“Echo chamber” is a phrase I first heard when visiting a college last spring. It’s been stuck in my mind ever since, slipping into my everyday vocabulary and forcing me to experience Columbus Academy differently.
I’ve grown up as a liberal in a conservative household. My stances on issues have always been challenged, and I haven’t always appreciated it. It’s difficult to articulate what you believe in sometimes, but it’s incredibly important that you do. I can’t get away without evidence or logic to support my views, and I’ve never been able to. I’ve noticed that the same is not true at school.
We’ve all been there: you’re sitting in a class, probably some form of history, and politics come up. Around ten liberal voices shout the same beliefs back and forth at one another until one or two brave conservatives begin to speak up. The class turns on the minority without pause, taking no time to evaluate what their point was. It’s immediately wrong because it’s different.
I’ve done this. My teachers have done this. You have likely done this as well.
Often, I look back on situations that I think I’ve handled well and find that I’ve actually only supported my beliefs well with no regard for the opposing view. I’m trying to be better, trying to use my formative years to grow in that sense, but I feel we all need a little push to do so.
When I saw that a High School Democrats Club was being established, I was nervous. Here’s one more room of people to yell the same beliefs back and forth at one another with no counterargument until they decide they’ve adequately fought the man for the day. When Conservative Club was established, I had different concerns. I was initially worried that not enough liberals would take the time to go listen to what was being talked about. Then my fears quickly shifted to the concern that too many liberals would go to make fun of the club rather than to hear a new viewpoint.
Let’s look now to the poster debacle. In early February, Conservative Club hung some posters in the hallway. The one that I remember said “working like crazy to support the lazy,” which seemed pretty bold coming from privately educated students, many of whom have never had a job. The posters were taken down, and Mr. Farrenkopf sent an email to Upper School students and faculty telling us to “not post political posters and stickers in the hallways.”
The issue seemed to have been dropped until April 14, when some signs that were passed out at a High School Democrats meeting were hung in the hallway. One depicted a woman wearing a hijab made of the American flag, and the photograph was captioned “We The People are greater than fear.”
This set off a large discussion, sparked by freshman Ryan McGraw’s email to the whole school that referred to the poster previously described, insinuating that it was a political poster and should be taken down. The poster was later removed from the hallway.
While school policy on the etiquette of political activity certainly needs to be solidified, I think that this issue is much larger than the poster question makes it seem. Students should feel that they have a voice on this campus, and Mr. Farrenkopf says that school administrators are already working toward a solution on the poster-specific front of that.
The larger issue is that we don’t understand how to talk to one another. I’m disappointed in both clubs and both sides of the political spectrum at Academy. I think this issue comes down to a meshing of the current hostile political environment with the competitive nature of our school. I think that we’ve become bad listeners.
I’m not saying that people literally won’t allow others to speak their view without interruption, though I have seen that happen as well, but I don’t think we’re really listening. We’re waiting until they stop speaking so that we can respond and prove everything they said wrong instead of considering their viewpoint as equal to ours. We’re waiting until they leave the room, so that we can bash what they said with all of our friends–a sort of private echo chamber. Whether you’re conservative or liberal, we need to learn to appreciate the other side.
We need to be put in more situations where we’re forced to challenge our beliefs. I’m a biased but strong believer that the Debate Team is the best place to do this, but I think that the same principles can be applied in classrooms or on a more public scale. That kind of education, however, has to be consistent and careful so we can actually grow as learners.
A Community Cafe here and there is a great step toward progress, but it won’t change our school. I think we need a weekly forum for students to debate specific political issues with adult moderation. If possible, I think this has a place in history classrooms or curricula. Students would need to know the topic that was being discussed beforehand so that they could do some research, and both sides of the topic would have to be adequately explained.
I was hopeful that High School Democrats and Conservative Club would be the bodies that facilitated this kind of discussion without large faculty involvement, but it seems that we aren’t there yet. We need to relearn how to talk to one another before we can truly witness progress.
If your beliefs haven’t been challenged yet, how do you know that they’re your beliefs? It’s your responsibility to climb out of the echo chamber.
