Here's a question I don't think we ask enough: What are we actually afraid of when we avoid genuine conversations with people who hold different political views?
The surface answer is usually something about not wanting to waste time on "bad faith" arguments or not wanting to legitimize "harmful" ideas. But in my work helping groups navigate conflict, I've learned that the surface explanation is rarely the whole story.
So let me ask a different question: What if the real fear isn't about their ideas at all, but about what engaging with those ideas might mean for our sense of who we are?
The Identity Protection Instinct
I work with a lot of smart, accomplished people who get genuinely uncomfortable when they hit the limits of their knowledge. Not because they can't handle being wrong about facts, but because "not knowing" feels threatening to their professional identity.
The same thing happens with political identity. We've often built our sense of self around being the kind of person who believes X and rejects Y. In this worldview, genuine curiosity about Y doesn't just risk changing our mind on an issue; it risks changing who we think we are.
And if our social connections, our sense of belonging, our reputation within our community all depend on being that kind of person... well, curiosity starts to feel genuinely dangerous.
Most folks I work with come to me resistant, full of assumptions, and confident in their perspectives. To get them to a wiser space, I don't start by challenging their positions. This is almost guaranteed to result in them solidifying their fortifications against opposing perspectives. Instead, I start by understanding what those positions do for them.
So, here are some questions worth sitting with to better understand yourself, and what your positions do for you:
What would it mean about me if I genuinely listened to someone from the "other side?"
Would your friends question your loyalty? Would you lose credibility in your professional circles? Would you have to admit you don't know something you've been confident about?
What would it mean about my community if some of their concerns turned out to be valid?
If the "other side" isn't just ignorant or malicious, if they're responding to real problems we haven't acknowledged, what does that say about our own understanding? About our group's wisdom?
What would I have to give up if I took their perspective seriously?
Sometimes it's not just about changing a policy position. Sometimes it's about acknowledging that people we've dismissed might have insights we need. That's a harder pill to swallow.
The Belonging Trap
Our political communities often demand purity as the price of membership. Not just policy agreement, but emotional agreement. The right enemies, the right tone, the right level of outrage.
I see this in organizational work, too. Teams get stuck because admitting the "other department" might have a point feels like betrayal of your own people. The loyalty test becomes more important than the problem-solving.
But here's what I've noticed about belonging: the groups that demand intellectual conformity are usually the most fragile. They require constant reinforcement of shared enemies and shared certainties because the belonging is built on opposition rather than purpose.
What kind of belonging do you actually want?
Do you want to belong to a group that requires you to remain incurious about half of the country? To assume the worst about people you've never really tried to understand? Do you want to belong to a group where your membership depends on never admitting uncertainty or complexity?
Or do you want to call your group to become a community that can handle nuance, that values truth-seeking over group loyalty, and that's secure enough in its principles to examine them honestly?
Here's a diagnostic question:
When you imagine having a genuinely curious conversation with someone from the "other side," what's the first concern that comes up? Is it about the conversation itself, or about what your people would think of you for having it?
If it's the latter, that tells you something important about the nature of your belonging. You're not just protecting your beliefs – you're protecting your social position within a group that might punish curiosity.
Another question worth exploring:
What would it mean about your community if they couldn't handle you engaging thoughtfully with different perspectives? Would that be a community worth protecting your place in?
I've worked with teams where people were genuinely afraid to suggest ideas that hadn't been pre-approved by the group consensus.
You can probably guess the result.
The creativity died. The problem-solving stopped. Everyone became focused on maintaining their position rather than advancing the work.
Political communities can fall into the same trap. When belonging requires intellectual conformity, we stop thinking and start performing. And performance isn't curiosity.
Which brings me to my next point.
The Security to Be Curious
The people who can engage genuinely across political lines aren't necessarily braver than everyone else. They're often just more secure in their core identity.
They know the difference between their deepest values and their current political positions. They can hold their beliefs strongly while remaining curious about their applications. They care more about being effective than about being consistent.
But here's what I've learned from years of helping people navigate difficult conversations: security isn't something you either have or don't have. It's something you can build.
Consider the difference between being right and being effective
A diagnostic question:
When you think about changing your mind on a political issue, what feels most threatening: being wrong about the facts, or what being wrong would mean about your judgment, your intelligence, your group membership?
If it's the latter, you're protecting your identity rather than pursuing truth. And that's understandable. But, it's also a form of intellectual insecurity.
Security comes from knowing what won't change about you
The most secure people I work with have a clear sense of their core mission that transcends their current strategies. They can pivot, adapt, even admit they were completely wrong about tactics, because they know their fundamental purpose remains constant.
Try these reflections
What is your core mission in engaging with politics at all? Is it to be right? To belong? To signal your values? Or is it to actually make progress on problems you care about?
If it's the latter, then curiosity becomes a tool rather than a threat. Any information that helps you be more effective in service of that mission becomes valuable, regardless of where it comes from.
What would you need to believe about the other person to be genuinely curious about their view?
Usually, it's something like: they're intelligent, they care about their community, they're responding to real problems they've observed. Try assuming that and see what shifts in your ability to listen.
What would you need to believe about your own community to risk disagreeing with them?
Would you need to believe that they can handle complexity? That they value truth-seeking over group loyalty? That they'd rather you be genuinely helpful than consistently agreeable? That they trust your judgment enough to let you think for yourself?
Here's the deeper question
If your community couldn't handle you engaging curiously with different perspectives, what would that tell you about their confidence in their own ideas?
Secure communities don't need to protect their members from exposure to different thinking. They trust that good ideas can withstand scrutiny and that their people are smart enough to think critically.
Insecure communities require intellectual isolation to maintain cohesion. Which kind do you want to belong to?
The Questions That Break Through
When someone expresses a political view that activates your in/out-group alarm bells, instead of debating the position, try getting curious about the experience behind it:
- "What have you seen that leads you to that conclusion?"
- "What would need to change for you to feel differently about this?"
- "What are you most concerned about if we went in the other direction?"
- "What am I not understanding about how this affects people in your situation?"
These questions bypass the identity threat because you're not challenging who they are – you're trying to understand what they've experienced.
Wrapping Things Up
Here's what I've learned: sustainable solutions require understanding all the perspectives that will need to support them. You can't solve complex problems by only listening to people who already agree with you.
This isn't about compromise for its own sake. It's about building solutions that actually work in the real world, with real people, including the ones who currently oppose you.
But it requires a different kind of courage than we usually talk about in politics. Not the courage to fight, but the courage to remain curious. Not the courage to be right, but the courage to be changed by what you learn.
And, sometimes, the courage to disappoint your own group in service of something larger.
