September 13, 2025 • 38 mins
Today, we're diving into the wild world of political polarization and outrage culture, and trust me, this isn't just your average chit-chat. We're thrilled to welcome David Beckemeyer, the mastermind behind the Outrage Overload podcast, who's on a mission to tackle these pressing issues head-on. With a background in media literacy, social psychology, and civil discourse, David’s here to share some seriously practical strategies for cooling down the heated conversations that seem to be taking over our lives. Whether you're feeling overwhelmed by the constant noise or just curious about how we got here, this episode is packed with insights that could make a real difference. So grab your favorite drink, sit back, and get ready for a fun, enlightening conversation that might just inspire you to bridge some gaps in your own life!
Takeaways:
- Political polarization is a pressing issue today, impacting our daily lives and mental health.
- David Beckemeyer emphasizes the importance of media literacy and civil discourse in bridging divides.
- Strategies to reduce outrage include being mindful of our language and seeking common ground with others.
- The algorithms behind social media often amplify outrage, so we must be aware of their influence on our perspectives.
- Connecting with mentors can greatly impact our personal growth and understanding of complex issues.
- The conversation around outrage culture requires us to actively engage and reflect on our own contributions to divisiveness.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:58):
Welcome to becoming bridgebuilders. We're about to dive into
some deep ideas in shaping ourworld and the voices that drive change.
Today we're joined by someonewho's tackling one of the most pressing
issues of our time, politicalpolarization and the outrage culture
that fuels it. Our guest todayis David Beckermeyer, host of the
Outrage Overload podcast. Daveis a leading voice in media literacy
(01:20):
and civil discourse, drawingfrom social psychology and communication
studies to help us understandthe mechanisms behind outreach media.
He is here to share practicalstrategies to reduce toxic outrage
and foster unity in anincreasingly divided world. Whether
you're overwhelmed by thenoise or just curious about how we
got here, this conversation isone that you won't want to miss.
(01:43):
We welcome David to the show.Well, David, so good to have you
on.
Yeah, it's great to be here.
This is a topic that I'm suremany of us either are dealing with
anxiety because of, or we seeit in our lives or among our families
every day. So we're going totalk about this and really kind of
get some insights from youabout how we can move forward as
(02:06):
a, as a nation and as apeople. So I'm looking forward to
this conversation.
Yeah, it's impacting a lot of people.
Yeah. But I'm going to startout with my favorite question first.
What's the best piece ofadvice you ever received?
Yeah, it's. I always have tothink about this question because
there's probably more than oneI could choose because I'm old enough
(02:28):
that I get a lot of advice.But, you know, one that really sticks
with me is one that I think myfather in law is who said it. And
I don't think he even thoughtof it as advice, you know, but it,
but it really stuck with meanyway. I think it was just like
a passing comment, just, youknow, move on kind of thing. And
I was asking him, you know, Iwas, I was a young, young man and,
(02:50):
you know, kind of trying tofigure things out, like we all are
and, you know, what is, whatis the future like and how do we
do this? And you know, I was.And he had five kids by the time
he was pretty young, I wouldsay, like early 30s or something
like that. He already had fivekids and all this kind of stuff.
And I'm like, man, you know,how did you do that? You know, and,
and his answer is like, whatdo you mean how you just do it? You
know, And I don't think itmeant much to him, but it really
(03:12):
stuck with me that, thatcomment so.
Nike owes him a lot of moneythen, apparently.
Right.
Since they borrowed his thing.
I think a lot of it means tome is like, don't overthink everything,
buddy.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I likethat because you do. We get into
(03:32):
our side of our own heads andwe end up doing more damage by trying
to process everything andfigure everything out, but just like.
And just paralyzes us by thedecisions we're trying to make. So.
Yeah, I agree with that. Asyou think about your life, I'm curious,
like you'd mentioned we'reboth a little older and have lived
a little bit of a life. Whoare some people in your life and
(03:53):
your journey who served asmentors or inspiration for you?
Yeah, and it is similarbecause at different phases of my
life, I've definitely. I mean,I definitely kind of have a. Everybody
that if you can sort of find amentor, take advantage of it, like
every opportunity that youhave, you know, and for me, I was.
I was pretty lucky to have afew at different times, at different
(04:15):
stages in my. In my life. I. Ithink one of my first ones was like
a high school auto shopteacher. So I was, you know, I was
looked at as somebody that wasprobably destined for, you know,
definitely not like a highacademic career. Right. I think at
that time. And this guy sawsomething in me, and so he's teaching
(04:36):
me autoshop, supposedly, orI'm in his auto shop class, but down
on the side, he's teaching mephysics and math. And he actually
helped me get into a juniorcollege class, which he was able
to do the paperwork. So eventhough I wasn't supposedly, I think
he had to be 18 or something.I wasn't 18, but with a teacher's
recommendation or whatever,you could do that. So I was taking
(04:59):
a few college courses while Iwas in high school, and it changed
my life, you know, really,because I was on. I was not on a
great track at that point. Youknow, I didn't see a lot of future
for myself. And I thinkthere's a lot of young men that can
find themselves in that spacepretty easily. So that was, I think,
in some ways, you know,between him and junior college, in
a lot of ways, that saved mylife. So that's been one. And I've
(05:21):
had others over my career. Andsometimes it's that unexpected person
that ends up being a mentor.Right. I actually had an employee
that was a mentor to me in alot of ways. And, you know, because
it was. It was one that. Hewas one of those people that really
Modeled by behavior, not. Nottalking. Right. He didn't explain
things, but he modeled thatmodeled sort of excellence by in
(05:45):
behavior. And he served as amentor me, so I've had several and
my uncle when I was young wasalways a mentor that I'll always
have. So yeah, I've had many.So I've been lucky in that regard.
Yeah. If we get those peoplein your life who pour into you, it's
so meaningful to have thatinfluence. So I always like to give
people a chance to just kindof thank those people that have meant
(06:05):
so much to them because wedon't always think about it until
sometimes it's too late. Man,I wish I'd said something to them
while they were here. Justthank them for being in my life at
that moment. So this kind ofgives us a chance to stop and reflect
on those people who have beenso important to us and shaped who
we are.
Yeah, exactly. And don't beafraid to like, if you see somebody
you think could be a mentorfor you, just ask them, like have
(06:28):
a conversation about it.
Yeah, I had a guest on too. Hetalked about, you know, don't be
ashamed to be a mentor forsomebody else. If you see someone
you can pour into, take theopportunity if they're willing to
walk alongside them, pay itback or pay it forward.
Somebody said, oh, for sure.Yeah, 100%.
So you've had a very diversecareer spanning technology, entrepreneurship,
(06:49):
civil engagement. How did yourjourney lead you to focus on political
polarization and media influence?
Yeah, I mean, I think 10 yearsago if I told somebody what I'm doing
now, or I told them what I'mgoing to be doing in 10 years, they'd
be like, what? Like whokidnapped you and made you do this?
But yeah, I mean, I think alot of it was just the world we're
(07:11):
in. Right. I mean, lookaround. And I think seeing that and
having the time, I'm retired,so I've got some time to do it. I'm
kind of a science nerd. Sothat took me down the track of kind
of thinking about maybethere's some smart people, way smarter
than me that are sort oflooking at some of this and maybe
that can help us understand ita little. And there were, of course,
(07:31):
so that was a big piece of itthat I'm living in the same life
and environment that we're allin and seeing the same things, experiencing
the same things. And I justwanted to understand it better. And
I felt like, well, maybe I canbring some of this bridge, some of
that academic information to amore. A wider audience without. You
(07:53):
don't have to be a hardcorescientist. And I try not to make
it, you know, like a two hourlong academic to academic talk. I
try to make it, you know,presentable and try to make it flow
and interesting enough that'llkeep people around for half an hour
to get some, get some, youknow, a highlight of some of the
science out there. And sothat's kind of where how I ended
up here from that perspectiveat the tail end of my career. But
(08:15):
yeah, I mean, so mostly I'm inwhat I'm doing now because I was
retired and really gotinterested, got pulled into this
and it's a, you know, I thinkI also like as a, as a, with all
the things I've always done inmy, in my, throughout my life from
you know, my academic worldand then, and then professionally,
I've always liked sort ofchallenges. So with this space, I'm
(08:36):
really jumping from a placewhere I kind of had a reputation
and people know me and it wasalmost like a comfort zone, right
to this space where I don'tknow anything, I don't know anybody,
you know, I've got to startall over again. So that was maybe
just a challenge for me as well.
As you got into this space andthings you've discovered what's been
the most surprising thing foryou as you've gone on this journey
(08:58):
of discovery?
Yeah, I mean, I think in termsof surprising, it's probably that
we are as wired as humans. Wehave a lot of blind spots and that
(09:21):
can make it really a challengefor us because it's easy sometimes
to see some of thesebehaviors, some of these phenomenon
when sort of other people aredoing it. But we can be right in
the middle of it and notrealize we're doing it. And I think
that applies to a lot ofthings that have sort of a psychological
underpinning to them. But thatsurprises me a lot because I know
(09:42):
people that really presentthemselves as sort of a champion
of bridge building and youknow, are upset about the divisiveness
and this kind of thing. Butthen almost in the same sentence
they'll, they'll, they'll uselanguage and, and, and really, you
know, mop be mocking andthings like that. And like they just
don't realize they're doing itso they can hold on to those two.
(10:04):
And I sure do it too, right? Imean, I think that's the surprise,
right? That I think it reallytakes a village almost, I guess in
some way to really help yousee those things. You know, you have
to have some trusted peoplethat can tell you, dude, you're doing
the thing right now.
So tell us about your podcast,Outrage Overload. Tell us what got
(10:25):
you started doing that.
Yeah, so like I said, I waskind of witnessing and experiencing
sort of this divisiveenvironment that we live in and the
sort of the toxicity and thehostility and animosity and, you
know, anger and, of course,outrage, ultimately. Right. And.
And I started to see thispattern of there's so many sort of
(10:48):
provocateurs out there, if youwill, that kind of leverage outrage
for their own. For their ownbenefit. And sometimes it's even,
you know, not necessarily,like, nefarious. You just find yourself
in an echo chamber. And. Andit's just the way we start. We start
piling on the other side insome way. Right. And it's kind of
a. It, you know, it's. It'spart of that tribal mentality that
(11:11):
people have, and it kind ofmakes you feel more part of a group
and all that, but ultimatelyit's not necessarily good for us
in the longer term. And. Andso sort of witnessing all that and
then saying, well, I'm kind ofa science nerd. And. And I do. I
think there's other peoplelike that that are kind of interested
in some of the science goingon here. So maybe we could take some
(11:32):
of what we see going on insideof this partisan political realm
and say, well, maybe there'ssome underlying stuff that's interesting
about it. So we can talk aboutpolitics without talking about issues.
You know, we can too much. Wedon't really. We're not out there
promoting policy andpromoting, you know, specific issues
for the most part. I mean, thebiggest. The only place we would
(11:52):
do that is typically if it'san issue, like, here's a bipartisan
bill to promote bridgebuilding. Like, we might help support
that. But in general, youknow, we don't do that. So what we
do instead, we don't. So wedon't talk about issues. We sort
of talk about. How we talkabout politics is a little bit more
meta and. And how we talkabout politics, how we find ourselves,
you know, with this kind ofhostile attitude and participating
(12:12):
in it and just some of thescience around that. And then I also
talk to practitioners becausethat's the other thing I sort of
discovered as I, you know,moved in, learned more about what's
happening in this space outthere, is there's this whole world
of what I call practitioners.I don't know if that's the right
word. Exactly. But there's awhole bunch of organizations out
there that are sort of lookingat these problems and then looking
at practical ways to maybebring people together in dialogue
(12:36):
or maybe other ways to lowerwhat I kind of call in general this
kind of idea of lowering the temperature.
So I always hear that, and I'mnot a science nerd, but I have a
few friends who were, who saythat there are algorithms that intentionally
designed to kind of amplifythe outrage. In your studying of
(12:57):
this from a scientificperspective, are you noticing that
there are algorithms in thesocial media Sphere, in your YouTube,
your Google, that drivedivision or drive you to a certain
mindset?
Well, it's definitely afactor. And for the most part, most
(13:19):
of the experts, I've talked toquite a few about this topic because
it's of course, a very top ofmind one with a lot of people, including
myself. Most of the expertssort of don't see it like sort of
Mr. Burns, you know, sittingin the top, you know, in a building,
kind of coming up with thisway. We can, we can do that, but
it's a side effect, for themost part, it's a side effect of
(13:39):
this, you know, optimizing forengagement. So these social media
platforms, you know, they're,they're getting, they're incentivized
by revenue, they get money. Ifwe're on there, the more we stay
on there, the more we engagein it, the more comments we do, the
more time we spend on there.And that's by creating an algorithm.
You know, that was a turningpoint in all this is turning on algorithms.
(13:59):
Right. By creating analgorithm that benefits or tries
to get us engaged, they sortof accidentally, you could say, something
discovered, oh, well, thisstuff that kind of enrages people,
keeps them motivated, getsthem to engage, keeps them coming
back. But I guess the otherside of that though, is even though
(14:19):
maybe it wasn't intentionalinitially, they've done a lot of
research on this and they knowthey're doing it, right. And they
also know they could stopdoing it, but they also know that.
So they know, but that hitstheir bottom line, right? So they
don't want to stop doing it.In fact, they, there was cases where
they, they did experiments toshow that they could turn this off
and it worked like peoplewould calm down and find better things
(14:41):
to do. But of course that'snot good. They don't want that. Right.
So. So they aren't necessarilyguilty of kind of an overall plot
to tear us apart. ButUltimately, that's kind of what they're
doing because they're tryingto keep us engaged and keep us on
these platforms, and theseplatforms are not ideal platforms
to have difficult conversations.
You mentioned and kind of inyour bio that the assassination attempt
(15:05):
kind of impacted you. Tell usa little bit about, you know, what
about that event kind oftriggers you maybe more to talk about,
like, how do we stop this?Because we're going down. I would
say, and you've mentioned itto kind of a dangerous path if we
don't pull back and go, whoa,this is a. This has gone too far.
(15:26):
Right. And that. That's kindof what I was kind of hoping that
event might signal that kindof thought. I mean, we had a little
bit of that at 9 11. After 911, there was some kind of coming
together and saying maybe, youknow, things need to calm down and
we need to work together alittle better. I was kind of hoping
maybe that event or some ofthese other events could maybe be
a trigger to be a catalyst forthinking about that. Like, look,
(15:49):
this is kind of going too far,right? This is kind of where this
leads. And we kind of knowthis because we've seen it in other
countries around the world.And so it was an event. I would kind
of hope to do that.Unfortunately, it kind of just didn't
stick, and we've kind of movedon already. Probably within a. Yeah,
I know maybe a month youcould. Could have given it. I don't
(16:10):
know. But it's. And I washoping, you know, that we could maybe
take advantage of that andhighlight that as a. Whichever side
you're on, you know, this isnot a direction we really want to
go in. And. Yeah, so that's.That's a. I think that's a big factor
in all this. That reallyconcerns me that, like I said, I'm
hopeful because there's somany people kind of looking at this.
(16:31):
There are a lot of solutionsthat could work if we could find
the will to implement some ofthem. But, yeah, I'm concerned because
this escalating. It's just anescalating spiral where each side.
And I think you end up. Whatwe see is that it's almost like preventive.
It's almost like people thinkthe other side's gonna do this thing.
(16:53):
So as a preventive measure,I'm gonna do it first. Right. And
now you've done it. And theother side said, hey, they did this
thing. Now we're gonna do thisthing. And as you build this animosity
towards each other, which isthe big place we are. It's more of
a psychological thing than itis an issue separation. It's more,
we don't like the other side,and we think they're immoral. And
(17:15):
that just continues. I mean,you know a lot about morality in
your work, and that justcontinues to sort of dehumanize,
and it creates opportunitiesto dehumanize and, you know, become
so righteous in a way on yourpolitical ideology that suddenly
you can justify doing badthings. And a lot of bad things have
happened in the name of mymorality is better than yours.
(17:38):
I want to dig into somethingyou just said because I think it's
important. You said, a lot oftimes we don't realize that we're
being. That we're also part ofthe problem. How do you help people
realize that even the languageyou're using is also contributing
to the outrage that you'recausing someone else? I mean, we
(18:00):
can see it in the other guy.It's like it is a famous line in
the Bible. You know, I can seethe speck in my brother's eye, but
I can't see the plank in myown eyes. So how do we see the speck
in our eyes? How do we see howwe contribute to the outreach? How
do you help people identify that?
Yeah, it's really hard, firstof all, because of the way human
brains work. We're really goodat sort of seeing what we want to
(18:21):
see. Um, but the first step,of course, is intentionality, right?
So the first step is saying,you know, I want to be. I, I, I want
to try to see it in myself,which is a big step for a lot of
people. They don't reallycare. They're doing fine. They just
keep doing what they're doing.But, but if you take that step of
intentionality, then you canperform some active, active measures.
(18:43):
So, you know, one is if youhave a trusted friend there, somebody
that you trust that you knowdoesn't have, they don't have to
call you out publicly, butthat you trust to say, hey, you know,
when I talked about thisthing, what do you think someone
on the other side might thinkof what I'm writing or what I'm saying
or what I'm. My thoughts onit, or. And like you say, even just
the language I'm using, right?Because many times, especially if
(19:03):
we're in our bubbles, we'renot like intentionally trying to
rile anybody up. It's just thelanguage we use in our information
sphere. And we don't reallyrealize that some of Those words
are maybe triggers or havebeen sort of weaponized by some people.
And we're just using thesewords that we think are kind of normal,
but they can be taken as beingweaponized. So it can be as simple
as that. So that's one thingis you can kind of, if you can have
(19:25):
some people that can helpcheck you a little bit because they're
like you say, the easiest wayis to have somebody else that can
see it before you do. And Ithink, I actually think something
like AI like, you know, couldactually help a little bit too. Like
I'm, I believe this thing or Iheard this thing and my position
on it looks like this, youknow, it somehow ask the AI, like
(19:46):
do you think that's a partisanposition or do you think that's contributing
to toxicity, or do you thinkit's a polarizing view that could
be harmful or, ordisrespectful in some way or something
like that? I think AI hasopportunity to that if we choose
to use it that way. Right. Itcan also obviously be used in lots
of bad ways. But if we chooseit to use it that way, that's one
(20:06):
thing that could probablyhelp. I mean, I think AI is pretty
neutral. I mean, I know thatit is. You know, there's been some
studies to show it leans tothe left primarily because the information
it's pulling from especially,you know, media sources lean left
somewhat. But it's pretty goodabout questions like that. Like if
you say is this a reasonableway to looking at it or is this possibly,
(20:26):
you know, politically toxic?It's pretty good about that. Whether
the thing sort of would bepolitically toxic or you know, inflaming
to somebody on the right orsomebody on the left. So that can
be one way and I think anotheris just cooling off a little bit
and asking yourself, do Ireally have the full picture here?
Because if we're looking atinformation in our information silo
(20:48):
with our like minded folks,we're seeing necessarily like most
people probably aren't tryingto tell us lies and straight up lies.
Sure it happens, the mediasometimes straight up lies. But more
often, the more reality, morereal picture that is very common
is they're just sort ofleaving things out. They're kind
of creating a narrative tomake it maybe sound worse than it
really is to sort of get youriled up. Because again, that media
(21:10):
is also driven by engagementand likes and clicks and all that
stuff. So they have the sameincentives to kind of get your attention
and get you riled up. So thisArticle might be designed that way,
and sometimes it's justunintentional because again, even
the guy writing that article,the person writing that article is
in the same psychological waytoo, and may not even realize they're
using inflammatory languageeither. Right. Or may not even realize
(21:31):
that they have a very sort ofa more biased view than you might
think, things like that. So itcan come out as a narrative that
gets you more riled up. Andthen when you look at it, you find,
oh, well, wait, it wasn't thatbad. When you put it in context a
little more or you add alittle bit, you know, some of the
other facts that were sort ofleft out, you know, it's not as bad
as they'd made it out to be.So that's always a good question
(21:53):
to ask yourself, am I. Is itreally as bad as they're presenting
it? Or maybe there's some moredata here that I could go find. And,
and unfortunately, all thesethings are heavy lifts for us to
do because our first Nreaction is to go, yeah, I'm really
mad about that.
Right. So when we start outwith that idiot, it's probably not
a good way to reduce the outrage.
(22:15):
Right? Right. Yeah, yeah,yeah. It's many of the folks that,
the practitioner space thatI'm talking about, there's a lot
of work going on and building,you know, digital tools and tools
to help with some of this. SoI do think over the next couple of
years we're going to. I'veseen some of the prototypes, but
I think a lot of this stuff isgoing to get more widely available,
and a lot of it is using AIand, you know, sort of AI for good,
(22:39):
if you will. And I think therewill be a lot more tools to help
us with some of this, so I'mencouraged by that.
So give me some examples ofthings you see coming down the pike
that would help with some ofour outrage.
Yeah, one of them is a lot ofpeople are doing things with, like
depolarizing chatbots. So theidea that instead of you just. Instead
(23:02):
of it just giving an answerlike a normal chatbot, it might come
back. Some examples are comingback with things like, well, here's
what. How someone on, like,you present an issue. Like, I think
everybody. That everybodyshould just have to buy a gun. Right.
So I'm going to put out someopinion. And then it would say, well,
here's what someone on theleft might say about that. Here's
what someone on the rightmight say about that. And then they'll
(23:22):
often Give like a third andit's not necessarily a center. Like
one of them is calleddepolarizing GPT and it's alternative,
its third option is notnecessarily a center position the
way you might think. It's justsplitting the difference. It's more
an integrated values 1. Sowhat it tries to do is say, well,
the left kind of values thesethings, the right kind of values
(23:42):
these things. And so I canpresent a response that integrates
some of those values. Sothat's one example. There's also
a lot of examples of likehelpers in dialogue, right? So say
you're getting an onlineconversation. You could have a, the
tool could almost be like, ifyou think of like a Grammarly tool
(24:03):
that sort of like can beforeyou type the thing, can kind of inspect
it and do some typos or fixyour grammar and things like that.
These tools could say, hey,wait a minute here, this one place
where you're saying this, youknow, that's. Do you really want
to say it that way? Like youwant to take a breath first? Or you
know, there's, here's threeother ways where you could sort of
make that point without alsosort of, you know, either being really
(24:26):
generally hateful orindividually hateful or somehow generalize
people into a category thatyou may not be right or like it's
not appropriate for thisconversation. So there's things like
that, they're like, that willsort of help you maybe settle down
a little bit before yourespond and maybe just capture bigger
(24:47):
input on it too. Like thosesame kind of tools can say, hey,
here's some more context. Likeyou're kind of angry about this thing.
Here's some more context aboutit. Right? So, and you can decide
then what do I want to do withthat extra context? But it might
just tell you a little bit.Well, the person said this thing,
but it was kind of in responseto this, not what they're presenting
it to be in response to thingslike that. Like oh, oh, well that
makes more sense in thatcontext or whatever, right? So there's
(25:09):
tools like that. So it's a lotof the things are along those lines
helping us better withdialogue. One, one project is happening
with, you know, they jump talkabout jumping into the deep end.
They've been working onconversations between Israelis and
Palestine, Palestinians andthey've been conducting these conversations
for, you know, quite a while,quite a number of years. And they've,
(25:32):
you know, been improving it,improving it and taking it more and
more from sort of humanmoderation and human assistance.
To more and more AI, and AImoderation. And moderation may not
even be the right word. It'smore like an AI assistant in the
conversation, and they're ableto have dialogue there with folks
that generally or have a hardtime with that, as you probably know.
(25:55):
So there's a lot of thingslike that happening, and I'm really
encouraged by a lot of theefforts being put into that now.
Some of it takes some will,but a lot of efforts are trying to
be done without that. Don'tneed, you know, to go get help from
the social media platforms.Right. They work. They can work outside
it or alongside it, so youdon't have to go get the cooperation
of social media companies.
(26:16):
So this is something that Ican tell you're passionate about.
Do you sense that's somethingthat more and more people are becoming
aware of? The fact that. Ijust. I'm really tired of the atmosphere,
the outrage. I really wish wecould just tone down. I think as
I interview a lot of people onmy podcast, I discover that more
people are in the center thanon the extremes. And I think my sense
(26:39):
is more and more people arejust frustrated with. Why can't we
just talk and haveconversation? I'm not on either.
At either of these twoextremes. Are you finding more and
more people are kind of in thecenter of this battle between both
sides?
Well, yes. I'll do sort of ayes end here because there's a lot
of data, you know, talkingabout how. I mean, first of all,
(27:02):
I have a problem. I have achallenge about the. I think the
whole paradigm of left andright is kind of broken. But that's
probably maybe anotherconversation we could have. But there's
a lot of data and a lot ofresearch that shows that, you know,
most people, there's this ideaof sort of the exhausted majority
that are, you know, tired ofkind of the both sides fighting and,
you know, and they'recertainly more moderate in terms
of the rhetoric they want tohear and things like that. They still
(27:25):
might hold, you know, strongpositions on certain things, but
they're less tribal. I mean,that's a big, big problem that we
have, is that we're. We don'treally. We don't even know we care
about the issues, but we'retold to care about it. So you're
supposed to think this wayabout these five things. And if we
really step back, do we reallycare about all five of those things
that much? Like, you know,things like that. And we know that
(27:46):
that majority is out there,right? So you can call them center,
you can call them a lot ofdifferent names, but. And more people
are registering or declaringthemselves to be independent too,
right? I mean, there's moreindependents than there are Republicans
and Democrats combined. Ithink that's an indicator that that
space exists. Right. That it'sreal, you know, but. So yeah, it's
(28:07):
definitely out there. And Ithink. And it's real. And I think
that's where these people thatare willing to break with their tribe
are probably the biggest thingthat can pull us out of this. Because
it's a hard emotional orpsychological thing to do. Right.
To break with your tribe. It'srisky, right? If I break with my
tribe, I might get kicked outof my tribe and then where do I live?
(28:30):
And a lot of the people thatwe're talking about even call themselves
kind of politically homeless.Right. Like they don't really know.
Neither party really servesthem and there's no real third party
option that's viable either.So they do feel politically homeless.
And yeah, so those people areprobably who is going to get out.
But I will add one aspect ofthat a little bit because I talk
to a lot of people and I alsotalk to a lot of experts on this.
(28:52):
But even I do some sort of nonscientific, what I call kind of these
man on the street interviewswhere I talk to a lot of people about
a lot of this and it'ssomewhat self selective of course,
because they agreed to talk tome. But you know, they, they all
say they want to lower therhetoric and lower the temperature
in some way. But then at thesame time, when you probe that a
(29:13):
little deeper, what they,their way to do that is to convince
the other person to think theright, you know, so it's, it's, that's
true of a lot of people too.And it's natural. Like I get that.
Like they think if I couldjust convince them then we wouldn't
fight anymore. That's what mywife says. If I would just do what
she says, we wouldn't be fighting.
Exactly. That makes sense. Soas you, as you think about the impact
(29:38):
you want to have in yourlegacy, what do you want your legacy
to be?
Yeah, I mean, I think withthis show, you know, and I get some
of these kind of commentsalready and I've had people literally
say, you know, I was, youknow, considering suicide and I listened
to some of your episodes andnow I'm like, wait, whoa, this is
(29:59):
like too much for me. I can'thandle that. But, you know, but I.
So I think The. You know, soI'm not. I'm one little show, but
I think, you know, as part ofthis larger network or this larger
sort of coalition, if I canhelp, you know, sort of six people,
like, maybe reconnect withtheir uncle or their brother or,
(30:21):
you know, somebody in theirfamily, a good friend, you know,
in some way that, you know, ifI can help them build some of the
tools and understand or evenwant to do that, because that's what
I'm saddened by the most. Itseems like almost everybody has a
story like that. You know,like, I don't go home for Thanksgiving
anymore because my brotherthis, my uncle that, or I don't talk
(30:42):
to Uncle Jones anymore, orhe's not invited as Thanksgiving
or whatever it might be.Everybody seems to have stories like
that. Certainly people haveeither experienced one side or the
other sort of getting blockedor unfriended on Facebook or something
like that. And these storiesreally saddened me because, you know,
part of what trying to do hereis message that those are the people
(31:06):
I really want to reach andtalk to and help. But it's hard for
someone to look at my show. Imean, I have to get better. I have
to figure out how to messagethat, because people think my show
is going to sort of be aboutpolitics, and I'm sort of tired of
talking about politicsanymore. Right. So, you know, I have
to do better to figure out howto present this in a way that, you
(31:27):
know, what we're really tryingto do is help people with those challenges
because it's so common. Sortof figure out some of the ways to
be resilient, the ways tomaybe reconnect, you know, but still
have to, you know, your mentalhealth comes first. I get that. Like,
you do have to take, you know,take. I'm not. I'm not necessarily
saying you must go deal withyour uncle, who's totally toxic and
(31:48):
you can't deal with. But maybethere's, you know, this. Some bridge
you can build a little bit.You know, maybe you can start some
kind of a dialogue. Maybe youcan. But, you know, there. There
may be others in your lifethat you can start to build some
of that bridge. And. And Ithink that's where I get frustrated
sometimes about peoplethinking my show is just about. Just
about politics. Like you'regonna just tell me, I don't know.
(32:11):
I have to get better atmessaging because those. That would
be the legacy that I'd love,is that I, you know, helped a hundred
people kind of reconnect inone of those, you know, some. Some
loved one with them, you know,kind of before it's too late, maybe
is. Maybe not quite the rightword, but you know what I mean?
I do. That's. That's. That'skind of what my show was designed
to do, too, is how do we beginto have conversations about. It started
(32:31):
out talking about race inAmerica because that. When I started
to show back in 2020, I mean,I was. That was a hot topic. Everybody
was hot and bothered about theGeorge Floyd thing, and we couldn't
talk, and everybody was angryand there were people upset. I'm
like, there's a deeper issue.How do we begin to have this conversation
in a way that bridges.Bridges. Gaps between. Bridges between
(32:53):
the two different sides. So,yeah, I get what you're saying. Hope,
is that we can encouragepeople and inspire them to realize
that there's. There's a much,much deeper conversation and more
ways that we can. We connectand can connect than ways that divide
us.
Yeah. And, you know, I work. Iworked a little bit in racial justice
around that same time period,and there are a lot of parallels,
(33:15):
for sure.
Yeah. So I got something newfor my guest issue. Pick a number.
We pick number one or numbertwo for your surprise question.
Okay, well, I gotta go with two.
Your surprise question is,what's the most awkward thing that
happens to you on a regular basis?
(33:36):
Well, I'm a fairly awkward guyin general. Right. So I think, yeah,
it's probably awkward justawkwardly introducing myself or awkwardly
saying hi to someone. Like,I'll. They'll say, how are you? And
I, you know, I'll say, youknow, blue. You know, you know, say
(33:56):
something like, not the answerto the question at all kind of thing.
You know, how are you? Yeah,my car is. I don't know, just something
weird like, okay, why. Why didI do that? What's wrong with me?
Why did I say that weird thing?
That's hilarious. I have totry that just for fun now. So where
can people find your podcastconnect with you on social media?
(34:16):
Yeah, that's great. So, yeah,well, of course, the main website
where we have all those links,so whatever platform you're listening
on, you can find it. There isoutrageoverload.net and that's also
where all my contact info is.But yeah, you could also obviously
search on your podcast playerplatform just for just outrage overload.
And we're. We're basicallyoutrage overload on. I only have
(34:40):
so many hours in the day, so Ispend probably more time on Instagram
than some of the othersocials, but we do have a Facebook
page with a Facebook group.Again, they're all named Outrage
Overload. So this should bepretty easy to find. And do we have
a blue sky? I think we have ablue sky as well. I don't get on
there very often, though, tobe honest.
I have one, too. I haven't.I've only been on a couple of times.
(35:02):
Yeah, I forget I have it mostof the time.
Yeah. U.S. independence. Imean, we just don't have a team of
people to handle our socialmedia for us.
I love that. So as we end, Iwant to kind of leave you with. Give
you a chance to kind of saythis. What. How do you. In terms
of your perspective on movingforward, what's your degree of hope
(35:23):
that this weekend, as acountry, resolve some of the outrage
that we have? Kind of give meyour. Your elevator speech for. Yeah,
I feel hopeful that we can. Wecan do something with this.
Yeah. Well. And I'm going tobe honest with you that it's a challenging
space. Like, you know, andI've talked to people that have been
in it for decades, and theystruggle with this. Like, every once
(35:45):
in a while they're going, whyam I doing this? It seems like we're
not getting any better. Itjust keeps getting worse. So it is.
It is definitely a challengingspace. And I. And I have, you know,
the encouraging days and Ihave the less encouraging days. But.
But overall, you know, I'mdoing it. I wouldn't be doing it
if I thought it was completelyhopeless. So. So I'm encouraged again,
like, sort of where I started,I'm encouraged by all the smart people
(36:08):
that are putting energy intothis and accepting it as a real problem.
So whether that's, you know,people doing the science in it that
I. That I talk to on the showor whether that's people that are,
you know, sort of doing thingswith these different organizations
and these practical tools. Sothose are the things that give me
the most hope that there's.It's. It's recognized as a problem
and there's really smartpeople looking at it. And, you know,
(36:29):
I'm. I think where I strugglethe most is that it's such a powerful.
It's such a powerful thingwith our human psyche that. That
worries me the most that, youknow, and it's happened. This kind
of division has occurredelsewhere. Like, we're like the.
We're like the first countryin the world of. The first. First
country in time, in all ofhistory to suffer. Suffer this. So
(36:52):
you know, we know that it cango sideways, and. And that's one
of the areas where people talkabout maybe that's the way we get
out of it. We hit some kind ofa rock bottom. I don't know what
rock bottom looks like forsure, but. But so. But that. That's
where I have. Have hope thatpeople have looked at a lot of this,
and we hopefully will be ableto look at some of that history and
(37:14):
realize, you know, I mean, oneof the guests that I had on talked
about, he's from Austria, andhe talked about, you know, in Austria,
interwar period in Austria,you know, they had division like
this, and then people on bothsides sat in jail together saying,
maybe we should have beennicer to each other.
(37:36):
Jill will do that to you.
Yeah.
We both end up in the same place.
Exactly.
Well, Dave, thanks so much forwhat you do, and I appreciate the
fact that you're in this spaceand that you're trying to be an encouraging
voice in this space to givepeople a better perspective or a
different perspective on. We.We can find ways to find common ground
(37:59):
and to talk with respect,because we don't want Thanksgiving
to be a time where we can't bewith each other because of our political
views or our toxicities. So Iappreciate anybody who's in this
space trying their best tobring about healing and reconciliation.
Yeah. And I have some similarthoughts towards the work you're
(38:19):
doing as well, Reverend.
Well, Dave, thank you so much.Have a great day.
You as well.
Welcome to becoming bridgebuilders. We're about to dive into
some deep ideas in shaping ourworld and the voices that drive change.
Today we're joined by someonewho's tackling one of the most pressing
issues of our time, politicalpolarization and the outrage culture
that fuels it. Our guest todayis David Beckermeyer, host of the
Outrage Overload podcast. Daveis a leading voice in media literacy
(01:20):
and civil discourse, drawingfrom social psychology and communication
studies to help us understandthe mechanisms behind outreach media.
He is here to share practicalstrategies to reduce toxic outrage
and foster unity in anincreasingly divided world. Whether
you're overwhelmed by thenoise or just curious about how we
got here, this conversation isone that you won't want to miss.
(01:43):
We welcome David to the show.Well, David, so good to have you
on.
Yeah, it's great to be here.
This is a topic that I'm suremany of us either are dealing with
anxiety because of, or we seeit in our lives or among our families
every day. So we're going totalk about this and really kind of
get some insights from youabout how we can move forward as
(02:06):
a, as a nation and as apeople. So I'm looking forward to
this conversation.
Yeah, it's impacting a lot of people.
Yeah. But I'm going to startout with my favorite question first.
What's the best piece ofadvice you ever received?
Yeah, it's. I always have tothink about this question because
there's probably more than oneI could choose because I'm old enough
(02:28):
that I get a lot of advice.But, you know, one that really sticks
with me is one that I think myfather in law is who said it. And
I don't think he even thoughtof it as advice, you know, but it,
but it really stuck with meanyway. I think it was just like
a passing comment, just, youknow, move on kind of thing. And
I was asking him, you know, Iwas, I was a young, young man and,
(02:50):
you know, kind of trying tofigure things out, like we all are
and, you know, what is, whatis the future like and how do we
do this? And you know, I was.And he had five kids by the time
he was pretty young, I wouldsay, like early 30s or something
like that. He already had fivekids and all this kind of stuff.
And I'm like, man, you know,how did you do that? You know, and,
and his answer is like, whatdo you mean how you just do it? You
know, And I don't think itmeant much to him, but it really
(03:12):
stuck with me that, thatcomment so.
Nike owes him a lot of moneythen, apparently.
Right.
Since they borrowed his thing.
I think a lot of it means tome is like, don't overthink everything,
buddy.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I likethat because you do. We get into
(03:32):
our side of our own heads andwe end up doing more damage by trying
to process everything andfigure everything out, but just like.
And just paralyzes us by thedecisions we're trying to make. So.
Yeah, I agree with that. Asyou think about your life, I'm curious,
like you'd mentioned we'reboth a little older and have lived
a little bit of a life. Whoare some people in your life and
(03:53):
your journey who served asmentors or inspiration for you?
Yeah, and it is similarbecause at different phases of my
life, I've definitely. I mean,I definitely kind of have a. Everybody
that if you can sort of find amentor, take advantage of it, like
every opportunity that youhave, you know, and for me, I was.
I was pretty lucky to have afew at different times, at different
(04:15):
stages in my. In my life. I. Ithink one of my first ones was like
a high school auto shopteacher. So I was, you know, I was
looked at as somebody that wasprobably destined for, you know,
definitely not like a highacademic career. Right. I think at
that time. And this guy sawsomething in me, and so he's teaching
(04:36):
me autoshop, supposedly, orI'm in his auto shop class, but down
on the side, he's teaching mephysics and math. And he actually
helped me get into a juniorcollege class, which he was able
to do the paperwork. So eventhough I wasn't supposedly, I think
he had to be 18 or something.I wasn't 18, but with a teacher's
recommendation or whatever,you could do that. So I was taking
(04:59):
a few college courses while Iwas in high school, and it changed
my life, you know, really,because I was on. I was not on a
great track at that point. Youknow, I didn't see a lot of future
for myself. And I thinkthere's a lot of young men that can
find themselves in that spacepretty easily. So that was, I think,
in some ways, you know,between him and junior college, in
a lot of ways, that saved mylife. So that's been one. And I've
(05:21):
had others over my career. Andsometimes it's that unexpected person
that ends up being a mentor.Right. I actually had an employee
that was a mentor to me in alot of ways. And, you know, because
it was. It was one that. Hewas one of those people that really
Modeled by behavior, not. Nottalking. Right. He didn't explain
things, but he modeled thatmodeled sort of excellence by in
(05:45):
behavior. And he served as amentor me, so I've had several and
my uncle when I was young wasalways a mentor that I'll always
have. So yeah, I've had many.So I've been lucky in that regard.
Yeah. If we get those peoplein your life who pour into you, it's
so meaningful to have thatinfluence. So I always like to give
people a chance to just kindof thank those people that have meant
(06:05):
so much to them because wedon't always think about it until
sometimes it's too late. Man,I wish I'd said something to them
while they were here. Justthank them for being in my life at
that moment. So this kind ofgives us a chance to stop and reflect
on those people who have beenso important to us and shaped who
we are.
Yeah, exactly. And don't beafraid to like, if you see somebody
you think could be a mentorfor you, just ask them, like have
(06:28):
a conversation about it.
Yeah, I had a guest on too. Hetalked about, you know, don't be
ashamed to be a mentor forsomebody else. If you see someone
you can pour into, take theopportunity if they're willing to
walk alongside them, pay itback or pay it forward.
Somebody said, oh, for sure.Yeah, 100%.
So you've had a very diversecareer spanning technology, entrepreneurship,
(06:49):
civil engagement. How did yourjourney lead you to focus on political
polarization and media influence?
Yeah, I mean, I think 10 yearsago if I told somebody what I'm doing
now, or I told them what I'mgoing to be doing in 10 years, they'd
be like, what? Like whokidnapped you and made you do this?
But yeah, I mean, I think alot of it was just the world we're
(07:11):
in. Right. I mean, lookaround. And I think seeing that and
having the time, I'm retired,so I've got some time to do it. I'm
kind of a science nerd. Sothat took me down the track of kind
of thinking about maybethere's some smart people, way smarter
than me that are sort oflooking at some of this and maybe
that can help us understand ita little. And there were, of course,
(07:31):
so that was a big piece of itthat I'm living in the same life
and environment that we're allin and seeing the same things, experiencing
the same things. And I justwanted to understand it better. And
I felt like, well, maybe I canbring some of this bridge, some of
that academic information to amore. A wider audience without. You
(07:53):
don't have to be a hardcorescientist. And I try not to make
it, you know, like a two hourlong academic to academic talk. I
try to make it, you know,presentable and try to make it flow
and interesting enough that'llkeep people around for half an hour
to get some, get some, youknow, a highlight of some of the
science out there. And sothat's kind of where how I ended
up here from that perspectiveat the tail end of my career. But
(08:15):
yeah, I mean, so mostly I'm inwhat I'm doing now because I was
retired and really gotinterested, got pulled into this
and it's a, you know, I thinkI also like as a, as a, with all
the things I've always done inmy, in my, throughout my life from
you know, my academic worldand then, and then professionally,
I've always liked sort ofchallenges. So with this space, I'm
(08:36):
really jumping from a placewhere I kind of had a reputation
and people know me and it wasalmost like a comfort zone, right
to this space where I don'tknow anything, I don't know anybody,
you know, I've got to startall over again. So that was maybe
just a challenge for me as well.
As you got into this space andthings you've discovered what's been
the most surprising thing foryou as you've gone on this journey
(08:58):
of discovery?
Yeah, I mean, I think in termsof surprising, it's probably that
we are as wired as humans. Wehave a lot of blind spots and that
(09:21):
can make it really a challengefor us because it's easy sometimes
to see some of thesebehaviors, some of these phenomenon
when sort of other people aredoing it. But we can be right in
the middle of it and notrealize we're doing it. And I think
that applies to a lot ofthings that have sort of a psychological
underpinning to them. But thatsurprises me a lot because I know
(09:42):
people that really presentthemselves as sort of a champion
of bridge building and youknow, are upset about the divisiveness
and this kind of thing. Butthen almost in the same sentence
they'll, they'll, they'll uselanguage and, and, and really, you
know, mop be mocking andthings like that. And like they just
don't realize they're doing itso they can hold on to those two.
(10:04):
And I sure do it too, right? Imean, I think that's the surprise,
right? That I think it reallytakes a village almost, I guess in
some way to really help yousee those things. You know, you have
to have some trusted peoplethat can tell you, dude, you're doing
the thing right now.
So tell us about your podcast,Outrage Overload. Tell us what got
(10:25):
you started doing that.
Yeah, so like I said, I waskind of witnessing and experiencing
sort of this divisiveenvironment that we live in and the
sort of the toxicity and thehostility and animosity and, you
know, anger and, of course,outrage, ultimately. Right. And.
And I started to see thispattern of there's so many sort of
(10:48):
provocateurs out there, if youwill, that kind of leverage outrage
for their own. For their ownbenefit. And sometimes it's even,
you know, not necessarily,like, nefarious. You just find yourself
in an echo chamber. And. Andit's just the way we start. We start
piling on the other side insome way. Right. And it's kind of
a. It, you know, it's. It'spart of that tribal mentality that
(11:11):
people have, and it kind ofmakes you feel more part of a group
and all that, but ultimatelyit's not necessarily good for us
in the longer term. And. Andso sort of witnessing all that and
then saying, well, I'm kind ofa science nerd. And. And I do. I
think there's other peoplelike that that are kind of interested
in some of the science goingon here. So maybe we could take some
(11:32):
of what we see going on insideof this partisan political realm
and say, well, maybe there'ssome underlying stuff that's interesting
about it. So we can talk aboutpolitics without talking about issues.
You know, we can too much. Wedon't really. We're not out there
promoting policy andpromoting, you know, specific issues
for the most part. I mean, thebiggest. The only place we would
(11:52):
do that is typically if it'san issue, like, here's a bipartisan
bill to promote bridgebuilding. Like, we might help support
that. But in general, youknow, we don't do that. So what we
do instead, we don't. So wedon't talk about issues. We sort
of talk about. How we talkabout politics is a little bit more
meta and. And how we talkabout politics, how we find ourselves,
you know, with this kind ofhostile attitude and participating
(12:12):
in it and just some of thescience around that. And then I also
talk to practitioners becausethat's the other thing I sort of
discovered as I, you know,moved in, learned more about what's
happening in this space outthere, is there's this whole world
of what I call practitioners.I don't know if that's the right
word. Exactly. But there's awhole bunch of organizations out
there that are sort of lookingat these problems and then looking
at practical ways to maybebring people together in dialogue
(12:36):
or maybe other ways to lowerwhat I kind of call in general this
kind of idea of lowering the temperature.
So I always hear that, and I'mnot a science nerd, but I have a
few friends who were, who saythat there are algorithms that intentionally
designed to kind of amplifythe outrage. In your studying of
(12:57):
this from a scientificperspective, are you noticing that
there are algorithms in thesocial media Sphere, in your YouTube,
your Google, that drivedivision or drive you to a certain
mindset?
Well, it's definitely afactor. And for the most part, most
(13:19):
of the experts, I've talked toquite a few about this topic because
it's of course, a very top ofmind one with a lot of people, including
myself. Most of the expertssort of don't see it like sort of
Mr. Burns, you know, sittingin the top, you know, in a building,
kind of coming up with thisway. We can, we can do that, but
it's a side effect, for themost part, it's a side effect of
(13:39):
this, you know, optimizing forengagement. So these social media
platforms, you know, they're,they're getting, they're incentivized
by revenue, they get money. Ifwe're on there, the more we stay
on there, the more we engagein it, the more comments we do, the
more time we spend on there.And that's by creating an algorithm.
You know, that was a turningpoint in all this is turning on algorithms.
(13:59):
Right. By creating analgorithm that benefits or tries
to get us engaged, they sortof accidentally, you could say, something
discovered, oh, well, thisstuff that kind of enrages people,
keeps them motivated, getsthem to engage, keeps them coming
back. But I guess the otherside of that though, is even though
(14:19):
maybe it wasn't intentionalinitially, they've done a lot of
research on this and they knowthey're doing it, right. And they
also know they could stopdoing it, but they also know that.
So they know, but that hitstheir bottom line, right? So they
don't want to stop doing it.In fact, they, there was cases where
they, they did experiments toshow that they could turn this off
and it worked like peoplewould calm down and find better things
(14:41):
to do. But of course that'snot good. They don't want that. Right.
So. So they aren't necessarilyguilty of kind of an overall plot
to tear us apart. ButUltimately, that's kind of what they're
doing because they're tryingto keep us engaged and keep us on
these platforms, and theseplatforms are not ideal platforms
to have difficult conversations.
You mentioned and kind of inyour bio that the assassination attempt
(15:05):
kind of impacted you. Tell usa little bit about, you know, what
about that event kind oftriggers you maybe more to talk about,
like, how do we stop this?Because we're going down. I would
say, and you've mentioned itto kind of a dangerous path if we
don't pull back and go, whoa,this is a. This has gone too far.
(15:26):
Right. And that. That's kindof what I was kind of hoping that
event might signal that kindof thought. I mean, we had a little
bit of that at 9 11. After 911, there was some kind of coming
together and saying maybe, youknow, things need to calm down and
we need to work together alittle better. I was kind of hoping
maybe that event or some ofthese other events could maybe be
a trigger to be a catalyst forthinking about that. Like, look,
(15:49):
this is kind of going too far,right? This is kind of where this
leads. And we kind of knowthis because we've seen it in other
countries around the world.And so it was an event. I would kind
of hope to do that.Unfortunately, it kind of just didn't
stick, and we've kind of movedon already. Probably within a. Yeah,
I know maybe a month youcould. Could have given it. I don't
(16:10):
know. But it's. And I washoping, you know, that we could maybe
take advantage of that andhighlight that as a. Whichever side
you're on, you know, this isnot a direction we really want to
go in. And. Yeah, so that's.That's a. I think that's a big factor
in all this. That reallyconcerns me that, like I said, I'm
hopeful because there's somany people kind of looking at this.
(16:31):
There are a lot of solutionsthat could work if we could find
the will to implement some ofthem. But, yeah, I'm concerned because
this escalating. It's just anescalating spiral where each side.
And I think you end up. Whatwe see is that it's almost like preventive.
It's almost like people thinkthe other side's gonna do this thing.
(16:53):
So as a preventive measure,I'm gonna do it first. Right. And
now you've done it. And theother side said, hey, they did this
thing. Now we're gonna do thisthing. And as you build this animosity
towards each other, which isthe big place we are. It's more of
a psychological thing than itis an issue separation. It's more,
we don't like the other side,and we think they're immoral. And
(17:15):
that just continues. I mean,you know a lot about morality in
your work, and that justcontinues to sort of dehumanize,
and it creates opportunitiesto dehumanize and, you know, become
so righteous in a way on yourpolitical ideology that suddenly
you can justify doing badthings. And a lot of bad things have
happened in the name of mymorality is better than yours.
(17:38):
I want to dig into somethingyou just said because I think it's
important. You said, a lot oftimes we don't realize that we're
being. That we're also part ofthe problem. How do you help people
realize that even the languageyou're using is also contributing
to the outrage that you'recausing someone else? I mean, we
(18:00):
can see it in the other guy.It's like it is a famous line in
the Bible. You know, I can seethe speck in my brother's eye, but
I can't see the plank in myown eyes. So how do we see the speck
in our eyes? How do we see howwe contribute to the outreach? How
do you help people identify that?
Yeah, it's really hard, firstof all, because of the way human
brains work. We're really goodat sort of seeing what we want to
(18:21):
see. Um, but the first step,of course, is intentionality, right?
So the first step is saying,you know, I want to be. I, I, I want
to try to see it in myself,which is a big step for a lot of
people. They don't reallycare. They're doing fine. They just
keep doing what they're doing.But, but if you take that step of
intentionality, then you canperform some active, active measures.
(18:43):
So, you know, one is if youhave a trusted friend there, somebody
that you trust that you knowdoesn't have, they don't have to
call you out publicly, butthat you trust to say, hey, you know,
when I talked about thisthing, what do you think someone
on the other side might thinkof what I'm writing or what I'm saying
or what I'm. My thoughts onit, or. And like you say, even just
the language I'm using, right?Because many times, especially if
(19:03):
we're in our bubbles, we'renot like intentionally trying to
rile anybody up. It's just thelanguage we use in our information
sphere. And we don't reallyrealize that some of Those words
are maybe triggers or havebeen sort of weaponized by some people.
And we're just using thesewords that we think are kind of normal,
but they can be taken as beingweaponized. So it can be as simple
as that. So that's one thingis you can kind of, if you can have
(19:25):
some people that can helpcheck you a little bit because they're
like you say, the easiest wayis to have somebody else that can
see it before you do. And Ithink, I actually think something
like AI like, you know, couldactually help a little bit too. Like
I'm, I believe this thing or Iheard this thing and my position
on it looks like this, youknow, it somehow ask the AI, like
(19:46):
do you think that's a partisanposition or do you think that's contributing
to toxicity, or do you thinkit's a polarizing view that could
be harmful or, ordisrespectful in some way or something
like that? I think AI hasopportunity to that if we choose
to use it that way. Right. Itcan also obviously be used in lots
of bad ways. But if we chooseit to use it that way, that's one
(20:06):
thing that could probablyhelp. I mean, I think AI is pretty
neutral. I mean, I know thatit is. You know, there's been some
studies to show it leans tothe left primarily because the information
it's pulling from especially,you know, media sources lean left
somewhat. But it's pretty goodabout questions like that. Like if
you say is this a reasonableway to looking at it or is this possibly,
(20:26):
you know, politically toxic?It's pretty good about that. Whether
the thing sort of would bepolitically toxic or you know, inflaming
to somebody on the right orsomebody on the left. So that can
be one way and I think anotheris just cooling off a little bit
and asking yourself, do Ireally have the full picture here?
Because if we're looking atinformation in our information silo
(20:48):
with our like minded folks,we're seeing necessarily like most
people probably aren't tryingto tell us lies and straight up lies.
Sure it happens, the mediasometimes straight up lies. But more
often, the more reality, morereal picture that is very common
is they're just sort ofleaving things out. They're kind
of creating a narrative tomake it maybe sound worse than it
really is to sort of get youriled up. Because again, that media
(21:10):
is also driven by engagementand likes and clicks and all that
stuff. So they have the sameincentives to kind of get your attention
and get you riled up. So thisArticle might be designed that way,
and sometimes it's justunintentional because again, even
the guy writing that article,the person writing that article is
in the same psychological waytoo, and may not even realize they're
using inflammatory languageeither. Right. Or may not even realize
(21:31):
that they have a very sort ofa more biased view than you might
think, things like that. So itcan come out as a narrative that
gets you more riled up. Andthen when you look at it, you find,
oh, well, wait, it wasn't thatbad. When you put it in context a
little more or you add alittle bit, you know, some of the
other facts that were sort ofleft out, you know, it's not as bad
as they'd made it out to be.So that's always a good question
(21:53):
to ask yourself, am I. Is itreally as bad as they're presenting
it? Or maybe there's some moredata here that I could go find. And,
and unfortunately, all thesethings are heavy lifts for us to
do because our first Nreaction is to go, yeah, I'm really
mad about that.
Right. So when we start outwith that idiot, it's probably not
a good way to reduce the outrage.
(22:15):
Right? Right. Yeah, yeah,yeah. It's many of the folks that,
the practitioner space thatI'm talking about, there's a lot
of work going on and building,you know, digital tools and tools
to help with some of this. SoI do think over the next couple of
years we're going to. I'veseen some of the prototypes, but
I think a lot of this stuff isgoing to get more widely available,
and a lot of it is using AIand, you know, sort of AI for good,
(22:39):
if you will. And I think therewill be a lot more tools to help
us with some of this, so I'mencouraged by that.
So give me some examples ofthings you see coming down the pike
that would help with some ofour outrage.
Yeah, one of them is a lot ofpeople are doing things with, like
depolarizing chatbots. So theidea that instead of you just. Instead
(23:02):
of it just giving an answerlike a normal chatbot, it might come
back. Some examples are comingback with things like, well, here's
what. How someone on, like,you present an issue. Like, I think
everybody. That everybodyshould just have to buy a gun. Right.
So I'm going to put out someopinion. And then it would say, well,
here's what someone on theleft might say about that. Here's
what someone on the rightmight say about that. And then they'll
(23:22):
often Give like a third andit's not necessarily a center. Like
one of them is calleddepolarizing GPT and it's alternative,
its third option is notnecessarily a center position the
way you might think. It's justsplitting the difference. It's more
an integrated values 1. Sowhat it tries to do is say, well,
the left kind of values thesethings, the right kind of values
(23:42):
these things. And so I canpresent a response that integrates
some of those values. Sothat's one example. There's also
a lot of examples of likehelpers in dialogue, right? So say
you're getting an onlineconversation. You could have a, the
tool could almost be like, ifyou think of like a Grammarly tool
(24:03):
that sort of like can beforeyou type the thing, can kind of inspect
it and do some typos or fixyour grammar and things like that.
These tools could say, hey,wait a minute here, this one place
where you're saying this, youknow, that's. Do you really want
to say it that way? Like youwant to take a breath first? Or you
know, there's, here's threeother ways where you could sort of
make that point without alsosort of, you know, either being really
(24:26):
generally hateful orindividually hateful or somehow generalize
people into a category thatyou may not be right or like it's
not appropriate for thisconversation. So there's things like
that, they're like, that willsort of help you maybe settle down
a little bit before yourespond and maybe just capture bigger
(24:47):
input on it too. Like thosesame kind of tools can say, hey,
here's some more context. Likeyou're kind of angry about this thing.
Here's some more context aboutit. Right? So, and you can decide
then what do I want to do withthat extra context? But it might
just tell you a little bit.Well, the person said this thing,
but it was kind of in responseto this, not what they're presenting
it to be in response to thingslike that. Like oh, oh, well that
makes more sense in thatcontext or whatever, right? So there's
(25:09):
tools like that. So it's a lotof the things are along those lines
helping us better withdialogue. One, one project is happening
with, you know, they jump talkabout jumping into the deep end.
They've been working onconversations between Israelis and
Palestine, Palestinians andthey've been conducting these conversations
for, you know, quite a while,quite a number of years. And they've,
(25:32):
you know, been improving it,improving it and taking it more and
more from sort of humanmoderation and human assistance.
To more and more AI, and AImoderation. And moderation may not
even be the right word. It'smore like an AI assistant in the
conversation, and they're ableto have dialogue there with folks
that generally or have a hardtime with that, as you probably know.
(25:55):
So there's a lot of thingslike that happening, and I'm really
encouraged by a lot of theefforts being put into that now.
Some of it takes some will,but a lot of efforts are trying to
be done without that. Don'tneed, you know, to go get help from
the social media platforms.Right. They work. They can work outside
it or alongside it, so youdon't have to go get the cooperation
of social media companies.
(26:16):
So this is something that Ican tell you're passionate about.
Do you sense that's somethingthat more and more people are becoming
aware of? The fact that. Ijust. I'm really tired of the atmosphere,
the outrage. I really wish wecould just tone down. I think as
I interview a lot of people onmy podcast, I discover that more
people are in the center thanon the extremes. And I think my sense
(26:39):
is more and more people arejust frustrated with. Why can't we
just talk and haveconversation? I'm not on either.
At either of these twoextremes. Are you finding more and
more people are kind of in thecenter of this battle between both
sides?
Well, yes. I'll do sort of ayes end here because there's a lot
of data, you know, talkingabout how. I mean, first of all,
(27:02):
I have a problem. I have achallenge about the. I think the
whole paradigm of left andright is kind of broken. But that's
probably maybe anotherconversation we could have. But there's
a lot of data and a lot ofresearch that shows that, you know,
most people, there's this ideaof sort of the exhausted majority
that are, you know, tired ofkind of the both sides fighting and,
you know, and they'recertainly more moderate in terms
of the rhetoric they want tohear and things like that. They still
(27:25):
might hold, you know, strongpositions on certain things, but
they're less tribal. I mean,that's a big, big problem that we
have, is that we're. We don'treally. We don't even know we care
about the issues, but we'retold to care about it. So you're
supposed to think this wayabout these five things. And if we
really step back, do we reallycare about all five of those things
that much? Like, you know,things like that. And we know that
(27:46):
that majority is out there,right? So you can call them center,
you can call them a lot ofdifferent names, but. And more people
are registering or declaringthemselves to be independent too,
right? I mean, there's moreindependents than there are Republicans
and Democrats combined. Ithink that's an indicator that that
space exists. Right. That it'sreal, you know, but. So yeah, it's
(28:07):
definitely out there. And Ithink. And it's real. And I think
that's where these people thatare willing to break with their tribe
are probably the biggest thingthat can pull us out of this. Because
it's a hard emotional orpsychological thing to do. Right.
To break with your tribe. It'srisky, right? If I break with my
tribe, I might get kicked outof my tribe and then where do I live?
(28:30):
And a lot of the people thatwe're talking about even call themselves
kind of politically homeless.Right. Like they don't really know.
Neither party really servesthem and there's no real third party
option that's viable either.So they do feel politically homeless.
And yeah, so those people areprobably who is going to get out.
But I will add one aspect ofthat a little bit because I talk
to a lot of people and I alsotalk to a lot of experts on this.
(28:52):
But even I do some sort of nonscientific, what I call kind of these
man on the street interviewswhere I talk to a lot of people about
a lot of this and it'ssomewhat self selective of course,
because they agreed to talk tome. But you know, they, they all
say they want to lower therhetoric and lower the temperature
in some way. But then at thesame time, when you probe that a
(29:13):
little deeper, what they,their way to do that is to convince
the other person to think theright, you know, so it's, it's, that's
true of a lot of people too.And it's natural. Like I get that.
Like they think if I couldjust convince them then we wouldn't
fight anymore. That's what mywife says. If I would just do what
she says, we wouldn't be fighting.
Exactly. That makes sense. Soas you, as you think about the impact
(29:38):
you want to have in yourlegacy, what do you want your legacy
to be?
Yeah, I mean, I think withthis show, you know, and I get some
of these kind of commentsalready and I've had people literally
say, you know, I was, youknow, considering suicide and I listened
to some of your episodes andnow I'm like, wait, whoa, this is
(29:59):
like too much for me. I can'thandle that. But, you know, but I.
So I think The. You know, soI'm not. I'm one little show, but
I think, you know, as part ofthis larger network or this larger
sort of coalition, if I canhelp, you know, sort of six people,
like, maybe reconnect withtheir uncle or their brother or,
(30:21):
you know, somebody in theirfamily, a good friend, you know,
in some way that, you know, ifI can help them build some of the
tools and understand or evenwant to do that, because that's what
I'm saddened by the most. Itseems like almost everybody has a
story like that. You know,like, I don't go home for Thanksgiving
anymore because my brotherthis, my uncle that, or I don't talk
(30:42):
to Uncle Jones anymore, orhe's not invited as Thanksgiving
or whatever it might be.Everybody seems to have stories like
that. Certainly people haveeither experienced one side or the
other sort of getting blockedor unfriended on Facebook or something
like that. And these storiesreally saddened me because, you know,
part of what trying to do hereis message that those are the people
(31:06):
I really want to reach andtalk to and help. But it's hard for
someone to look at my show. Imean, I have to get better. I have
to figure out how to messagethat, because people think my show
is going to sort of be aboutpolitics, and I'm sort of tired of
talking about politicsanymore. Right. So, you know, I have
to do better to figure out howto present this in a way that, you
(31:27):
know, what we're really tryingto do is help people with those challenges
because it's so common. Sortof figure out some of the ways to
be resilient, the ways tomaybe reconnect, you know, but still
have to, you know, your mentalhealth comes first. I get that. Like,
you do have to take, you know,take. I'm not. I'm not necessarily
saying you must go deal withyour uncle, who's totally toxic and
(31:48):
you can't deal with. But maybethere's, you know, this. Some bridge
you can build a little bit.You know, maybe you can start some
kind of a dialogue. Maybe youcan. But, you know, there. There
may be others in your lifethat you can start to build some
of that bridge. And. And Ithink that's where I get frustrated
sometimes about peoplethinking my show is just about. Just
about politics. Like you'regonna just tell me, I don't know.
(32:11):
I have to get better atmessaging because those. That would
be the legacy that I'd love,is that I, you know, helped a hundred
people kind of reconnect inone of those, you know, some. Some
loved one with them, you know,kind of before it's too late, maybe
is. Maybe not quite the rightword, but you know what I mean?
I do. That's. That's. That'skind of what my show was designed
to do, too, is how do we beginto have conversations about. It started
(32:31):
out talking about race inAmerica because that. When I started
to show back in 2020, I mean,I was. That was a hot topic. Everybody
was hot and bothered about theGeorge Floyd thing, and we couldn't
talk, and everybody was angryand there were people upset. I'm
like, there's a deeper issue.How do we begin to have this conversation
in a way that bridges.Bridges. Gaps between. Bridges between
(32:53):
the two different sides. So,yeah, I get what you're saying. Hope,
is that we can encouragepeople and inspire them to realize
that there's. There's a much,much deeper conversation and more
ways that we can. We connectand can connect than ways that divide
us.
Yeah. And, you know, I work. Iworked a little bit in racial justice
around that same time period,and there are a lot of parallels,
(33:15):
for sure.
Yeah. So I got something newfor my guest issue. Pick a number.
We pick number one or numbertwo for your surprise question.
Okay, well, I gotta go with two.
Your surprise question is,what's the most awkward thing that
happens to you on a regular basis?
(33:36):
Well, I'm a fairly awkward guyin general. Right. So I think, yeah,
it's probably awkward justawkwardly introducing myself or awkwardly
saying hi to someone. Like,I'll. They'll say, how are you? And
I, you know, I'll say, youknow, blue. You know, you know, say
(33:56):
something like, not the answerto the question at all kind of thing.
You know, how are you? Yeah,my car is. I don't know, just something
weird like, okay, why. Why didI do that? What's wrong with me?
Why did I say that weird thing?
That's hilarious. I have totry that just for fun now. So where
can people find your podcastconnect with you on social media?
(34:16):
Yeah, that's great. So, yeah,well, of course, the main website
where we have all those links,so whatever platform you're listening
on, you can find it. There isoutrageoverload.net and that's also
where all my contact info is.But yeah, you could also obviously
search on your podcast playerplatform just for just outrage overload.
And we're. We're basicallyoutrage overload on. I only have
(34:40):
so many hours in the day, so Ispend probably more time on Instagram
than some of the othersocials, but we do have a Facebook
page with a Facebook group.Again, they're all named Outrage
Overload. So this should bepretty easy to find. And do we have
a blue sky? I think we have ablue sky as well. I don't get on
there very often, though, tobe honest.
I have one, too. I haven't.I've only been on a couple of times.
(35:02):
Yeah, I forget I have it mostof the time.
Yeah. U.S. independence. Imean, we just don't have a team of
people to handle our socialmedia for us.
I love that. So as we end, Iwant to kind of leave you with. Give
you a chance to kind of saythis. What. How do you. In terms
of your perspective on movingforward, what's your degree of hope
(35:23):
that this weekend, as acountry, resolve some of the outrage
that we have? Kind of give meyour. Your elevator speech for. Yeah,
I feel hopeful that we can. Wecan do something with this.
Yeah. Well. And I'm going tobe honest with you that it's a challenging
space. Like, you know, andI've talked to people that have been
in it for decades, and theystruggle with this. Like, every once
(35:45):
in a while they're going, whyam I doing this? It seems like we're
not getting any better. Itjust keeps getting worse. So it is.
It is definitely a challengingspace. And I. And I have, you know,
the encouraging days and Ihave the less encouraging days. But.
But overall, you know, I'mdoing it. I wouldn't be doing it
if I thought it was completelyhopeless. So. So I'm encouraged again,
like, sort of where I started,I'm encouraged by all the smart people
(36:08):
that are putting energy intothis and accepting it as a real problem.
So whether that's, you know,people doing the science in it that
I. That I talk to on the showor whether that's people that are,
you know, sort of doing thingswith these different organizations
and these practical tools. Sothose are the things that give me
the most hope that there's.It's. It's recognized as a problem
and there's really smartpeople looking at it. And, you know,
(36:29):
I'm. I think where I strugglethe most is that it's such a powerful.
It's such a powerful thingwith our human psyche that. That
worries me the most that, youknow, and it's happened. This kind
of division has occurredelsewhere. Like, we're like the.
We're like the first countryin the world of. The first. First
country in time, in all ofhistory to suffer. Suffer this. So
(36:52):
you know, we know that it cango sideways, and. And that's one
of the areas where people talkabout maybe that's the way we get
out of it. We hit some kind ofa rock bottom. I don't know what
rock bottom looks like forsure, but. But so. But that. That's
where I have. Have hope thatpeople have looked at a lot of this,
and we hopefully will be ableto look at some of that history and
(37:14):
realize, you know, I mean, oneof the guests that I had on talked
about, he's from Austria, andhe talked about, you know, in Austria,
interwar period in Austria,you know, they had division like
this, and then people on bothsides sat in jail together saying,
maybe we should have beennicer to each other.
(37:36):
Jill will do that to you.
Yeah.
We both end up in the same place.
Exactly.
Well, Dave, thanks so much forwhat you do, and I appreciate the
fact that you're in this spaceand that you're trying to be an encouraging
voice in this space to givepeople a better perspective or a
different perspective on. We.We can find ways to find common ground
(37:59):
and to talk with respect,because we don't want Thanksgiving
to be a time where we can't bewith each other because of our political
views or our toxicities. So Iappreciate anybody who's in this
space trying their best tobring about healing and reconciliation.
Yeah. And I have some similarthoughts towards the work you're
(38:19):
doing as well, Reverend.
Well, Dave, thank you so much.Have a great day.
You as well.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!