I’m finally plugged back into the Lifestream and halfway settled in my summer abode, so it’s finally time for another wordy and rambling post.

I was on the road quite a bit this past weekend and in order to make the time go faster, I tried listening to talk radio. This is something I hadn’t really ever done before so it was a new experience and my impressions of it are limited to a few hours of listening. Normally I wouldn’t make judgments and what have you with such short exposure, but I need to vent some frustration.

First of all while browsing through the AM stations trying to find something interesting, I was surprised how poorly most of them came in. The only ones that came in really clear were either sports stations or evangelical Christian preachers. I did manage for short spurts of time to tune into a few politically oriented stations.

One of the first stations I started listening to was a discussion between the host and a Maryland professor about Capitalism’s affect on American society and how it has changed over the years due to increasingly heavy advertising and marketing. At first the discussion was somewhat interesting and there were decent points brought up on both sides of the issue that at least gave me something to think about. After a while the discussion, which had started out with at least a thin layer of respect and open-mindedness, began to get more heated. Both men started repeating themselves constantly while not answering the other person’s point, and their arguments got weaker and weaker with less evidence. I got the impression that the radio host was incredibly pompous while the professor was probably just extremely earnest. The affect was the same on either side regardless.

This is a trend I noticed pretty consistently as I scrolled through the stations. The worst ones were the shows that had no opponent and no discussion. It was basically just some guy masturbating his ego and spouting off his opinions as if they were most obvious thing in the world. You’d have to be blind or an idiot to not see his point. A lot of talk was about some 350 page immigration reform bill that no one had read. The bill had not been released to the public yet. Most of congress hadn’t even seen it and these guys were all giving their opinion about whether it was/wasn’t good.

That last paragraph was kind of off topic. The main problem I took from this experience (as well as my limited podcast debate listening) is that people don’t come to a debate/discussion with any intention of listening. Most of these situations that I have seen don’t have people coming to try to debate each other in order to find common ground or understanding. Their main goal isn’t even really to debate their opponent’s arguments. They come with the idea that they will just say what they believe over and over until somebody accepts it. I desperately crave to hear a debate where both parties understand and respect each other. Where quality responsive arguments are made. Where facts are used from credible trustworthy sources. Where the tone of voice isn’t one of malice or aggression. Where there is an air of friendship rather than hostility. I want to see people come together not necessarily with the intention of “winning,” but instead with a thirst for understanding.

That being said, I think it is quite necessary for a person to stand strong behind her thoughts, beliefs, or ideals. You can still be passionate and champion an idea without holding a strong animosity towards those behind others.