By Tamra Wright, Lecturer and Intergroup Dialogue Facilitator, O’Neill IUPUI
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “people fail to get along because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they have not communicated with each other.”
To combat fear—an emotion so powerful in its ability to paralyze and divide—we must communicate through meaningful and sustained dialogue. The most important conversations are often the hardest to have. It’s easier to avoid them, especially if the topics are sensitive and uncomfortable. But avoidance does little to quell the fears that exist when it comes to communicating across differences and engaging in difficult conversations.
To have those conversations, it’s important to first understand the difference between dialogue, discussion, and debate. This is especially critical as students return to college campuses and online platforms, where they will no doubt encounter challenging topics.