Deborah Frances-White on why it’s time to start talking
Deborah Frances-White on why it’s time to start talking
There are some topics that have become so toxic that we’re too scared to even talk about them… Deborah Frances-White challenges us to speak up.
Deborah Frances-White’s hugely popular podcast The Guilty Feminist has prompted so many insightful conversations on the pressing topics of our age. But along the way, she has found that there are some issues that are so divisive we will avoid them at all costs.
In her new book, Six Conversations We’re Scared to Have, she looks at some of the biggies and argues that they should very much be areas for discussion – and why we don’t actually have to agree with each other. The book covers topics such as comedy in relation to freedom of speech, cancel culture, gender non-conformity and the danger of viewing history with 21st century values.
Everything has become so polarised that we’re afraid to say what we think for fear we will be cast out from our tribe. This stops us from making any real progress on some of the big issues, because we’re too afraid to have meaningful debates, Deborah says.
As human beings, we want to be a part of a community and for many this is a virtual one shared in a digital world with those who we feel hold the same views and values as us. But we still harbour the same concerns as our forebears. “It feels very anxiety inducing because if our ancestors had been cast out from their communities they wouldn’t have survived. So we will stay with our communities at any cost.”
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In the first chapter, she looks at why we won’t have discussions anymore. Deborah likens it to when she was in a cult when she was younger. “I feel like the world is a series of intersecting cults where if you’re in this group, you’ve got to be this kind of person, and you must never question the orthodoxy. I think a lot of progressive movements, not that their goals aren’t great, are using cult tactics.”
People need to be able to express doubts without fear. “We’ve got to become more honest with ourselves about our doubts, allow ourselves to think things through, and to be able to talk things through.”
We also need to get better at working together. She gives some examples from the past of how different factions worked successfully for a shared cause. “The suffragettes and the suffragists thought differently. The suffragists didn’t agree with the civil disobedience of the suffragettes. They disagreed publicly but when it came down to it, they worked together.”
That would not happen now. “If Emmeline Pankhurst retweeted a suffragist, her lot would say she’d betrayed them.” And social media has a lot to answer for, with those with opposing views all too ready to shout down each other or cancel them altogether.
This aggressive approach won’t work. “You can’t get someone to change their amygdala. As soon as you start shouting at them, their defences go up and they go into fight or flight – they won’t change their amygdala, but they will change their mind. So this book is about how to change minds, including our own.”
Deborah hopes to get people thinking critically. “I want readers to talk about the topics in the book with their friends and ask what they thought. There’s value in opening up the conversation, whether you totally disagree or it gets you thinking about things differently.”
And we need to act now. She says: “We have to address this because the polarisation between the left and the right has never been more extreme in my lifetime. And the inability of progressive people to come together and ask, how are we going to make this work together even though we disagree, is really concerning.”
