A majority of Americans have “stayed quiet” to avoid a fight or conflict over opinions over the past year, according to a Morning Consult survey of 2,007 people conducted last month.
Around 59% of respondents said they had “stayed quiet” to avoid conflict over the previous 2-month period. However, only 22% said they lied about their opinions to avoid a fight.
When it came to individual topics people stayed quirt on or said something “not true” to their opinions to avoid fights or conflict, sexual identity was in the lead with 34%, followed by abortion and politics/political campaigns (tied) with 32%, Republicans with 29% and Democrats and “woke” ideology (tied) with 28%. Other topics included: race relations (27%), guns (27%), immigration (25%), climate change (19%), crime (17%), police practices (16%), and education/school curriculum (12%).
According to The Center Square, the survey was commissioned by the State Policy Network.
“We’ve gone through a period where debate on difficult topics has gotten very ugly,” State Policy Network Senior Messaging Strategist Erin Norman told the outlet. “It’s common to see people compare relatively minor disagreements on policy to instances of slavery or genocide. Most people just aren’t interested in having those types of discussions and for most people politics isn’t the focus of their life. It’s easier to just stay quiet than deal with any potential fallout. Especially when you see how the mob can swiftly turn and threaten careers and livelihood.”
In 2020, researchers from Brown University and Stanford University published findings that political polarization in the U.S. had grown rapidly over the previous four decades. This polarization outpaced the U.K., Canada, Australia and Germany. Researchers said the phenomenon could possibly be due to increased racial division, the rise of partisan cable news and changes in the composition of the Democratic and Republican parties.
Stephanie Edgerly, a professor and associate dean at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism who specializes in audience insight, recently joined Audacy’s “It’s Generational” podcast. She too mentioned how the media can play a role in political polarization.
“You’re either liberal or you’re either conservative… maybe there’s like one in the middle,” she said, explaining the lack of more “neutral” news options and the sometimes-overwhelming process of determining what sources to trust.
“There are good reasons to think that when people in different political camps cease to respect each other, it’s harder to make political compromises and create good public policy,” said Jesse Shapiro, a professor of political economy at Brown University and co-author of the Brown study. “There’s also some evidence that a person’s political identity can influence their behavior – what they buy, where they live, who they hire. If we can understand what’s driving partisan divides, we may be able to take steps to reduce them.”
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