Do you think american culture encourages dichotomous thinking?

[zoltani]

The more I become aware of my own dichotomous, or black and white, thinking the more I recognize it in our culture and feel that our culture may encourage it. As I pay attention to media, entertainment, politics, etc I notice that there is a lot of dichotomous thinking ("you're either with us or against us" is a classic example). Our language itself seems to promote it as well, you are either happy or sad, shy or outgoing, calm or anxious, etc. There seems to be a lack of language for the in between, the middle ground.

Do you think American culture and the English language encourage dichotomous thinking?

[ncornilsen]

No.

I think social media, and the ease with which one can find other people with the same set of beliefs to hide among and find re-enforcement for them, encourages it.

[Jack]

I'm amused that you asked this in the form of a yes or no question.

[zoltani]

I'm amused that you asked this in the form of a yes or no question.

Lol, yes, but to be fair I admitted to my own dichotomous thinking.

[Kris]

The more I become aware of my own dichotomous, or black and white, thinking the more I recognize it in our culture and feel that our culture may encourage it. As I pay attention to media, entertainment, politics, etc I notice that there is a lot of dichotomous thinking ("you're either with us or against us" is a classic example). Our language itself seems to promote it as well, you are either happy or sad, shy or outgoing, calm or anxious, etc. There seems to be a lack of language for the in between, the middle ground.

Do you think American culture and the English language encourage dichotomous thinking?

Haha -- so, SO much. Yes. We are a very dichotomous culture, from way back.

[ketchup]

The more I become aware of my own dichotomous, or black and white, thinking the more I recognize it in our culture and feel that our culture may encourage it. As I pay attention to media, entertainment, politics, etc I notice that there is a lot of dichotomous thinking ("you're either with us or against us" is a classic example). Our language itself seems to promote it as well, you are either happy or sad, shy or outgoing, calm or anxious, etc. There seems to be a lack of language for the in between, the middle ground.

Do you think American culture and the English language encourage dichotomous thinking?

Haha -- so, SO much. Yes. We are a very dichotomous culture, from way back.

NO!  We are not dichotomous, at all!

/s

[RetiredAt63]

Try teaching stats (alpha and beta and type 1 and type 2 errors).  My students always wanted to know if something was right or wrong (true or false).  Ambiguity was an unpleasant and almost not-understandable concept.

[Stachey]

Doesn't your political system say it all?  You're either Republican or you're Democrat...has there ever been any other choice?

[daverobev]

I don't think it's the language. There is a lot less of this in the UK, IMHO. Same in Canada - if you just want to limit it to politics, there are three significant parties in both countries with special/single interest parties having strong showings as well (how well the SNP or BQ would take being called such I don't know, but it's true - the SNP wants Scotland out of the UK, the BQ wants Quebec out of Canada).

The saying goes something like "don't talk politics or religion at dinner parties", hmm. Funny because they are my favourite topics (well, not really with religion, I get a bit too angry, ha).

There's also the thing where, the more something is said no matter for or against, those that are strongly of one opinion on the thing get entrenched in that position. So the more you yell "Trump is an idiot!" the more people inclined to vote for him will remember the media was talking about him, but oddly forget they were saying he was an idiot.

[stoaX]

"you're either with us or against us"

This saying or variations of it go back to biblical times so it isn't an American culture or English language example. In my decades of adulthood in the USA I do find things far more dichotomous now than 20 or more years ago.  My casual observation is that this started with cable news opinion shows and was exacerbated by the internet.  But with the rise of Al-Qaeda and ISIS and Boko Haram and etc.... there is some black and white thinking going on in other parts of the world too (again, just my casual observation).

[Bajadoc]

Do you think American culture and the English language encourage dichotomous thinking?

Yes and no.

[mrpercentage]

No but American culture highlights and reinforces individualism. We are prospectors. Doesn't matter if you dad was a Senator or an axe murderer-- you will not be judged by them. You make your own destiny. Not all cultures are like that. In some cultures your reputation will effect the reputation of your entire family--- like Japan. Whole different dynamic there.

We would rather let a guilty person go to protect the right of an individual. Innocent until proven guilty. We put the individual above the good of society. We are unutilitarian

Now let me ask you a question. Have you noticed that this election has been about Boomers and millenials? What about Gen X? We have another forgotten generation

[Kris]

We are, culturally, extremely protestant and puritan. That has merged with other tendencies in our culture to encourage this very dichotomous way of thinking. We are firmly convinced as a society that things are either good or bad, even though the reality of our worlds should be teaching us that most things are more nuanced and complex than that. Our cinema and most of our commercial entertainment is almost pathologically that way. Pair that up with our sense of American exceptionalism and a simplistic, almost rabid patriotism. and.... We are all about reifying comforting dichotomies.

[marty998]

Do you think American culture and the English language encourage dichotomous thinking?

Yes and no.

Only an Australian can understand the difference between "yeah nah" and "nah yeah"

[LeRainDrop]

Yes, I do feel that way.  You're right or you're wrong, you're left or you're right, you're for something or you're against it, you win or you lose, etc.  The gray/in-between is often seen as wishy-washy or indecisive or too cowardly to pick a side.  And when people go to a lawyer or a doctor for advice, they want a yes or a no, not a maybe based on factors x, y, z.

[matchewed]

I think our culture at large does frame things dichotomously (really is that a word even?).  It is jarring to have a discussion with someone and they are convinced that their line of reasoning is the answer when you can think of the multitude of factors that also may be influencing the situation. I also find this to be true in workplaces where you're encouraged to come to the root cause. Most root cause analysis I've done has been able to be broken down into various categories depending how you frame them.

Education (from the liberal arts side of things) may encourage people to take multiple views and reduce the amount of black and white thinking. But our culture has always enforced an "us vs. them" or a "be right at all times" mentality. I'm cool with being wrong and being both wrong and right at the same time. More of that is necessary to remain flexible in a mental sense.