Reference no: EM133315402

Question: Given what you have learned about political ideology and Congress, consider the claims made by the Governors in the video "How these 3 governors say we can overcome political polarization". Can you think of any conditions that might help mend the growing ideological divide in the US? Do you think this is likely? Why or why not. Once you have completed your initial post, reply to another student's initial post. Engage with their post by considering their arguments in section 3.

Case Study: Political polarization is when members of a certain group tend to believe and act more extreme once surrounded by its own members and beliefs are strengthened. Legislators and congress men and women are all involved in their own parties and once it is time to negotiate for common ground something like group polarization gets in the way because it has become so side vs side. Political parties can no longer agree on fundamental problems that plague society because there is no common ground anymore, either someone agrees or disagrees with the party there is no in between and this causes a lack of progression in the United States. Each side makes their own "facts" and can no longer look at another sides proposals because to do that would compromise the group, therefore leading to further polarization.

Something like the "fact gap" is a perfect example about how group polarization might grow stronger and more opinionated. One example of this is pulled from the podcast where they mention climate change. Either one side believes climate change is a human caused issue while the other side may say it simply does not exist. Fact is no longer held in any value and once fact is used in a debate it immediatelty is disregarded, strengthening that divide. Covid-19 was also used as an example where it was because of this fact gap that there were so many differing opinions and misinformation about the virus as well as the vaccines that will continue forever because of the polarization these groups may have. This further grows the political divide and this has led to different groups getting different information from different sources, eventually creating an inevitable clash of ideologies that the country will suffer for because of the lack of unity. In the podcast Ditto discusses something that has interested him in this topic called "motivated skeptisism". Skeptisism is a normal thing and most information should and is naturally questioned, whether that be the source of the information or its context. However it is the certian biases that groups have to immediatelty dismiss information or come up with an answer as to why it would be wrong, regardless of the informations validity and this is what Ditto means by motivated skepticism. It is the rejection of differing information that creates a huge divide in the country and adds to political polarization and adds fuel to that fire.

Governor Larry Hogan discusses the hope and belief that the majority of Americans will understand that the political divide hurts everyone and that there is a common hope to strive for unity. He also states that "There is more that unites us as Americans than that which divides us" (Hogan). Governor Tom Wolf believes that it is important to listen to the other side in the debate and respect different view points and respect people in general in order to listen to each other. Gov. Chris Sununu believes empathy is the key to coming together and that there is hope. I believe that some of what each governor said is beneficial to creating unity and closing that divide. I also believe it is a difficult task to have people listen to each other and have more respect and empathy when there is such a political divide. I have hope and I wish that there was more common ground and more transparency but it is the lack of these values that creates such hostility and I believe it will take a great amount of time. I wish fact was regarded more than opinion but because it is not it creates these tensions that tend to blow up, creating even more of a divide.