Idaho politics are polarized. Can these projects help people ‘see each other’s humanity’?

BOISE, Idaho — Onstage at Boise State University, Jarom Jemmett, a third-generation Idaho farmer who identifies as “right-leaning,” spoke about how much he values family. Not just his own, but those his work helps feed, and the families of the Mexican laborers who work seasonally on his farm, sending money home. After his speech, other Idahoans took the stage to share what they value and why.

On a rainy Saturday morning, left-leaning Idahoans, including some candidates for public office, dialed in to a three-hour Zoom workshop to learn how to navigate their status as a political minority in the state. They talked about strategies to better communicate their beliefs “in a way that others might hear” — while “abandoning the hope” that they will change conservatives’ minds and remaining open to learning from conservative perspectives.

This election year, scenes like these are becoming more common. In a deeply divided political environment, a growing number of Idahoans are clamoring for events and workshops that can help humanize the other side and fight political polarization.

Idaho state coordinators for Braver Angels — a national nonprofit that combats “growing partisan animosity,” according to its website — said demand for their programming has spiked. The organization offers workshops that allow people on both sides of the political spectrum to get to know each other individually and better understand the other side.

So far in 2024, the group’s Idaho chapter has added nearly 100 paying members, event attendees and email subscribers, almost the same number they added in all of 2023. And they’ve already held as many workshops this year as they did in all of last year. The first Braver Angels workshop in Idaho was held in 2018.

The momentum for this kind of work is ramping up as well-established groups, like the Rotary Club, encourage their own members to become involved, said Damien Preinitz, the chapter’s outgoing “red” coordinator. Each state chapter has both a right-leaning, or red, and left-leaning, or blue, lead.

“It’s kind of organic — that’s the power of the mission,” said Rob Hanson, the chapter’s blue coordinator and the national organization’s Mountain Region lead.

The organization grows as participants bring their friends along. For those who are new, “there is a level of skepticism” about the group’s goals, Preinitz said.

But “when they see that there’s actually a 10-meter target – that we’re not trying to just walk into somewhere and say, ‘all polarization is solved, great job, team,’ but rather to give individuals skills to better themselves to … have these interactions to repair their family environment — then that can give you hope,” he said. “It gives you the ability to shape your landscape.”

Organizers aren’t surprised to see demand for their programming jump in an election year.

“This is when people need to have these family and politics debates,” Preinitz said. “This is when people are feeling those pain points of, ‘I can’t have Thanksgiving dinner with my family, because crazy Uncle Steve’s going to show up and start spouting off his political nonsense.”

In these times, many people are particularly “hungry” for ways to achieve mutual understanding, said Dan Long, the chapter’s incoming red coordinator.

“There’s a lot of really good-intentioned people who would like to have a conversation, but they don’t really know how to do it,” Hanson said. If people start off with something like, “‘Damien, are you really that stupid? I just want to talk to you about it,’” he joked, “that doesn’t work. So Braver Angels equips you to go out, listen, acknowledge. Your goal is not to change his mind. Your goal is to understand as they’re saying their story. And that starts putting the human face on it.”

At Boise State University’s Institute for Advancing American Values, which has also organized depolarization-related programs, leaders agree. Andrew Finstuen, the institute’s executive director and the dean of the university’s Honors College, emphasized that the programming aims to “harness the power of the university even more” — to “promote dialogue, promote the humanization of differences, and promote … disagreement, done in such a way where we still recognize one another’s dignity.”

At Braver Angels’ Red/Blue workshops, which Preinitz describe as the “cornerstone” of the organization’s programming, an equal number of Republicans and Democrats take turns sharing the stereotypes they believe the other side holds about them. They explain how their own side’s policies would be good for the country, and what concerns they have about their own side’s perspective.

The group also offers more “advanced” programs, including discussions of terms or ideas that have become polarized, like an event last April where participants discussed what the term “woke” means to them. Others focus on “ depolarizing within “ – exploring how participants talk with like-minded people about those on the other side.

Willing to bridge partisan divide

In October, Mary Hanlin, who identifies as “super liberal,” was struggling to pull together a speech about her values as part of Idaho Listens. The event was run by Boise State’s Institute for Advancing American Values and is part of the same series where Jemmett spoke.

Hanlin, a waitress in Coeur d’Alene who has worked in marketing for an art gallery, initially found it challenging to put her values into words. She eventually drew inspiration from an online post that said, “I just want my gay friends to be able to protect their marijuana plants with guns.”

She grew up in a conservative Christian community but in a household that was often exposed to other cultures through her father’s international business trips and visitors. Over time, she began to question and move away from her faith.

“At a certain point in time, it was like, well, the values that Jesus supposedly brought to the table — loving your neighbor, you being able to express yourself — I’m not seeing those really being lived by the faith practices that we get raised in or the political groups that we get raised in,” she said.

She found the Idaho Listens event to be unexpectedly emotional. By design, there was no applause between the speakers. Just silence.

“It sounds like an inconsequential change,” Hanlin said. “But then when you’re in the space of the event, that’s actually a really powerful shift. It’s very odd, because there’s no space where we really do that, right? Somebody talks, and then you just have to sit with the story.”

In an environment where participants were not crafting their own rebuttals or even visibly reacting to each others’ stories, Hanlin found herself becoming more willing to engage with those she might have previously written off.

“It kind of takes you off your guard, and you can see each other’s humanity,” she said. She compared the experience to being in an art gallery or class, where people have come together for a shared purpose that doesn’t involve politics.

In those settings, “I’m not even conceptualizing anything else about you. You’re just a person in the class,” she said. “And then we start talking, and then, maybe, I already like you as a person before you drop that you’re a Christian or a Republican — and then I have to be like, ‘what does that mean?’”

Participants and organizers emphasize that this work isn’t just about being nice to one another. It has implications for effective governance if “bipartisan becomes a dirty word” and voters consider it acceptable for their own party to focus on slowing government down to make the party in power “look bad,” Preinitz said.

“There’s a real pragmatic reason to do it,” Hanson said. “When we’re able to talk, we’re able to actually understand in more detail where we differ. And that’s where you start solving problems … as opposed to ‘you’re some right-wing crazy person,’ or ‘you’re some socialist who thinks government is the answer to everything.’ You’ve learned nothing from that. You just go back to your sides –”

“And just try to win the next election,” Preinitz finished.

‘Basic foundation’ for discussion

Choosing to participate in workshops like these takes a degree of open-mindedness, said Jemmett, the third-generation farmer in Parma who participated in the Idaho Listens event at Boise State in 2022.

Even before the workshop, he believed that people should “stop voting based on party and start voting based on (candidates’) ideals, their beliefs, and what they would do if they’re elected.”

The program forces participants to productively engage with the reasons for their own beliefs and values, rather than just shouting down the other side, said Jemmett, who serves on the board of the Idaho-Eastern Oregon Onion Committee and is president of the Idaho Onion Growers Association.

“It may help you solidify your beliefs if you can tell someone why they’re terrible, but at the end of the day, if you don’t have a solid reason for your belief … you need to think about it,” he said. “I think, when we can answer the ‘why’ for ourselves, and not just because someone on Facebook posted a meme, then OK, that becomes a value to you. And then we can have a discussion.”

But for some prospective participants, especially reds, joining in events like these is unappealing, said Long, Braver Angels’ incoming red state coordinator. Long, who identifies as “a red, pretty hardcore,” recalled speaking with a fellow Republican in his prayer group who was “bristling” at the idea of participating in depolarization workshops.

Long said the man shared that he felt there was no “basic foundation” for discussion between him and liberals — that they couldn’t agree, for example, on the number of sexes. Many Republicans, Long added, feel that they are already barraged by left-leaning media, and don’t want to expose themselves to another situation where they feel they will be “shouted down.”

Finstuen, of the Boise State institute, acknowledged this challenge, sharing that the institute had found success by going directly to the communities it hoped to reach and finding people through word of mouth.

“I think sometimes … we expect folks from different constituencies to come to us, rather than we go to them,” he said.

Those who do join in these events are often surprised to learn that their values and beliefs are closer than they expected — or at least, that the way people on the other side came to their beliefs was understandable, Hanson said.

At one Braver Angels event, a participant left angry.

“Why didn’t we know about this?” Hanson recalled her saying. “How did we not know these other people had so much in common with us?”