Mature Speech

 I recently listened to a presentation sponsored by JFK University about the war in Ukraine. It featured a political scientist and a historian. I paid it rapt attention. Not just because the subject was important to me, but also because of the character of the speech. Each sentence was complex yet clear, compelling, and nuanced. The purpose of the presentation was to inform, not to entertain, indoctrinate, or persuade. I found it strangely refreshing, and reminiscent of a time long ago, when I first participated in a discussion of similar intelligence.

I must have been in my early teens or so when I had dinner with my Aunt Mary’s family. This may have been my first discussion of current events, at least the first not circumscribed by the presence of small children. I don’t remember the specifics, but I was very impressed by the vocabulary, knowledge, and confidence of each person’s contribution. I felt myself getting smarter just by listening to them. It was a revelation compared to the low-knowledge, high opinion and prejudice talk I was used to.

Some discussions at my college and law school approached similar heights of intelligence, but not often.

In the Trump era, opinions and prejudices have been elevated into alternative facts that the speaker expects to have taken as true. This cheapens all discourse, and makes it impossible to learn new information or to solve actual problems.