AARON MATÉ: It's The Real News, I'm Aaron Maté.
To deal with the jarring reality of Donald Trump's presidency many people have turned
to mindfulness practices like yoga and meditation.
These practices have been used to ease stress induced by Trump in the White House and to
promote calm during very uncertain times.
Well, my next guest argues that mindfulness meditation, especially, can be used as a weapon
against Trump and his allies and help overcome some of the ways in which the self-proclaimed
resistance may fall short.
Robert Wright is a visiting professor of Science and Religion at Union Theological Seminary
in New York City.
He is author of several bestselling books, including his latest Why Buddhism is True:
The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment.
In part one we discussed the book, and now in part two we're going to discuss what Wright
calls mindful resistance, which also is the name of a website that he has founded.
Welcome, Robert.
How can mindful resistance help us take on Trump?
ROBERT WRIGHT: Well, I think, first of all, my premise is that what we call the resistance,
the opposition to Trump, for starters sometimes suffers from excessive reactivity, I guess
you might think.
You might say that there's overreaction to some of the things he does, which doesn't
mean the things he does aren't bad.
They're very bad.
It's just that I think sometimes his goal is to elicit a strong reaction because a strong
reaction from his opponents, in some cases at least, kind of reinforces the narrative
that he has going with his base.
The narrative being that all of these liberals and coastal elites have contempt for ordinary
Americans and they have contempt for Trump, that the media is biased and takes every opportunity
to present him in the least favorable light and so on.
I think one big reason to not overreact to Trump is you want to be careful and not play
into his hands and just fall for every provocation.
Another reason is that it's distracting.
There's real work to be done.
I think it's important to figure out what was it that allowed him to get as many votes
as he got, even though, of course, he didn't get a majority of the votes, but still, got
enough.
What was the source of his appeal?
Obviously, there's just some bad people who supported him, some racists and so on.
I'm convinced that's not the whole story, that it's more complicated than that, that
different people supported him for different reasons.
I think it's important to figure out why and when possible, when these people had valid
grievances about the way they were being treated by the political system to address those,
and so offer an alternative to Trump.
I think there are really big, important issues of policy raised by the kind of attitude of
voters who supported Trump.
That's a couple of the reasons that I think sometimes, at least, the resistance to Trump
needs to be a little less reactive and more reflective.
AARON MATÉ: Right, in this respect I think the resistance is a very apt term because
it also is a term in psychoanalysis, right?
When someone has resistance subconsciously to something it's because they, perhaps, see
a threat to their own ego and to something actually in them that they see reflected back,
which they don't want to look at.
Instead of acting with an open mind and with compassion, they act with sort of a very quick
defensive wall.
I think in some of the ways in which the resistance has responded to Trump by blaming Russia for
him being elected, by maligning those who voted for him and ignoring his concerns, as
you point out, the resistance is, in fact, displaying a form of psychoanalytical resistance.
I'm wondering if you agree.
ROBERT WRIGHT: You're right, once you feel threatened by anything, all kinds of things
are set in motion that may obscure your vision.
I do want to emphasize the obscuring your vision part.
You mentioned the issue, I forget if you used the word compassion but the idea that there
are impediments to kind of empathizing with Trump voters once you see Trump as this big
threat, which he certainly in a sense is.
I think the problem goes beyond that.
I think you're right that we don't easily kind of feel the pain of Trump supporters.
In addition to this lack of what is sometimes called emotional empathy, there are impediments
to cognitive empathy, by which I mean just understanding what their perspective is, understanding
the way they see the world.
It's called perspective-taking sometimes.
I think that kind of empathy is also impeded.
I think, in a way, that's more important than the emotional empathy.
I don't think it's so important that you actually feel their pain and spend a lot of time doing
that.
I do think it's very important you understand where they're coming from, why they see the
world they way they do.
We know now, from modern psychology, that when you see a group as the enemy there are
some cognitive biases set in motion that keep you, actually, that are oddly almost designed
by natural selection to keep you from sizing them up in an objective and clear-eyed way.
As it happens, mindfulness meditation can, I think, help clarify your vision but even
if you don't meditate I think there's still the case for just making an effort to view
the situation mindfully, as calmly and as reflectively as possible.
AARON MATÉ: Right.
Let me put to you some of the impediments in my own resistance in my own life in the
hopes that they're relatable and that they offer lessons that maybe can be applied generally.
There was a time in my life when I would seek out people to argue with about issues that
I felt strongly about.
I really wanted to argue with the people who disagreed with me.
There was a really strong belief in me that this would make a difference, that this actually
was something productive.
Really, when I can look back on it now I can see it was entirely selfish.
It was my own feelings of inadequacy compelled me to want to justify my existence by being
right against somebody else.
I'm wondering your thought on that as broader political dynamic when it comes to our politics
today and how that kind of gratification self-righteous psychology feeds into our politics.
ROBERT WRIGHT: Well, first of all, I'm like you, I like arguing.
Arguing makes you a better arguer.
It puts you in touch with challenges to your point of view and so it allows you to defend
your views more effectively next time around.
On the other hand, we now understand that the human mind seems to have been designed
by natural selection to in the service of being a good arguer, we are designed to argue.
The mind is designed to make arguments in defense of our position.
Being a good arguer can mean not seeing things clearly.
The most famous example is confirmation bias.
We notice and welcome and accept evidence consistent with our view.
We reject or don't even notice evidence that's opposed to our view, and by the way, I think
this is responsible for a lot of what we call fake news.
I personally think most of us have been guilty of spreading fake news.
I know I have in the sense that there are times when I've re-tweeted things without
really going and looking at exactly what they said and evaluating the credibility.
The reason I've done it is because the news reflected unfavorably on the opposing tribe,
which in my case would be the Trump tribe.
If you look closely at what's facilitating this cognitive bias and leading you to accept
evidence that supports your view uncritically or that reflects unfavorably on your opponents
uncritically, it's a feeling.
It feels good to believe the thing, and you feel like you want to share the news with
others and amplify the news.
One thing about mindfulness, especially, again, if reinforced through meditation, is it makes
you more aware of the way feelings are pushing and pulling you.
I think it makes you less likely to spread fake news.
I want to say that although fake news is a problem, probably, I think, I try to be objective
but I think it's a bigger problem on the Trump side than on our side.
I still think that it is a problem on our side.
I want to emphasize that when we spread fake news it reinforces Trumps narrative.
If he can point to things untrue that we spread that just drives home, in his view, the fact
that we're all out to get him and the media's biased and so on.
I think although, ideally, you want to end fake news on both sides, I actually think
if we just on the anti-Trump side are more careful about the news we do and don't spread
that can actually help our side.
That can weaken Trump, just to clean up our own backyard to begin with.
AARON MATÉ: In the same sense that I think that when Trump points coastal elites and
he says that people on the coast don't care about middle America and he disingenuously
claims that he's going to work for average people, that Democratic elites have sold out,
even though, of course, he has no intention to, and he certainly hasn't.
But he's still effective because he's tapping into some truth, which I think, he's skilled
at recognizing somehow.
I guess, Robert, I'm wondering your thoughts on how effective can the anti-Trump resistance
be if it's still committed to not fully recognizing all the grievances that Trump tapped into?
ROBERT WRIGHT: I think the first step is to appreciate that not all the grievances are
crazy or dreamed up.
It is, for example, a fact that as globalization proceeds there are people on both coasts who
feel more of an affinity for people of their demographic in Europe or Asia than for people
in a very different demographic in America.
That's a real thing and it's something we need to think about because, on the one hand,
globalization has good things.
I don't want to see the world fall apart along national lines, international bonding is at
some level a good thing but it has its downside.
It's important that we think about this and not get too distracted by overreacting to
Trump.
Now, as for the challenge of getting more kind of coastal elites to realize that this
is a real thing, it begins by not, as they say essentializing Trump voters.
You remember Hillary's remark "basket of deplorables," most of them are supposedly these horrible
people.
That is kind of seeing a kind of essence of Trump voter, they're all racists or they're
all this or they're all that keeps you from doing the kind of exploration of what's actually
going on in their minds.
Interestingly, Buddhist philosophy and Buddhism is the context from which the whole idea of
mindfulness comes, it's very anti-essentialist.
Buddhist philosophy argues that whenever we perceive a kind of essence of things and certainly
an essence of person, like, "That's a good person, that's a bad person, that's a good
group, that's a bad group," that we're mis-perceiving because things are more complicated than that.
I think the first step toward understanding that if had lived the lives that some of these
people live you also might feel that America's elites are indifferent to you.
The first step to that is to quit thinking that they're all evil people.
I just took a long walk through a big stretch of Missouri with my daughter.
We went into some very small towns.
I remember thinking, "You know, if you were in this cultural milieu and you turned on
the TV to one of the major networks or to CNN, MSNBC or the latest show on Netflix,
you just wouldn't feel that the people who produced this stuff were anchored in your
world."
There are significant cultural differences.
I think the more earnestly we get out and do the work of trying to actually understand
all this, the better we'll be able to come up with some long-term ways of addressing
it.
AARON MATÉ: Finally, I have a concern that comes up for me when I hear some Buddhist
teachers try to analyze politics which is that their commitment to compassion for everybody
and their commitment to equanimity on all sides might sort of water their political
analysis.
For example, whereas there'd be no equivocation if they were to look at the Nazi Holocaust,
on other issues they might see parity where it's not there.
I want to give you one example, which is I heard a very famous and very wise Buddhist
teacher, someone who I really value, say about the Israel-Palestine conflict that, "If only
both sides could just come together and listen to each other, then the problem could be solved,"
which I found to be very naive because as I see that conflict it's a case of an occupied
people confronting an occupier, a military occupier.
Of course, there's complexities to it, but that to me is what it is at its core.
I'm wondering your thoughts if there's a risk sometimes of how the pursuit of compassion,
of balance, of not being accusatory, not being self-righteous can sometimes weaken our ability
to see things clearly.
ROBERT WRIGHT: It can in principle, but I would say that the kind of compassion that
ideally you cultivate through Buddhist practice has a kind of almost objectivity to it.
In other words, it's not the kind of emotional investment that leads a parent to despise
the rivals of his or her daughter or son.
In theory, it can help you understand both sides better.
As far the Israel-Palestine goes, I agree, it's an occupation and America shouldn't be
supporting it as uncritically as it is.
On the other hand, it's important to understand, I've been to Israel, I've been to the West
Bank, Israelis are genuinely fearful for their security.
They're not like just saying that so they can oppress people.
That's their big issue and they think that if they give an inch, I think they're mistaken,
I think what they're doing is bad for their security in the long run but they genuinely
think that they can't afford give an inch.
I think it's important to understand both sides.
Mindfulness meditation, it's hard to convey to people who haven't done it but when it
works I think it gives you, in principle, a compassion for all people that doesn't involve
the kind of intense attachment that keeps you from having a kind of a global perspective
on actually solving the problem.
AARON MATÉ: I don't disagree, and I don't want to get too political here because it's
not the purpose of this discussion for us to debate Israel-Palestine.
My concern is that in this attempt to understand both sides might establish more parity than
there actually is.
If it's a situation where you have an occupier and an occupied people, then from my point
of view I don't really care so much about what the occupied side feels or thinks.
I understand it's important to hear them and to not dismiss anybody but I'm just concerned
about in this attempt to understand everyone's feelings that we establish a parity that is
not fair to the situation.
ROBERT WRIGHT: One thing I'd emphasize is that when you try to explain someone's behavior
you're not excusing it.
Okay?
You're not saying, "Well, then whatever they do is defensible.
Now that we understand it and understand that even we might behave like them in a similar
situation, well then okay, we'll have to accept it."
That's a common human intuition that to explain something is to excuse it but I think I have
to emphasize that that's not the deal, that, in my view, first you try to understand the
situation, which involves coming to the clearest possible understanding of why everyone did
everything and then you try to solve the problem.
I certainly think that the Palestinian perspective just does not penetrate the American consciousness
the way that Israeli perspective does, and that's part of the problem in terms of America's
policy.
That doesn't mean that there's not an Israeli perspective, the understanding of which, could
actually facilitate a solution to the problem, but I know you don't want to argue Israel-Palestine.
AARON MATÉ: That's a case where I think the Palestinian perspective might resonate more
if it was given more of a fair hearing.
I think the fact that it doesn't reflects- ROBERT WRIGHT: It doesn't.
The journalism does not generally illuminate a Palestinian perspective.
American journalism tends not to, in my view, I don't know, for whatever reason there tends
to be more of a natural kind of cultural identification with the Israeli perspective.
The Israeli situation is, in a way, more like the American situation but for whatever reason
I agree.
AARON MATÉ: Look, I have my own views on what maybe Palestinians might be able to do
to reach Americans more but at the same time I don't live under occupation, so it's easy
for me to judge and come up with ways that I think that they could be more effective.
ROBERT WRIGHT: I agree.
I've been there.
I've said, "Hey, why don't you just hold demonstrations saying, 'Just give us the vote.
If you're going to occupy us let us vote.'"
That would be very effective.
That might really get on the news in America but they have reasons that some of them don't
think that that's the way to go and so on.
AARON MATÉ: It's just very difficult to organize and there's a history of when they try that
that gets repressed like during the first intifada.
Again, this gets us into a conversation that we didn't plan on.
ROBERT WRIGHT: This would be a different kind of mindful resistance, resistance in a different
context, yeah.
AARON MATÉ: Well, Robert Wright, we thank you for sharing with us your thoughts on mindful
resistance.
Robert Wright is a visiting professor of Science and Religion at Union Theological Seminary
in New York City, author of several bestselling books, including his latest, which I highly
recommend, "Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment".
Robert, thank you.
ROBERT WRIGHT: Thank you.
AARON MATÉ: And thank you for joining us on The Real News.