Do you wave at each other as you bring in the garbage can from the end of the driveway? Do you make a little extra time and chat about the Saints game? Or do you know each other better, asking about children or pets and helping each other when possible?
I probably fall right in the middle. Our family is fortunate to live in a neighborhood where people wave to each other, and we’ve gotten to know some neighbors well enough to have them check on our house if we are traveling. And then there are others who I might not recognize at the Winn-Dixie!
It seems the past couple years have brought some changes in our society. While many of us had already dipped our toe into a virtual social landscape, the COVID quarantine and social distancing have accelerated that shift. I have to admit to getting a little too comfortable with texting friends rather than connecting in person.
Lately I have been wondering; is this shift in our social landscape playing out on a bigger field? There seems to be a widening cultural gap between neighbors, to the point where some of us cannot see eye to eye on basic issues. And that’s not even considering the politics, where Congress is constantly chasing emergency funding measures because they cannot agree on a national budget!
I recently read an interesting article from the Pew Research Center regarding partisanship and the meaning of life. Earlier this year, the open-ended question was asked of over 2,500 US adults: “What about your life do you find meaningful, fulfilling or satisfying?” When broken into Republicans and Democrats, there were some important commonalities, with half of respondents from each group mentioning Family as the most meaningful, fulfilling or satisfying. But not surprisingly there also were significant differences.
For example, Democrat (or D-leaning) respondents included Friends & Community Relationships (#2), Well-Being & Quality of Life (#3), and Occupation & Career (#4) most important after Family. And tied for 5th most important were Physical/Mental Health and Hobbies & Recreation.
Meanwhile, Republican (or R-leaning) respondents selected Religion as the 2nd most important provider of meaning in their life. And while the next three highest response groups were similar to Democrats (Friends, Well-Being, and Occupation), Republican respondents listed Society & Institutions at #5.
One interesting way of looking at the survey responses was by using a “Word Cloud” graph, where words used more frequently by respondents are assigned a larger font. One group frequently used words like “God”, “Freedom”, “Country”, “Jesus” and “Religion”, while the other used “Outside”, “Dog”, “Reading”, “Nature”, and “New” (in the context of learning or meeting someone/something new). While spirituality was mentioned by both groups, it was chosen by 22% of respondents from one group and only 8% from the other.
So what is the Pew Research Center really telling us with this information? To me, it is a valuable way to learn what my neighbors find important. Whether I speak with them every day or only share a wave from behind a windshield, whether we vote the same or not, I can feel reassured that we all are motivated by good intentions.
This information also tells me that breaking us down into Red vs. Blue may not be the best way to paint a picture of society, as it may not take into account our individualism. Take me for example; after “Family”, the largest words in my word cloud might be “Nature” and “Art”. And yet I also am a committed member of a local church, defying a superficial judgment that religion is unimportant.
As I was reading about this Pew survey, I could not help but think about some important research recently published by MIT’s Technology Review. In late 2019 it was discovered that 19 of the top 20 most popular Facebook pages for Christians were operated by Eastern European troll farms! Now I admit to needing to look up the definition of a “troll farm”; a professional group working in a coordinated manner to post misinformation or provocative content to online social networks. These 19 most popular Christian pages reached 140 Million American users, each month, leading up to the contentious 2020 election.
While Facebook officials say they are working on this big problem of Christians being targeted by foreign troll farms, how can we be sure we are getting reliable information? There are plenty of good sources including your regional newspaper, the Associated Press, Reuters and many others (maybe not cable news though), and they all have social media pages if that is where you need to source your info.
For a society that can feel so divided, choosing reliable information could bring some healing. But it may be just as important for us to reach out and get to know our neighbors “on the other side”. These may be the best ways to bridge the gap and make common progress. So what would your word cloud look like? Or perhaps more importantly, what would your neighbor’s word cloud include?
Chris Werle of Lamar County is Mississippi state coordinator for the Citizens’ Climate Lobby. Write him at chriswerle@cclvolunteer.org.
