{"id":64855,"date":"2012-08-30T10:23:00","date_gmt":"2012-08-30T14:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=64855"},"modified":"2012-09-06T08:43:00","modified_gmt":"2012-09-06T12:43:00","slug":"how-to-build-a-just-society-with-courtesy-and-civility-be-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2012\/08\/how-to-build-a-just-society-with-courtesy-and-civility-be-good\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Build a Just Society with Courtesy and Civility: Be Good"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Randy<\/a>
Randy Cohen, former ethics columnist for the New York Times, opens the Civility Metanoia Speakers Series at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts on Aug. 29. (Peter Morenus\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Despite the public handwringing about the divisiveness of Washington politics today, former New York Times<\/em> ethics columnist Randy Cohen does not think the current climate is the low point in political discourse.<\/p>\n

Opening the Civility Metanoia Speakers Series Wednesday at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts, Cohen said that while some may consider today\u2019s political attack ads as the low point in modern civility, the Foundation Fathers of the nation \u201cwere much more obnoxious than we are\u00a0\u2013 yet another way in which they were superior to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Randy<\/a>
Randy Cohen speaks about civil society. (Peter Morenus\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cohen, a former writer for \u201cLate Night with David Letterman,” cited the 1800 presidential election between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, who each hired writers to develop the 18th-century version of attack ads.<\/p>\n

Jefferson\u2019s writers said of Adams: \u201cHe is a hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.\u201d Adams\u2019s side claimed that if Jefferson were elected:\u00a0 \u201cAre you prepared to see your dwellings in flames, female chastity violated, children writhing on pikes? Great god of compassion and justice! Shield my country from destruction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cohen, whose latest book is Be Good: How to Navigate the Ethics of Everything<\/em>, said that all communities, including government, require civility, including the university \u201cwhere the essential mission is the exchange of ideas. What will result from [civility] is discussion, debate, and disagreement … If we\u2019re going to face each other with conflicting ideas, that requires civility. We can\u2019t just demand that people do the right thing. We have to create circumstances that make it possible. The essential element is civility. We needn\u2019t agree with one another, but we have to be able to disagree without fistfights.\u201d<\/p>\n

Noting that the United States is an immigrant nation, Cohen said that encountering people of different backgrounds not similar to our own establishes one of the essential elements of a university\u00a0\u2013 to be exposed to new ideas.<\/p>\n

\u201c[You encounter] different ways of thinking, but that\u2019s going to mean there is going to be friction,\u201d he said. \u201cPoliteness is the way to ease friction. Civility is a public act, the way we behave with people we don\u2019t know very well. \u201c<\/p>\n

He offered five guidelines for responding with civility when presented with a new idea, \u201cno matter how goofy the idea it is, or how wrongheaded it seems”:<\/p>\n