* The following was an invited talk held on January 15, 2025 at the Portneuf Inn of Court, Pocatello, ID

Civility is a concept that starts with presuming the best from others to promote respectful dialogue. Whether in a state or federal legislature, boardroom, courtroom, or living room, civility is a byproduct of mindful listening and the willingness to collaborate.

Civility is both honest and productive, though it’s also uncomfortable and fraught with uncertainty, requiring a surprising level of patience and care when speaking and listening. The responsibility of maintaining civility rests equally upon the shoulders of those participating.

But it’s also important to define what civility is NOT…

Civility is not shouting louder so you’re heard.

Civility is not domination, nor is it a contest to be won or lost.

Civility is not limited to being polite, affable, and orderly.

Civility does not commence with force, nor does it require luring someone into a conversation already loaded with the verbal equivalent of landmines.

Civil discourse begins with an invitation to share dialogue and exchange ideas — not agree on ideas — for the sole purpose of understanding.

And through understanding, we find progress, innovation, and we challenge both ourselves and others in the pursuit of growth.

The necessity for civility is now both as desperate as it is painfully clear. Polarization and partisanship have pitted neighbors and families against each other, creating an environment steeped in distrust and fear, where those who disagree are perceived as threats.

Civility provides space for confronting discomfort and wrestling with challenging issues to deliberate our solutions, take action, engage with one another respectfully, and work toward resolution — even if we still disagree afterward.

Though I’m now a recovering professor, I used to feel that it was problematic when I saw students and faculty hesitant to engage or would downright avoid conversations on divisive topics. As I saw civility wane, previously benign courses like public speaking or intercultural communication became fertile ground in which conflict blossomed.

The two most common objectives from any of the courses I taught included critical thinking and exploration of diverse perspectives, yet despite my attempt to facilitate constructive dialogue, that chasm widened year after year as society’s default attitude toward one another grew into being wary, suspicious, or even paranoid when considering dialogue around polarized issues.

I saw professors quell discussion if remotely adjacent to these topics, seeking to avoid inflammatory conflict in their classrooms, including virtual classes. That’s antithetical to what it means to learn, especially for higher education, as it fails to guide students and model productive, civil discourse.

I have no doubt we can still engage with each other, even on the most challenging topics if we approach them with civility. In a world where polarization is now the norm, where people fight over anything from large topics like the economy or healthcare, to dilemmas like where to park at Costco if you go on a Saturday.

Civility is now our moral imperative. We have to learn to navigate disagreements without devolving into animosity and disrespect.

Civility empowers us to wrestle with opposing ideas until we find mutual understanding.

Civility persuades others with a delicate balance of both reason AND emotion. We can no longer afford to ignore our emotions as a defining feature of humanity.

Civility recognizes that humanity in one another. By sheltering ourselves and avoiding dialogue on tough topics simply because we’re uncomfortable experiencing the pangs of uncertainty, anxiety, and potential conflict…

We self-impose restrictions on our own development.

We grow stagnant as we stifle potential for innovation.

We suppress opportunities for connection with others.

We cease articulation of viewpoints as the world around continues requiring flexibility, resilience, and adaptation.

We eliminate critical reflection on our beliefs, preventing us from growing further.

We remove the possibility for respectful engagement, especially among those who think differently.

Avoiding uncomfortable conversations leads to avoiding the topics that matter most to us — topics we hold dearly, woven into the foundational values of our identities. Despite the discomfort, engaging in civil discourse allows us to develop empathy and open-mindedness while offering the potential for harmony even for the most diametrically opposing views, and to occur, it isn’t all about what we say…

Its ability to thrive depends on how well we listen mindfully — communication works only when both halves — sending AND receiving — are fulfilled successfully.

For me to convey a message, I have to package and deliver it to the recipients so that they understand its content and also the peripheral meaning or intent. This is the half of communication that has become the focal point of formal communication education and more informal communication training and development.

Simply stated, we all have an innate and instinctive desire to be heard. With our ever-increasing range of communication technology and outlets through which we can express ourselves, our society has become a cacophony of voices all vying for attention.

Meanwhile, the other half of communication — listening — is frequently ignored or glossed over, relegated it to a passive or less-than status.

We all want to be heard but few are willing to listen.

Here’s the kicker — upon receiving a message, there is an overwhelmingly complex series of processes that must come together to result in understanding, starting with sensory input.

Listening is more than something we do with our ears; it’s the act of absorbing input/stimuli from the world around us. While our 5 senses (okay, maybe 6) act as sensors, relaying input from our immediate surroundings, it is impossible for our brains to pay attention to all of them.

For example, it’s estimated that we are bombarded with anywhere from 5,000 to 10,000 persuasive messages every single day. We cannot physically notice and comprehend that many because we’d go mad.

This means the first barrier to listening is selection — where we direct our attention. Selection determines everything we think about, so if we don’t notice certain input, then regardless of its objective existence, it simply doesn’t exist, at least according to our minds.

This is why, when two people share the exact same experience, they’ll typically recount two similar yet different stories. If we presume they both tell the truth, don’t exaggerate or minimize, and keep their facts from getting distorted, then both accounts are true. Each account simply shares a different slice from the same reality pie.

Where we direct our attention is determined by a huge range of factors. What matters to someone in rural northern Idaho won’t matter as critically to someone born and raised in some urban metropolis like Seattle or LA, so what each person selects to pay attention to affects everything else that follows.

The selected message has to be broken down and digested in the recipient’s mind by way of a complicated process that engages our rational and emotional cognition, effectively interpreting the message, which is so predictably and wildly unreliable that we had to invent a word for it — subjectivity.

Subjective interpretations vary widely from one person to another, but one thing will always be true. Regardless of how far and wide someone’s interpretation strays from the facts, to that person, their interpretation IS reality, and we will defend that reality with ferocity.

We can see this in every attempt to align someone’s subjective interpretation with the broader objective reality, as civility deteriorates. That’s when we see dramatic increases in volume, caustic mockery, public humiliation, and in extreme cases, mob mentality culminating in attempted excommunication from the very fabric of society.

Amid all these consequences, there’s typically one person or group who claims to possess Truth while they attempt to win over everyone else as their interpretations are deemed less valuable.

This is a textbook example of one-way communication.

It shouldn’t surprise us, though. Our educational systems are all built around the importance of one-way communication. Think about it — there are few to no examples of any formal education program where the art of listening is given the same priority as outward communication. By de-prioritizing the more critical half of the communication cycle does a great disservice to listening by reducing it to a secondary status and the impression that it’s just some passive thing we all do.

Of course, as we know, it’s a spectrum, where some listen WAY better than others, while fallout from someone who can’t listen is at best, comical, and at worst, catastrophic.

When it’s us doing the talking, we will monitor listeners for all signs that confirm attention and presence are with us, and depending on the topic, the intensity of that scrutiny could elevate the act of listening to such import and critical necessity that, if we discover the tiniest break in their attention, no matter how momentary, then it becomes a threat to the survival of the human race!

On the other hand, if someone else is speaking and our eardrums are vibrating at least occasionally, we assume we’re all good.

This illustrates what listening is not…

Listening isn’t waiting patiently for our turn to speak.

Listening is not time to formulate what to say next, what question to ask, and which points to make. When we focus attention this way, we retreat into our mind, effectively having one foot outside the conversation space as we only half-listen, which filters out most of the message and relegates listening to a passive activity.

In fact, passive listening isn’t listening at all. It’s called hearing.

Listening is the creation of possibility that can open pathways to understanding.

Listening is empathy made visible.

Listening is the ultimate demonstration of respect by making it clear that we are consciously choosing to direct our full attention and presence at someone like they matter.

Listening is the antidote to misunderstanding arising from assumptions. Filtered half-listening causes us to miss important details and then we fill in gaps with assumptions. To avoid admitting our failure to listen, we may even retaliate defensively to hide the error.

Civility means acknowledging our natural fallibility by showing our willingness to admit we’re human.

In using civility to navigate the most difficult conversations, we need to avoid 3 of the most common conversational mistakes, where we…

  • Assume we know everything there is to know about the situation.
  • Neglect/ignore our emotions on one end and allow strong feelings to run rampant on the other extreme.
  • Ignore who we are and pretend that our identity isn’t directly affecting our interpretation.

Avoiding these won’t be easy, but the key is in a shift in thinking.

Rather than approaching conversations feeling compelled to explain your perspective or “make them understand” you, try approaching conversations with these two statements as your motivation:

I need to listen. I need to learn.

Truth be told, difficult conversations only happen when better conversations don’t. People tend to feel cornered or threatened when criticized, so try to adhere to a 4:1 ratio of positive/upbeat subject matter to the more challenging topics, and simply. by increasing the positive, you can strengthen engagement and prevent reactance which is the threat response that causes someone who feels cornered to resist even harder.

I firmly believe we can experience more civil dialogue because using the tips above has led me to some of the most meaningful and memorable interactions of my life.

Doing so takes commitment and a willingness to arrive at understanding through listening. It means that we drop our incessant need to be RIGHT or to WIN. Dialogue is NOT a competition but more of a dance.

By offering honey to people expecting vinegar, you’ll quickly realize the power of civility.