are your first thoughts about Saturday and the protests?

Tania Israel: So, I think it’s great that people care so much about these issues, and it’s wonderful when we can do any kind of organizing that gets that many people activated.
So I’m really happy to see that. I think also people needed to know that there were people noticing what’s going on and there are people who just needed to do something and so it helped to get them activated and engaged.

So I think that those are some of the real positive things about that activity. How about you?

Elizabeth Scharf: I agree. I was very happy to see people out showing up, not being a slacktivist, but an activist. I think 10–15 years ago this would have come out as a thumbs up on Facebook or a thumbs down on Facebook—more slacktivism than activism.

So I did really appreciate people coming out and showing up in many different places around the world.

From my tone and your tone, it sounds like there’s a “but” that’s about to happen. Or an “and what?” I don’t know.

Tania Israel: Maybe an and. Because I don’t disagree with any of those goals—thank you for laying out like, this is what the objectives were.

The thing that I’m aware of is that having those protests may not actually achieve those objectives.
I don’t think that the president and his inner circle are now mulling over all of these people who showed up and going, “Oh, okay, yeah, I think we should really change now.” Like, that seems unlikely.

So at the same time, I don’t dismiss the protests themselves, and I think: what more do we need to do? So there were the hands-off protests, but what’s our hands-on approach now to actually make a difference?

Elizabeth Scharf: These protests remind me a bit of past protests against brands or companies. And in the past, many times, protests would work and brands would change their stance because they really listened to consumers—because they know they have to, at the end of the day, sell the product to them.

This was quite different in terms of exactly what you said. I don’t think Trump and Elon are listening to all the protests and really taking their “consumers”—the American public, the voters—into consideration when they’re making decisions.

So it’s quite a contrast between activism and what the actual output could be.

And then I think about the word activist overall—and activist is from active. So you could say people are being active by going to the protests, but what next?

How can they be active to change things? Because Trump’s not going to change policy because of these protests.

So it gets me to the conclusion of, yeah, what are ways that people can activate post-protest to change things in their community or, ideally, nationally?

Tania Israel:: Yeah. One of the things I’ve been thinking about is: all right, well, there are things that we’re trying to do right now in terms of combating some of the policies that are coming down.

And there are also things that we want to do to really lay the groundwork for the upcoming elections—for midterms and then the next presidential election. And the things that we need to do related to those might be a little bit different, but there might also be some areas of convergence.

So when I think about how do we actually do something related to the policies and executive orders and unfunding and firings and all of those things, I think a lot of that is working its way through the courts.  And so I think where we can support that—you know, donate money to the ACLU or different organizations and entities that are doing that—I think that’s great, because that also slows it down.

Even if we don’t win all of those cases, it might slow things down at least so that there can’t just be this constant barrage of change and executive orders and policies that are going into effect.

So I think that’s one of the pieces of like, okay, what do we do right now? Because I think it’s important to think about: what do we have control over here and what don’t we? And where are the effective guardrails and impediments to some of these things that are coming down?

Elizabeth Scharf: I feel pretty futile in any attempt I would make to try to change national policy, but I recently have felt the urge to pick up a phone and do things more locally, which is not really my go-to.

So I’ve been watching the case of Sable Oil restarting oil production close to our home here in Santa Barbara. And I was also here less than 10 years ago when we had an oil spill from that very same oil well.

And so today I picked up the phone and I called Newsom and I called the Santa Barbara County and I called Salud Carbajal. And I called—something I usually don’t do—and I called and left a statement saying that I’m against this in my community. And I wonder if I had that reaction, which I’ve not had in the past, to do something community-like because I felt like I could have more control.

Tania Israel: Yeah.

Elizabeth Scharf: And so I agree with your point. What can we control? We can control things that are closer to us.

Tania Israel: Yeah. We can contact our elected officials and if they are supporting things in alignment with our values, we can say thank you. And when they’re not, we can say, “Hey, this is my view. This is what I’d like to see you doing,” or if they’re trying to decide.
So I think that’s a great thing to do. I mean, we are the ones who elect them. And so I think that makes a lot of sense.

Elizabeth Scharf: Are there things that you’re doing to activate in the community?

Tania Israel: So one of the—can I?

Elizabeth Scharf: Yeah, yeah. I’m sorry, I just threw like a fireball at you. So what do you do, god damn it?

Tania Israel: I’m like, I’m not going to the hotel.

Elizabeth Scharf: You’re like, I’m sticking around in the country. We had all this content.

Tania Israel: What do you want from me? Geez. OK, I’ll just say a different thing.

I think it’s really good to talk to policymakers. And I think it’s also really good to think about: what are the skill sets that each of us might need to build in order to be effective?

So I think for some people, it’s the kind of advocacy you’re talking about: How do I actually reach my policymakers and what do I do or say?

There’s another skill set that I’m aware of that has to do with—and this is really in terms of laying the groundwork for the future—we sometimes do live inside these bubbles. And especially on the left, I feel like we are sometimes seen as being in these bubbles and not having a lot of tolerance for hearing views that are different from our own.

And so when I think about the hands-off protest, I think, okay, these are great in some ways that all these people are showing up. But I’m also aware that these are people who are gathering with like-minded people and saying things together that everybody agrees on.

And there’s real benefit to doing that and amplifying those messages. But we also could benefit from having some skill at encountering people who aren’t completely on the same page that we’re on, and being able to tolerate hearing a different perspective.

And that’s where I think we need to be to lay some groundwork for future elections, because it’s great when we have everybody together—and frankly, the left didn’t have everybody on the same page in the last election.

So if we can get everybody on the same page, that’s really great. If we want to grow our base, something for us to think about is: there are people out there who might be willing to join us if we had some ability to broaden our minds about who they are—and not to judge them as being extremely on the other side just because they’re not exactly where we are.

Elizabeth Scharf: I hear you and I take your point very seriously. I just was with some friends and family on the East Coast who have very different mindsets than me, and I have to say I didn’t have much patience for it.

I felt like their point of view leads to a personal attack on my family and me. They weren’t attacking overtly, but the people they support do, and I felt angry.

And I just couldn’t really have that dialogue. I don’t know how to get over that and maybe compartmentalize my personal emotions and still have an engaging conversation with them. So that’s what I’m working on right now—how to do that. Because I do value your point of view. Absolutely, it makes sense.

Tania Israel: I mean, but I think you’re already doing that. Like, you’re staying in relationship with these people who have very different views than you have, right?

Elizabeth Scharf: Well, they are my family.

Tania Israel: But not everybody’s making that choice.

Elizabeth Scharf: Oh, I guess okay. All right. This was the second time that I asked for no political discourse. There was some in the beginning and that just got me all frustrated, and so we kept it non-political. And I think that made the trip easier.

Tania Israel: Well, I feel like sometimes people assume that when I say, like, just be around other people who might not be completely aligned with us, it means—and you have to talk to them about politics.

Elizabeth Scharf: Oh, okay. So we don’t have to. Got it.

Tania Israel: You don’t have to talk to them about politics. And also people think that I mean—and you have to try to have some conversation where you’re convincing them to see things the way that you do, because otherwise there’s no productive outcome of that interaction. But quite the opposite.

I actually think that we need to stay connected to people who have different views than we do and who might not be completely aligned. And we also have to learn how to interact with and communicate about and care about those people. And I think that’s the only way that we actually broaden our support.

So you’re staying in connection with folks. You’re saying, “You know what, I don’t want to talk about politics, but I want to stay in connection and talk about other things.” That’s something that is really helpful and frankly not where everybody is.

There’s a lot of boundary-setting and separation from people, and I know it’s hard. It can be hard to hear those things, especially because we take it not just as: “Here’s somebody who has a different view than we do,” but “Here’s somebody who is hostile to my people.”

Elizabeth Scharf: So how can we—if we don’t have those debates with people—how can we change their minds?

Tania Israel: Because that’s the goal, right? To change their minds?

Elizabeth Scharf: Yeah, I would start with the goal. So I’m like, all right, we don’t have those debates, then how can I—yeah—how can I persuade them?
Is it that they get to know me and they think, “Oh, what a great person and family, and why would I want policies that make their life more difficult?” Are they going to have that realization by themselves when they walk away, or…?

Tania Israel: So the things that actually help—when people say they’re interested in connecting with people across the divide and I ask why, like what is it that you want to get out of that—there are four answers to that question.

Some people say: there’s somebody in my life I want to stay connected with. You’ve got that family.
Some people say: I want to persuade or convince someone. And you’re like, yeah, that too—I want to persuade or convince my family.

Some people want to heal the divide or find common ground. And some people say: I simply cannot fathom how people can think or act or vote as they do, and I’m looking for some insight.

Turns out for any of those outcomes, you want to do exactly the same thing: you want to create a warm and caring relationship where you are trying to understand them.

That’s actually what works. And people are like, “But how am I gonna persuade them if I’m just listening to them?”

Actually, listening to them and showing that you care what they have to say is so important—because if you show that you don’t care what they have to say, there’s no way… they’re going to want to put your side in power. If everything, if you’re not even listening to them, then why on earth would they want your side to win who’s not going to listen to them? So that’s a piece of it. And then people are like, “Well, is that all I’m going to do is just understand them? When do I get to talk?”

So you can talk. But when you share your perspective, it’s so much more effective—and research supports this—if you share stories rather than stats and slogans or even convincing arguments, you know? So sharing a story about something is really gonna come across the most effectively in terms of what you’re gonna put out there.

Elizabeth Scharf: That is helpful. And now I wanna bring up a little scenario, maybe a role play if you’re up for it. We went to the same preschool and beginning of elementary school with a family in town. They used to live pretty close to us and we’ve known them since our kids were two. So we’ve known them for five years.
 

Well, recently we—and they’re always very friendly, even though I feel like we might have some differences of life—and then recently we ran into them, and one of the parents is very tall and he was wearing a hat. And we didn’t see it until the end but he picked something up and he was wearing a hat that said “Gulf of America.”  Then my family and I walked away, and I just thought to myself, “Never gonna talk to that guy again.”
 

So I’m gonna run into him again. What do you think that looks like? What does that interaction look like? Do I say, “Hey, you wanna grab some lunch and talk about your hat?”

Tania Israel: Well, let’s start with when you think, “Oh, it’s the last time I remember we’re gonna talk to that guy again.” What’s going through your head? Like, how do you get there?

Elizabeth Scharf: I think, one, he’s showing—and he wants to communicate to people—that he aligns with Trump and the policies that Trump has for executive orders. And then, two—actually, one is that he aligns. Two is that he wants to communicate that to people, and it’s more that that I have a problem with. Then one, he’s being an activist about where he stands.

Tania Israel: And what about that makes you not want to talk to him?

Elizabeth Scharf:I had an inkling that he probably leaned onto the Trump side, but hoped that he had some social justice—I don’t know, liberal in social policies and maybe more conservative on the fiscal policies. But also that it was about the Gulf and the naming of the Gulf—like that’s almost a mockery or a hyperbole, I don’t know, of the serious things that he’s doing. Do you know what I mean? Like this is—it’s almost like a middle finger kind of thing. Because it’s—I think a lot—a lot of people care about that renaming, but it really isn’t affecting everyone’s life on a day-to-day like the more serious things that he’s doing. So he was, I think, cavalier about communicating.

Tania Israel: So you saw it as being sort of a statement of where he stands politically—as being not just somebody who would support Trump, but somebody who would actively want to put that out there. Not someone who was embarrassed to have voted for Trump, but somebody who really, like, doubles down on it. And that you kind of see it as uncaring also—that, you know, he’s not paying attention to the serious things that are affecting people’s lives,
but instead this kind of symbolic gesture, you know. Okay, so one of the things to do is for us to just unpack that a little bit. 

Like you have this reaction, “I’m never gonna talk to him again,” but it’s helpful to unpack that and go,  “What are my assumptions about this person?” And hopefully then that can make us curious about, “I wonder if any of that’s true?” Because you don’t know. And so that’s where our curiosity can help to guide us. Because when you see something like that, you can always say, “Hey, I’m curious, like, about your hat.” And like, yeah, like, “What’s it mean to you?” And then you get to find out more. And if your only goal is to find out more and to learn more about that and to maybe test your assumptions, then it, one, gives you a place to have a conversation.  And two, it sort of humanizes that other person so that they’re not just the assumptions you have or the stereotypes that you have.  Like maybe every single one of those things that you assume is accurate. But it also puts you in a place where now he sees you as somebody who it’s like, “Oh, you’re a caring person. You’re not just gonna dismiss me because of the hat that I’m wearing.” And building those connections in our country I think is really important frankly to saving our democracy.  Like I think we’ve got to have—we’ve got to feel like there’s people who we can care about and who care about us who have different views if we want to try to keep this thing together.

Elizabeth Scharf: So the first thing I would do would be to put my investigator hat on.

Tania Israel: Nice hat thing.

Elizabeth Scharf: Yes, investigator hat rather than my maybe personal hat. So put my investigator hat on, my researcher hat and ask good questions—like I like how you phrased it.
“What does that mean to you?”
“Why did you decide to wear that today?” Actually, that sounds accusatory. But, yeah, I’ll put my investigator hat on. I’m gonna try this.

Tania Israel: Oh, I’m okay. And then you’ll come back and tell us.

Elizabeth Scharf: Yes, yes.

Tania Israel: I mean, I wear—I’ve got an awful lot of Obama gear. So I’m often out there wearing Obama’s— I don’t know what anybody makes of that. They’re like, “Do you know that he’s not president anymore?”

Elizabeth Scharf: I’m like, come on—a t-shirt. And they’re like, “Do you know she never was president?”

Tania Israel: Yeah, but then it’s curious, like if somebody asked me, then I’d have a whole great story to tell them about how he’s involved in the campaign and all of this stuff. So if nothing else, it allows us to have a maybe interesting interaction with other people. And so these interactions—so this is where I think—so first of all, I want to thank you for sharing that story .I really appreciate it because I think these kinds of small interactions that we might be having with other people give us some opportunity. And if we haven’t thought through how to really take advantage of that opportunity that we’re presented with, then we won’t.
So thanks for bringing that forward so that we could talk about it.

Elizabeth Scharf: Absolutely.

Tania Israel: And I think that this is exactly what we’re talking about. Like, okay, hands-off protests, yes. We want, you know, hands-off of these things and we wanna make some changes, but what are the hands-on things that we can do? So when we see something and we have some curiosity and we’ve got an opportunity, we can take a hands-on approach of, “Hey, I’m gonna take this opportunity to engage.” Doesn’t mean you have to do it every single time when you’re exhausted and, you know, whatever, but it means you’ve got the opportunity to do that. Somebody asked me, they’re like, “Okay, well, if you could have all those people who showed up at the protest do something, what would you want them to do?” And I love this question. I love any question that’s like, if you could have everybody do something—do your bidding—what would it be? And I said, volunteer in their communities, unquestionably. So, you know, we had that whole episode about the Join or Die movie that I’m completely obsessed with. And that’s really about civic engagement. It’s really about people participating in their communities.  And again, it doesn’t have to be political. It can be joining the Rotary Club, coaching soccer, volunteering at your library.  It can be anything where we put down our phones and rather than interacting with other people’s social media accounts, we’re interacting with three-dimensional human beings. More of that is what we need in this country.

Elizabeth Scharf:I wonder if people are ready for it because it’s been—how many days since he was inaugurated? I feel like I’m more ready to do that. I think my hangover is over a bit.
And I can put my investigator hat on and collect some data and I’ll report back.

Tania Israel: Yeah, that’s fantastic. I love that. Are there any other hands-on actions you would like to see all of those people do?

Elizabeth Scharf: I think the other hands-on would be engaging with people in settings that you already go to or participate in. It might be a little easier than joining something new. So whether it’s at church or whether it’s at school, if you’re dropping off for school, engage with folks at the post office—things that you’re already doing—and engage with people in the lobby or in the whatever it may be.

Tania Israel: Mm-hmm. Are there any particular kinds of conversations you want to see happen in those settings?

Elizabeth Scharf: I think some of the conversations that would be good to see would be conversations like ours of, “What did you think about the protest?” And someone might say, “I didn’t know there was one,” and then that can start a conversation between different people that might not have the same mindset. So I’d like to see that. I think I’d like to see a conversation about not necessarily the executive orders, because I think that’s too political, but it could be about things that we can come together on—whether it be music or sports, I think is a great one, or art. Because I like your point of view of not having to convince the person on a policy point, but rather just connect—not just, but connect in different ways.

Tania Israel: Yeah, that sounds great. I love that—more connection.

Elizabeth Scharf: Mm-hmm.

Tania Israel: Fantastic. Well, so it sounds like we support the idea of public protests and we want to see other kinds of actions happen, and those kinds of things could be at a level of advocacy, reaching out to policymakers. They could also just be having a conversation with another human being who may or may not see things the same way that you do. It doesn’t have to be political, but it can have something to do with maybe some different experiences or different ideologies, and then you can just participate in your community in a lot of different ways and maybe put down your phone. You know, like you were talking about—this slacktivism—like let’s not do this all through social media. Let’s actually be with other human beings, like you and I are, in a closet.

Elizabeth Scharf: So, let’s be hands-off, but also hands-on.

Tania Israel: I’m Tania Israel: Israel, professor, psychologist, and author of Facing the Fracture.

Elizabeth Scharf: And I’m Elizabeth Scharf: Scharf, social entrepreneur and urgent optimist. Make your choice.

Tania Israel: Are you ready to be strong?