I LOVE this sentiment and so many of these questions. (You know how I love questions.) And you are my go-to for truly open-ended questions in real life! Having said that, these felt off to me: "Knowing how hard it is to be a parent, why would you choose to make it harder for other kids and parents, especially kids and parents for whom ou…
I LOVE this sentiment and so many of these questions. (You know how I love questions.) And you are my go-to for truly open-ended questions in real life!
Having said that, these felt off to me:
"Knowing how hard it is to be a parent, why would you choose to make it harder for other kids and parents, especially kids and parents for whom our society already creates so many extra barriers (because of race, class, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, etc.)?
Knowing how much you love your kids, why would you choose to make life harder for anybody else’s kid— somebody else’s Queer or trans kids, somebody else’s Black and Brown kids, somebody else’s poor kid?
Is this why you became a parent? To make your world smaller and smaller? Or were you hoping for something more expansive, something more connected, something more communal?
Do you honestly believe that the politicians telling you to hate or fear somebody else right now— A Black Studies Professor, a non-binary teenager, a beloved social studies teacher— love you and your kids? Or are they using you?"
If we're genuinely asking our mama bear parents where their motivation comes from, and the pain and fear underneath that motivation, don't these feel like questions that--in their very framing--would put people on the defensive? Are there ways to make these questions less rooted in your/our worldview and more curious?
Thank you for reading these and thinking through what it would feel like to actually sit across from somebody and ask them. And you're right-- those particular questions aren't the kind that make somebody feel open-hearted and heard and seen, they're very specifically designed to be provocative and proddy. In this case, that's why I put them where they are-- after a long line of other questions, after the other person recognizes that I'm sitting in the murk with them. They may very well still cause defensiveness and contraction, but I'm interested in that too! What's behind that defensiveness, even after a long line of being listened to? I think that's valuable to bring out, and while my organizing techniques aren't always provocative by design, in this case, I think that the pivot towards having to sit in "whether I believe it or not, this is how my beliefs and values and world view are potentially impacting others" is an important part of the process.
Fascinating. Now I see what you're up to more clearly. I'm sure this is a much longer conversation, but how do you decide when to be "provocative by design?" Maybe you could give your readers (including me!) a bit to chew on.
Well, one thing that I'm taking from your (great) questions is that I definitely didn't do any of that meta-thinking up above-- instead I just dropped a whole lot of questions in a pile, which probably isn't ideal! To answer your question, I know this probably sounds simple, but I think the question is always "after the person feels heard enough that they are ready to think a little more deeply and consider somebody else's perspective." The question I left out up above is an interstitial "permission structure" question [which I usually do after summarizing their perspective]. "Hey, do you feel safe enough in this conversation for me to ask questions that might deliberately provoke?" Interestingly enough, I do this in parenting a lot-- especially when my older child is frustrated with the younger child and therefore not seeing her. perspective. I do a "Ok, so I think you feel heard by me now, is this right? Are you ready to now think through where your sister is coming from too?"
That's revelatory for me. Consensual provocation! I think I have witnessed/experienced so much shitty provocation (the dude in the college class who is like "just to play devil's advocate...") that I don't have a lot of models of someone provoking for genuine good.
Isn't there an answer to these questions? They see some people as a threat, based on a very intricate and difficult to challenge set of beliefs. These are hard to understand from the perspective of liberal openness to difference and rational inquiry because they mostly depend on rejection of liberal openness and rational inquiry. (Maybe not directly. The process is complex and involves reflection and learning but from a different authoritative basis--one that doesn't accept certain norms of rational inquiry that liberals have--which is why there is great anxiety around education because the hope is to ensure one's child does not learn these norms.
I LOVE this sentiment and so many of these questions. (You know how I love questions.) And you are my go-to for truly open-ended questions in real life!
Having said that, these felt off to me:
"Knowing how hard it is to be a parent, why would you choose to make it harder for other kids and parents, especially kids and parents for whom our society already creates so many extra barriers (because of race, class, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, etc.)?
Knowing how much you love your kids, why would you choose to make life harder for anybody else’s kid— somebody else’s Queer or trans kids, somebody else’s Black and Brown kids, somebody else’s poor kid?
Is this why you became a parent? To make your world smaller and smaller? Or were you hoping for something more expansive, something more connected, something more communal?
Do you honestly believe that the politicians telling you to hate or fear somebody else right now— A Black Studies Professor, a non-binary teenager, a beloved social studies teacher— love you and your kids? Or are they using you?"
If we're genuinely asking our mama bear parents where their motivation comes from, and the pain and fear underneath that motivation, don't these feel like questions that--in their very framing--would put people on the defensive? Are there ways to make these questions less rooted in your/our worldview and more curious?
Thank you for reading these and thinking through what it would feel like to actually sit across from somebody and ask them. And you're right-- those particular questions aren't the kind that make somebody feel open-hearted and heard and seen, they're very specifically designed to be provocative and proddy. In this case, that's why I put them where they are-- after a long line of other questions, after the other person recognizes that I'm sitting in the murk with them. They may very well still cause defensiveness and contraction, but I'm interested in that too! What's behind that defensiveness, even after a long line of being listened to? I think that's valuable to bring out, and while my organizing techniques aren't always provocative by design, in this case, I think that the pivot towards having to sit in "whether I believe it or not, this is how my beliefs and values and world view are potentially impacting others" is an important part of the process.
Fascinating. Now I see what you're up to more clearly. I'm sure this is a much longer conversation, but how do you decide when to be "provocative by design?" Maybe you could give your readers (including me!) a bit to chew on.
Well, one thing that I'm taking from your (great) questions is that I definitely didn't do any of that meta-thinking up above-- instead I just dropped a whole lot of questions in a pile, which probably isn't ideal! To answer your question, I know this probably sounds simple, but I think the question is always "after the person feels heard enough that they are ready to think a little more deeply and consider somebody else's perspective." The question I left out up above is an interstitial "permission structure" question [which I usually do after summarizing their perspective]. "Hey, do you feel safe enough in this conversation for me to ask questions that might deliberately provoke?" Interestingly enough, I do this in parenting a lot-- especially when my older child is frustrated with the younger child and therefore not seeing her. perspective. I do a "Ok, so I think you feel heard by me now, is this right? Are you ready to now think through where your sister is coming from too?"
That's revelatory for me. Consensual provocation! I think I have witnessed/experienced so much shitty provocation (the dude in the college class who is like "just to play devil's advocate...") that I don't have a lot of models of someone provoking for genuine good.
Isn't there an answer to these questions? They see some people as a threat, based on a very intricate and difficult to challenge set of beliefs. These are hard to understand from the perspective of liberal openness to difference and rational inquiry because they mostly depend on rejection of liberal openness and rational inquiry. (Maybe not directly. The process is complex and involves reflection and learning but from a different authoritative basis--one that doesn't accept certain norms of rational inquiry that liberals have--which is why there is great anxiety around education because the hope is to ensure one's child does not learn these norms.