Presidents Day began as a tribute to George Washington, a man whose most profound contribution to the American executive was his willingness to relinquish it. By refusing to consolidate power or pursue a lifelong tenure, Washington established the office’s primary virtue: restraint. But if Washington defined the presidency’s physical boundaries through the surrender of power, it was Abraham Lincoln who defined its internal moral architecture through the surrender of ego.

The American presidency is, by its nature, an isolating office, buffered by protocol and a defensive perimeter of sycophants. But, on a sweltering August day in 1863, the Executive Mansion witnessed a collision of moral forces that remains among the most instructive moments in the history of the American executive.

Frederick Douglass, by then the nation’s most formidable abolitionist and a man both self-emancipated and self-educated, came to the White House to deliver a rebuke. He bypassed the office-seekers and the military adjutants to confront the president with grievances that were as morally sound as they were scorching. Black soldiers, Douglass noted, were being paid half the wages of their white counterparts. They were denied officer commissions. They were being left to the summary ‘justice’ of Confederate executioners without meaningful Union retaliation.

How Lincoln responded to accusations of cowardice and prejudice reveals the alchemy of his greatness. A lesser man with thinner skin or a more brittle ego would have retreated into the reflexes of office. He might have invoked the exigencies of war, the precariousness of his coalition, or the insolence of a private citizen lecturing the Commander in Chief. Instead, Lincoln rose, extended his hand, and said with characteristic lack of artifice: “Mr. Douglass, I know who you are… I am glad to see you.”

What followed was a colloquy for the ages. Lincoln did not patronize Douglass with empty assurances. He explained the political calculus of a divided North, conceded the justice of Douglass’s points, and, most importantly, treated Douglass as an intellectual equal. Douglass later reflected that he was “never… more quickly or completely put at my ease” by a man of power, and that Lincoln never once reminded him of his color.

On President’s Day, we are accustomed to celebrating Lincoln for the sweeping outcomes of his tenure: the preserved Union, the 13th Amendment, the Gettysburg shorthand for democracy. But we should also remember the internal discipline required to achieve them. The character strengths that shaped Lincoln’s capacity for reasoned engagement are core to the Lincoln-Douglass story.

Their relationship, like so much of American public life today, was never one of simple harmony. Douglass remained one of Lincoln’s most sophisticated critics. In 1876, a decade after Lincoln’s assassination, Douglass gave a eulogy at the Freedmen’s Monument, mixing praise with unflinching critique:

Abraham Lincoln was not, in the fullest sense of the word, either our man or our model… He was pre-eminently the white man’s President.

[T]hough the Union was more to him than our freedom or our future, under his wise and beneficent rule we saw ourselves gradually lifted from the depths of slavery to the heights of liberty and manhood; under his wise and beneficent rule, and by measures approved and vigorously pressed by him, we saw that the handwriting of ages, in the form of prejudice and proscription, was rapidly fading away from the face of our whole country.

The capacity to recognize a leader’s flaws while at the same time acknowledging his virtues is what our political culture most desperately lacks.

We live in an era that rewards reduction. People are sorted into tribes. Leaders are either idolized or demonized. Disagreement is treated as moral defect. Institutions are often bent to protect individuals rather than to serve the common good.

Lincoln and Douglass offer a more demanding model of disagreement. It requires treating people as ends in themselves, capable of reason, growth, and principled contention. The Greeks called it megalopsychia, a term meaning magnanimity, or greatness of soul. It is the rare strength to hold power without letting it shrink your humanity.

Lincoln did not shut the White House doors to Douglass when lesser men would have. And though direct and uncushioned, Douglass’s critique of Lincoln never plunged into demonization. Lesser men than Douglass would not have had the wisdom, humility, or forbearance to hold righteous fire in abeyance. Thank goodness; these men embarked on a dialogue that was intellectually honest, emotionally disciplined, and ultimately, transformative for the Republic.

That he helped end slavery ensures Lincoln’s place in the American pantheon. But that he possessed the moral stamina to listen to the man who told him he had not done enough—

That, more than any monument, is the measure of the man.

Adam Thompson is the Communications Manager at the Prohuman Foundation. Originally from Maine, he studied at Colby College and lives with his wife and daughter in Vietnam.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

My wife still remembers seeing the number in her third-grade classroom.

Not a lesson plan. Not a textbook chapter. A tattoo on her teacher’s forearm—the mark the Nazis used after reducing a human being to inventory. It was dehumanization made literal: a person stripped of name and individuality, marked so she could be processed and, if necessary, identified after death.

In January, two dates sit close together on the American calendar. Earlier this month, we commemorated the life of Martin Luther King Jr. and the struggle for civil rights. Today, January 27, we mark the day that the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp was liberated in 1945.

Different histories. Similar lessons. In both cases, progress arrived only when moral clarity overcame indifference. January 27 is therefore more than a day of grief. It is also a day of courage and hope—the moment when the world confronted the horror of what had been unfolding across Europe.

The Holocaust was not a generic tragedy or an episode of wartime brutality. It was the systematic attempt to exterminate the Jewish people. By the time it ended, six million Jews had been murdered—roughly two-thirds of Europe’s Jewish population and nearly half of the world’s Jews alive at the time. Entire communities vanished. Languages, traditions, and family lines were erased. The magnitude was not incidental. It was the objective.

Sixty years later, in 2005, the United Nations anchored that history to the calendar by establishing International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27 and urging member states to commit to education and to reject denial and distortion. Whatever one thinks of the UN today, that moment reflected a clearer consensus than we often see now: that the Holocaust was a civilizational rupture, and that remembering it accurately was not optional.

That consensus is now under strain.

In the United States, the Anti-Defamation League reports record levels of antisemitic incidents, including sharp increases in antisemitism on college campuses—my alma mater, Columbia University in New York City, being one notable example.

At the same time, surveys show that large numbers of younger Americans do not know basic facts about the Holocaust: how many Jews were murdered, why they were targeted, or even what Auschwitz was. Many cannot name a single camp or ghetto, and some doubt that it happened at all. Distance from the event, combined with uneven emphasis in education, has turned what was once lived history into something increasingly abstract.

Abstraction can be dangerous.

The Holocaust did not begin with gas chambers. It began with the conversion of people into categories, and categories into problems. Once individuals were treated as abstractions rather than as human beings, moral limits weakened. By the time mass murder began, much of the groundwork had already been laid.

For years, Holocaust education relied on proximity. My children have been fortunate. Their teachers brought Holocaust survivors into the classroom; men and women who spoke plainly about what they endured. When a survivor speaks, history stops feeling theoretical. You can see it happen: the shift from “this happened” to “this happened to someone.”

My wife’s experience was similar, though quieter and more enduring. One of her teachers was a Holocaust survivor. What stayed with her wasn’t a speech or a carefully designed lesson. It was the number on her teacher’s arm, the residue of a system that sought to erase an entire people by first erasing their humanity. The teacher went on to educate children and build a life with purpose. But the number remained.

That kind of encounter will soon be unavailable. The survivors who visited my children’s classrooms, and the teacher my wife remembers, will not be there for the next generation. There are estimated to be fewer than 250,000 Holocaust survivors today, with half of them living in Israel. Soon, no one will be left to say, in the first person, I was there. What replaces living testimony will matter enormously.

This is where courage reenters the story. Courage, in this context, means insisting on accuracy about what happened and how extensive it was. It means refusing to let the attempted extermination of an entire people be softened into vague language or collapsed into just another historical atrocity. It means maintaining educational seriousness even when attention drifts and controversy intrudes.

Courage did not come early enough in Europe during the Holocaust, or in America during the struggle for civil rights. The lesson from history is that it rarely does.

When my wife describes her teacher’s tattoo, I’m reminded that the Holocaust was made possible by the deliberate reduction of a person to a number. January 27 marks the day the world found the courage to reject that logic. When the witnesses are gone, education will matter more than ever. But the most durable safeguard begins with a simple discipline: insisting, without exception, that this is a human being.

Bion Bartning is an entrepreneur and investor. He is co-founder of the Prohuman Foundation with Daryl Davis and Letitia Kim.

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Over the years, I’ve made my kids do something on Martin Luther King Jr. Day that they didn’t always love in the moment: sit still and listen to the entire “I Have a Dream” speech. Not a clip. Not an excerpt. All of it. Seventeen minutes, start to finish. This year, we’ll do it again.

Each time we watch, I’m caught a little off guard by how much it still moves me—literally, to tears. I know the words. I know the arc. I know how it ends. Yet Martin Luther King Jr.’s voice still reaches across decades and lands squarely in the present, undiminished by time or repetition.

What moves me most is not just the dream he describes, but the confidence with which he expresses his faith that, with discipline and sacrifice, “we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.” In a time when people too often mistake noise for progress, that line feels like both a challenge and an invitation.

Listening to the speech in its entirety matters. King’s argument unfolds slowly and deliberately. He names injustice plainly, without euphemism. He rejects complacency without indulging hatred. He demands urgency, but warns against despair. He assumes the listener is capable of patience, complexity, and moral imagination.

In today’s world of ever-shorter attention spans, that assumption can feel radical—especially for my 12- and 15-year-old kids.

“The function of education,” King once wrote, “is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education.” King articulated this ideal while striving to live it, publicly and imperfectly.

In recent years, there has been a temptation either to sanitize him into a marble statue or to dismiss him by cataloging his personal flaws. Both moves miss the point. King was neither flawless nor fraudulent. He was a gifted man who inspired millions—and who understood that leadership doesn’t require perfection, but courage, humility, and accountability to something larger than oneself.

Listening to “I Have a Dream” makes that unmistakable. The speech insists that equality is a debt long overdue, and it does so without collapsing the moral universe into heroes and villains. King speaks of brotherhood not because he was naïve about human nature, but because he understood that embracing our shared humanity is the only way forward.

He knew that systems change only when people do, and that people rarely change through humiliation or denigration. They change through connection, discipline, and example.

When we listen as a family, I watch my kids encounter a voice that offers an antidote to the polarization of our moment. King condemns injustice, but rejects hatred. He calls for impatient protest, but insists on moral restraint. He dreams boldly, but never disconnects the dream from sacrifice.

It is, in the best sense of the word, an education.

Not the kind that ends with a test score or a credential, but the kind that shapes how you see yourself in relation to others. The kind that teaches you not just how to think, but how to live.

So this year, instead of treating Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a moment for slogans or recycled quotations, I’ll offer a simple challenge.

Find a quiet place, away from distractions. Turn off the notifications on your phone. And listen to, or watch, the entire “I Have a Dream” speech. Not in the background. Not while multitasking. All the way through.

See if you can do it without being moved. See if you can listen without feeling unexpectedly hopeful. Let go, if only briefly, of the cynicism that tells us ideals are naïve or that faith is for fools.

King never promised progress would be easy or inevitable. He promised only that it was possible, and that it would require discipline, courage, and character. His words still carry that charge.

The question is whether we’re willing to listen long enough to hear it—and humble enough to let ourselves be inspired once again.

Bion Bartning is an entrepreneur and investor. He is co-founder of the Prohuman Foundation with Daryl Davis and Letitia Kim.

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On the first day of Hanukkah, as we commemorate the endurance of light in dark times, it’s worth recalling an unlikely postwar experiment in peacekeeping.

When the Eurovision Song Contest debuted in 1956, it wasn’t conceived as kitsch or escapism. It was a postwar response to catastrophe. Europe had just lived through the consequences of hardened identities, zero-sum politics, and the moral certainty that accompanies them.

Tens of millions were dead. Borders had shifted. Distrust lingered, and the Cold War was already pressing new ideological divisions onto an already wounded continent. Against that backdrop, the European Broadcasting Union launched a live, cross-border music competition with the ambition of fostering intercultural exchange and a sense of shared humanity in a continent that had lost both.

Eurovision was less a spectacle than a statement of faith that cultural exchange might bridge political differences and help prevent the next war.

Nearly seventy years later, that faith is being tested.

In response to the European Broadcasting Union’s decision on December 4 to allow Israel’s continued participation in the contest, broadcasters from five countries, including Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and Iceland, announced boycotts of Eurovision in protest of Israel’s inclusion in the contest.

Israel is not a recent or incidental participant. It first joined Eurovision in 1973, seeking cultural integration rather than isolation, based on the premise that Eurovision was about shared broadcasting values, not simply geography. Within a few years, Israel had won the competition twice, followed by its most recent win in 2018.

These boycotts are unfolding at a moment when antisemitism has reemerged with disturbing clarity, and with increasing violence. Yesterday, 15 people were murdered and multiple others wounded in a mass shooting targeting Jewish families on the first night of Hanukkah in Sydney, Australia. This is just one incident in what has become an alarming global pattern.

Against that backdrop, the attempts to exclude Israeli singers from Eurovision take on a different resonance. Making Jewish participation in shared civic spaces conditional signals something darker than protest.

None of this is to deny the gravity of the war in Gaza or the legitimacy of political disagreement. It’s to ask whether cultural boycotts actually advance peace, or whether they simply satisfy the urge to take sides while making future coexistence harder.

For me, the answer to that question is grounded in experience. As a teenager, I spent a year as an international exchange student in the Dominican Republic through American Field Service (AFS), an organization founded after World War II on a premise similar to Eurovision’s. Its founders believed that diplomacy alone was insufficient to prevent future global conflict, and that sustained person-to-person engagement could succeed where treaties had failed.

Their logic was practical, not sentimental. Young people who live with host families, learn new languages, and experience daily life across borders are less likely to reduce others to abstractions later in life. During my year abroad, I learned to speak Spanish and dance merengue. I came to appreciate Dominican culture, without losing my own culture in the process.

I learned that exchange doesn’t eliminate disagreement or create homogeneity. Rather, it humanizes people across distant cultures. My year abroad didn’t subtract from the person I was. I kept my fundamental values and beliefs, but gained perspective, friendship, and empathy.

Eurovision was founded on the same insight.

Its creators didn’t imagine that music could resolve geopolitical disputes. They believed that continued cultural exposure could lower the temperature and complicate easy antagonisms. Eurovision was never intended to endorse governments. It was intended to showcase people.

That’s why the current wave of boycotts is so revealing.

Withdrawal may feel like moral clarity, but it represents a retreat from one of the few remaining forums where nations meet as cultural equals rather than geopolitical adversaries. It signals that even artistic institutions must now conform to political battle lines, and that participation itself is suspect.

History suggests a different approach.

Europe learned, at extraordinary cost, that cultural isolation fuels extremism and mistrust. The value of exchange, whether through AFS or Eurovision, is that it requires individuals to remain present and to recognize humanity in others, even amid disagreement.

AFS didn’t suspend exchange programs every time the United States went to war or had policy disagreements with other countries. Had it done so, the organization wouldn’t have survived the Cold War, Vietnam, or numerous other periods of sustained global tension. Its founders understood that moments of conflict are precisely when exchange matters most.

There’s a choice embedded in this moment. Nations with political differences can treat Eurovision as a proxy battlefield, narrowing the space for understanding among millions of ordinary people, or they can reclaim its original purpose: a shared stage where disagreement doesn’t preclude participation and where cultural engagement persists despite political conflict.

When I co-founded the Prohuman Foundation with Daryl Davis and Letitia Kim, we were driven by the enduring belief that every person is a unique individual, united by our shared humanity. Daryl, a musician who has spent decades engaging people across the deepest ideological divides, often reminds me that when people are talking with one another, they aren’t fighting.

The same is true when people are making music together. Conversation and shared cultural experiences don’t guarantee agreement, but they do make violence harder to justify.

On this first day of Hanukkah, we are reminded that light endures when people choose to preserve it. If we truly want more light in our future, the answer isn’t fewer shared stages.

Choosing to sing together may still be the best way to create harmony.

Bion Bartning is an entrepreneur and investor. He is co-founder of the Prohuman Foundation with Daryl Davis and Letitia Kim.

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HR professionals are entrusted with shaping workplaces that honor the inherent dignity of every individual. The decision by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) to convene voices as divergent as Van Jones and Robby Starbuck at their Blueprint 2025 Conference, despite drawing some criticism, reflects a commitment to this ideal. By creating a forum where diverse viewpoints can be aired and examined, SHRM is helping to build communities and workplaces where every individual is seen, heard, and valued.

If this were easy, it would be the norm.

At the Prohuman Foundation, we support those who stand up to engage in challenging dialogue with curiosity and compassion. We believe that this is not only a professional obligation for leaders, but a civic imperative.

And it takes courage. In an age where discourse too often descends into rancor, SHRM’s call to “Listen Across Lines” is encouraging. A society, or a workplace, thrives only when its members dare to listen, not merely to affirm their own convictions, but to understand the ‘other side’ as fellow bearers of reason and experience. This demands the discipline to suspend judgment, the humility to acknowledge one’s own limitations, and the resolve to seek common ground without compromising principle.

To shy away from such engagement would be to impoverish the HR profession and our shared humanity. Just as Van Jones and Robby Starbuck should be afforded the dignity to be heard, critics of their participation with SHRM should not be dismissed, but should be met with the same curiosity and compassion.

The workplace is not a sanctuary from conflict, but a proving ground for resolving disagreement with integrity.

As stewards of organizational culture, HR professionals are uniquely positioned to model the art of principled disagreement. SHRM’s “Listen Across Lines” initiative is an invitation to practice this art. We hope all participants will meet this moment with the courage of conviction and the grace of understanding, trusting that such efforts will advance the cause of human dignity and the common good.

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George Floyd and Charlie Kirk share a birthday today, twenty years apart. That coincidence, random and meaningless in most contexts, now carries unexpected weight. It reminds us that before they became symbols, before their names became tribal tokens, both were human beings who entered the world the same way we all do.

Yet, tragically, our most salient memories are of how they left this world.

Both Floyd and Kirk died violent, public deaths that sparked nationwide movements. And, for highlighting challenges with respect to criminal justice and political violence, both deaths demanded serious national conversations.

Instead, we got tribal sorting exercises.

Binaries Sever Our Humanity

Floyd and Kirk, the complex multi-faceted individuals, were each flattened under the polarized narratives their deaths ignited. Consider how quickly Floyd’s death stopped being about Floyd himself. Almost immediately, the national conversation calcified into a binary: Were you Black Lives Matter or Blue Lives Matter? Floyd’s humanity and agency were squeezed from the right and the left: little more than a felon to some; a victim of oppression to others. A human being became a symbol to be claimed or rejected.

The response to Kirk’s death has followed a similar trajectory. Instead of grappling with what the public assassination of a political figure means for our democracy, many are retreating into familiar trenches. Was he a hero or a villain? Are you pro-free speech or anti-free speech? Pro-MAGA or anti-MAGA? These reductive questions flatten Kirk’s life into competing caricatures. To many, he was a bigot who peddled hate. To many others, he was the embodiment of everything good about America, a martyr for freedom. The man himself—complex, contradictory, human—disappeared.

Along the way, observers are flattened, too, trained to package our own complex values, beliefs, and goals into ideological binaries. As our thinking narrows, relationships with those who appear “problematic” dwindle—our lives and humanity are impoverished.

Binaries Sever Our Politics

The cost of side-taking in the aftermath of these high-profile deaths extends beyond the harm done to our humanity. It also reaches into policy, taxing our ability to find common ground amid complex political challenges.

Criminal justice reform isn’t a zero-sum game between police and communities. Research suggests that reforms making police more transparent and accountable simultaneously make officers safer while reducing community harm. But when we’re trapped in the Black Lives Matter versus Blue Lives Matter binary, as in the years following Floyd’s death, we can’t access these non-zero-sum reforms. Most Americans, when asked directly, oppose the type of excessive force used on Floyd, but our fracturing under the intense pressure of binary discourse prevented us from finding that common ground.

Kirk’s death also crystallized widespread fear about America’s future. Stemming the tide of political violence also demands non-zero-sum thinking. We need to understand what drives political violence, how to protect democratic discourse, how to disagree vehemently while maintaining civic bonds. These are complex problems requiring complex thinking. Meanwhile, the vast majority of Americans on both sides of the aisle agree: political violence is never acceptable. The problem is that even with this overwhelming agreement, each side sees the other as the chief source of political violence.

Uniting on the common ground we already share requires us to resist easy binaries and grasp all four dimensions of the challenges we face. Doing so can offer real insights, giving us access to non-zero-sum solutions—solutions that don’t animate partisan conflict.

When we view real human beings like George Floyd and Charlie Kirk through one dimensional lenses, we dishonor their humanity and thwart our capacity to solve complex political problems. But, both examples can provide us with a thread back to our common goals, if we let them. To see this means recognizing that real human beings are never symbols, that worthy policy solutions rarely fit partisan categories, and that our shared humanity matters more than our tribal affinities.

Lauren Hall is an author and political scientist whose writing on “radical moderation” critiques binary thinking to promote multidimensional perspectives on personal, social, and political issues. She is a professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs in Rochester Institute of Technology’s College of Liberal Arts. She serves as a Pluralism Fellow at the Mercatus Center, a Movement Partner with Builders, and as an advisor to the Prohuman Foundation.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

Monday night was the start of the Jewish High Holy Days, a time of reflection and renewal. This year, that spirit of reckoning comes as our nation faces a wave of extremist violence.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk two weeks ago was an attack on the principle at the heart of democracy: that we can disagree passionately without resorting to violence.

That same day, September 10, a 16-year-old shot two classmates at Evergreen High School in Colorado before turning the gun on himself. Reports indicate he had been consuming extremist propaganda online, drawn into a dark world of hate.

This week, a sniper killed one immigrant detainee and left two others in critical condition at a Dallas, Texas Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility, before killing himself.

And these are not isolated events. In just the past few months:

• A former student with anti-Catholic and antisemitic views opened fire on worshippers and children at the Church of the Annunciation school in Minneapolis.

• Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband were murdered in their home in what authorities called a targeted political attack.

• In Boulder, Colorado, a man attacked people attending a pro-Israel solidarity walk with a flamethrower and Molotov cocktails, shouting “End Zionists!”

Different tragedies. One root cause: hate.

I write these words as a husband and father, inspired by my work with Daryl Davis, a Black musician who has spent decades persuading members of the Ku Klux Klan to abandon hate. Through this experience, I have seen both the corrosive power of hate and the possibility of redemption. Daryl and I don’t agree on every issue, but what unites us is the conviction that hate — whether rooted in bigotry, ideology, or politics — is poison.

Charlie Kirk was a polarizing figure. Some revered him, others denounced him. While his defense of free expression resonated, his dismissal of Martin Luther King Jr. as “a bad guy” did not. But democracy depends on protecting the rights of those we disagree with most. When someone chose to silence him with a bullet, we all lost.

Hate doesn’t start with bullets. It starts with whispered stereotypes, cruel jokes, and caricatures on social media. Slowly, neighbors become enemies. As Daryl asked Klansmen: How can you hate me when you don’t even know me? Many cracked under the weight of that question and walked away from their robes and hoods.

Murder robs us of the chance for persuasion and change. Violence doesn’t resolve conflict. It amplifies it.

The False Promise of Hate

People don’t choose hate because they’re born violent. They embrace it because it offers the illusion of belonging, purpose, and power. It says: You’re part of the tribe because we share an enemy. You matter because you’re superior. You’re powerful because we can destroy what we fear. But belonging built on hate is fragile. Purpose grounded in resentment yields only pain. Power built on destruction is fleeting.

These violent acts of extremism are all grim reminders of the same truth: hate corrodes the vessel that carries it. They left behind devastated families and communities, and fueled the suspicion that dialogue is impossible: See? They’ll never talk. They’ll only kill.

Violence deepens the divides it pretends to solve.

It’s tempting to say some voices are too dangerous to be heard. I understand the fear. But if we answer hate with hate, we only prove its logic. The harder path is to show up with courage, without hate — with questions, dialogue, and the refusal to strip others of their humanity, even when they can’t see ours.

That’s not weakness. That’s strength.

The Founders left us with a revolutionary idea: that citizens could disagree fiercely and passionately without violence. The ballot box, the press, and the public square were meant to be our tools, not bullets. We can’t let extremist violence become normalized.

The America we need is not one where we all agree. It’s one where we argue with conviction, but never forget that the person across from us is still a person.

A Turning Point

This moment must be a wake-up call. Not for vengeance. Not for deeper trenches. But for renewed courage to look one another in the eye. We need leaders who model dialogue instead of demonization. Citizens willing to listen before shouting, to question before condemning. And an unequivocal rejection of the idea that killing people we disagree with is ever a path to justice.

Those who carried out these violent acts were consumed by hate until it destroyed them. The rest of us still have a choice. We can let these tragedies fuel more division, or we can make them a turning point, when we as a nation finally say: Enough. The way forward begins with us choosing to see one another, even in deep disagreement, as human beings first.

Bion Bartning is an entrepreneur and investor. He is co-founder of the Prohuman Foundation with Daryl Davis and Letitia Kim.

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What should we do about the political parties?

Should we scrap them? Reform them? Strengthen them? What role do they play in a democracy that so many people feel shut out of? For tens of millions of Americans—especially the growing number of independent voters—these questions aren’t just theoretical. They feel urgent and personal.

Last month, I took part in a Braver Angels ‘conversation circle,’ sponsored by the Prohuman Foundation, seeking answers. The conversation circle, styled like a debate, included a panel of partisans, independents, reformers, and skeptics. And even though there was plenty of criticism of both parties, and plenty of disagreement about how to move forward, the striking thing was how respectful and constructive the conversation was.

In contrast with the divisive rhetoric that plagues social media and cable news, this conversation—though inherently contentious—had a lightness about it. Panelists were convicted in their beliefs, yet curious. Spirited, yet civil. It offered proof that not only are difficult conversations possible under the right conditions, they can also be uplifting. It offered hope.

Two Opposing Cases

We started with a proposition: “Resolved: Our political parties are obsolete institutions.”

I opened with an affirmative case, arguing that parties have failed their core institutional responsibilities—to engage voters, develop sound policy, and elevate capable candidates. Instead, they’ve consolidated power, fueled polarization, and left a growing share of the country feeling unheard and politically homeless. I shared that 34% of voters now identify as independents—35% identify as Republicans and 31% as Democrats—and I cited the 80% of Americans who believe that elected officials don’t care what they think. At my organization, the Independent Center, we hear from them every day.

As one of our members put it, “They’re not actually listening to the people and what we want to happen.”

The major parties are worse than obsolete, I concluded. They're failing on every dimension that matters. The only question is what we should do about it.

Joining me on the panel—rejecting the resolution that the parties are obsolete—was William Deresiewicz, author, essayist, and former Yale University English professor. (Side note, if your first-ever debate pits you against a man of letters, at least make sure it’s also his first debate.)

Bill made the case that parties—flawed though they may be—are still essential. Our two-party system is deeply embedded in our electoral structure, and no third party is likely to gain traction fast enough to meaningfully disrupt it. Rather than discard the parties, Bill argued that we should focus on reforming them. After all, the parties are coalitions—and history shows that insurgent movements can take over a party and drive real change. Think FDR, Reagan, Clinton, even Trump.

He also reminded us that alternative systems, like Israel’s multi-party parliamentary model, come with chaos of their own—frequent elections, fragmented legislatures, and unstable coalitions.

Consensus Amid Disagreement

My fellow panelists shared deep frustration with the parties, but very few wanted to get rid of them altogether. Instead, they wanted ways to make the parties more responsive to voters, less beholden to insiders, and more open to competition. People wanted accountability, not annihilation.

We landed on a point of agreement, but the path we took to get there was just as—if not more—important. We took the path of civility, and that made all the difference. Guided by genuine curiosity, humility, and respect, we didn’t spiral into defensiveness. We listened. We took turns speaking. These fundamentals may be neglected in mass media and diminished online, but they are not lost in the wider culture. They still resonate with most Americans, and that gives me hope.

What Independent Voters Bring to the Table

As someone who speaks often with independent and nonaligned voters, I’m used to encountering nuance. Independents aren’t anti-party. They are pro-accountability and pro-decency. They are also deeply tired of being ignored. They want a system that treats them like full participants—not as afterthoughts or spoilers. They want leaders who represent all their constituents, not just their partisan base. And they want politics to value integrity and sound policy over tribal loyalty.

Finding common ground in a debate reinforced something I’ve believed for a long time: We don’t need to stop talking, and even disagreeing, about politics. We need better ways to hear each other.

Where We Go from Here

If you’re frustrated with the state of American politics, you’re not alone. You’re also not powerless. Conversations like the one facilitated by Braver Angels and the Prohuman Foundation remind me that meaningful political dialogue is still possible—in the best case, it’s even fun—and that reform doesn’t require unity. It requires curiosity, respect, and the willingness to stay at the table.

So, what should we do about the parties? Start by talking about them. Challenge them. Push them to be better. And most of all, refuse to accept that outrage is the only way to be heard.

Author’s Note:
With deep appreciation for all of the Conversation Circle participants at the 2025 FreedomFest as well as the Prohuman Foundation for the opportunity to join this debate, and Braver Angels for all the work they do promoting bipartisan political engagement. Finally, thanks to Bill Deresiewicz for being a gracious interlocutor.

Lura Forcum holds a PhD in Consumer Psychology and is the President of the Independent Center, a “resource hub and champion for the millions of Americans who believe we share common ground.” Her work in governance, policy, and civil society is informed by her scholarship and passion for shifting hearts and minds.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

Today, American flags ripple meaningfully in the summer breeze. Tonight, fireworks will paint the sky. These symbols of American might will prompt many of us to pause and reflect on the blessings of liberty—and the complex history that shapes it.

Another, less known, but mighty symbol will stir today in the aureate glow of a luthier’s shop in New York City. The Lady Liberty Violin was brought to life as a tribute to this country by her maker, Lukas Wronski, a Polish immigrant. She is played (in the video below) by the virtuoso Kinga Augustyn, also from Poland.

Watch the video, if you can. It’s a brief tribute to the American ideal: Liberty for all. The freedom to pursue truth, beauty, and goodness. Love. Man’s lust for power checked by law; division tempered by the bonds of our affections. This is the promise that drew Lukas to craft the Lady Liberty Violin and Kinga to draw her bow across its strings, their artistry a testament to a nation where dreams can take root.

But, look closely and you’ll see the violin’s jarring asymmetries, seemingly a reminder that America’s story is not a simple one. The nation that welcomed Lukas and Kinga also bears the scars of slavery and segregation, and too many other moments when freedom was denied.

Keep watching… Kinga ends with the theme from Schindler’s List. Several notes into John Williams’ masterpiece, its horrific beauty squeezes the air from your chest, evoking horrors; camps, trenches, hell on Earth. But also grace. The melody carries the weight of humanity’s darkest hours, yet it soars with resilience, a reminder that beauty can emerge from pain. The Lady Liberty Violin, with its scroll crowned by that solemn likeness of sacred honor, gazes out as if bearing witness to man’s struggle with depravity. Her body, framed by odd bulges and spikes, seems to sing, “I am beauty born of defect! I am the child of American dreams come true, and the soberly mourning mother of dreams deferred.”

On this Fourth, we celebrate a country that turns imperfection into possibility. From the abolitionists to the civil rights marchers, from the poets to the soldiers—and among those working today to ensure the next generation learns fairness, understanding, and humanity—America’s strength lies in its people’s resolve to make her core ideals a reality.

The Lady Liberty Violin, crafted and played by those who chose this land, is a love letter to that promise. Her song holds the ache of past mistakes, but rises with hope. She calls us to draw beauty from our defects and to let grace rise from grief. As her notes linger, they suggest that America is not a finished work, but a living anthem, carried by those who believe in its dream enough to keep playing.

Adam Thompson is the Communications Manager at the Prohuman Foundation. Originally from Maine, he studied at Colby College and lives with his wife and daughter in Vietnam.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

A version of this article was published previously in Blue Avocado, a platform dedicated to helping nonprofit leaders. Blue Avocado is sponsored by Nonprofits Insurance Alliance.

Recent sweeping actions by the Trump administration have brought Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) training programs and policies into the headlines, with implications for both government and the broader workforce — including nonprofits.

The nonprofit sector has long been committed to being a place where people from diverse backgrounds and identities can thrive and contribute.

Nonprofits were early and eager adopters of the language and professional community that grew up around DEI, because of the persistence of negative experiences and injustices that even many of the harshest critics of DEI would admit are real.

But over the past few years, many people — even within the sector — have become disillusioned with common institutionalized approaches that fall under the DEI label.

Ironically and tragically, DEI’s most passionate proponents — and most passionate opponents — are both reacting to the same root cause: Something is broken in how Americans encounter each other across differences.

Repeated Cycles of Overreach and Backlash

The 20th Century saw tremendous progress for America’s pluralism, with advances in equal treatment for women and people racialized as minorities, and unprecedented interreligious harmony.

Yet, as that progress triumphed in law and turned towards culture, it led to repeated cycles of overreach and backlash — think of the “politically correct” conflicts of the 1990s and the “woke” / “anti-woke” dynamics of the past half-decade.

How Can We Get to Someplace Better?

The answer begins with a black man sitting down with a Klansman in a Maryland bar.

The man is Daryl Davis, whose efforts to build bridges with KKK members — and talking dozens of them into giving up their robes and leaving hate behind — have become legendary. (If you’re unfamiliar, watch Daryl’s TEDx talk and the documentary “Accidental Courtesy.”)

Davis is among the co-founders of a new organization aiming to help America remember how to listen again.

The Prohuman Foundation seeks to break through demonization and division by lifting up the individuality and shared humanity of every person.

In a world of bitter fights between “antiracist” and “anti-woke,” the Prohuman Approach is focused not on either of these “anti” directions, but on the “pro-” that renders both unnecessary.

The Prohuman Approach works on three layers: The individual, the relational, and the communal.

• Individually, it asks us to adopt a growth mindset, committed to practicing gratitude, optimism, and grit. Sometimes, before attempting difficult conversations with others; we need to work on ourselves first.

• Relationally, the Prohuman Approach teaches curiosity, courage, and compassion. Having solidified our individual selves, we’re ready to be truly open to the full individuality of others.

• Communally, the Prohuman Approach aims for fairness, understanding, and embracing our common humanity — all of which create strong communities.

Can the Prohuman Approach Help?

I’ve spent the past five months learning about the Prohuman Approach in their Prohuman Ambassador program, and the experience has been inspiring and uplifting. It has changed how I think about my local community, my nonprofit workplace, and the nonprofit sector.

At a time when many nonprofit professionals are looking for ways out of the dead end of DEI controversies, can the Prohuman Approach help?

The Prohuman curriculum is not yet offered officially for workplaces; the foundation’s initial focus is on K-12 schools. But I believe we in nonprofit organizations can still begin to ask ourselves questions inspired by the Prohuman Approach — questions like:

1. How can we create that growth mindset as individual employees by leveraging gratitude, optimism, and grit?

2. How can we create positive social relationships in our organizations with curiosity, courage, and compassion?

3. How can we create social harmony in our organizations and communities, with fairness for all, mutual understanding, and recognition of our shared humanity?

Dodging the Dogma Trap

Let me be clear, however: I’m not calling for everyone to adopt this, or any one approach. What we need is this model’s emotional and relational skills, not a shared commitment to any one set of vocabulary.

Indeed, for those of us who find this model useful, we should heed the lessons of the model itself in how we advance it.

We should be grateful, gritty, humble, and hopeful enough in our individual convictions that we can advance Prohuman goals even without others being on board.

We should be committed in our interpersonal relationships to being curious, courageous, and compassionate — even toward those who would rather ground themselves in other, “rival” models.

And we should work towards building communities — workplaces, houses of worship, neighborhoods, and more — that foster fairness, understanding, and respect for everyone’s humanity, no matter what buzzwords people reference in making it happen.

Talking about either DEI or its alternatives has become fraught in ways it didn’t used to be. But if Daryl Davis can walk into a literal Klan rally, then all of us in the nonprofit sector can dig deep and find the courage to open up a conversation with our colleagues — and the even greater strength it takes to actually listen, with an open mind and heart.

Seth Chalmer is a Prohuman Ambassador candidate and Vice President of Communications at Leading Edge, but the opinions expressed in this article are his own. A graduate of NYU’s dual Masters in Nonprofit Management and Judaic Studies, his writing has appeared in Stanford Social Innovation Review, The Los Angeles Times, and Quillette.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

Last summer, my wife Marina and I visited Israel—our third trip in recent years. It felt different this time, coming just nine months after the October 7, 2023 terrorist attacks, and with the war in Gaza underway.

The pain felt by so many Israelis was palpable. Posters with messages of support for the hostages and their families were everywhere; the entire nation was in mourning. We spent time with Marina’s family in Tel Aviv, and at one point drove an hour and a half south, to the site of the Nova music festival massacre, stopping along the way to visit several of the kibbutzim that were brutally attacked by Hamas. We were seeking, in our own way, to bear witness to the calamity that was still ongoing.

The following day, we went to a rally in Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square to show our support for the hostages and their families. We gathered with thousands of people that evening, and were overcome by a flood of emotions—love and interconnectedness, combined with a profound feeling of sadness and loss. Touched by our experience, I brought home a yellow wristband imprinted with “#BringThemHomeNOW.”

Today, almost a year later, the imprint on my yellow wristband has faded away—but I wear it every day, and think about the fact that 58 Israeli hostages are still being held by Hamas, over 600 days after they were first stolen from their families.

Reflecting on Sunday’s tragic antisemitic terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, I’m feeling the same mix of emotions that I felt last summer in Hostage Square. Especially the sadness.

I’m heartbroken that we have reached a point in this country where a man armed with a blowtorch and molotov cocktails feels emboldened to heartlessly attack and burn at least a dozen innocent people on the eve of the Jewish holiday of Shavuot—including an 88 year old Holocaust survivor—while shouting “Free Palestine” and “Fuck you, Zionists.”

I’m heartbroken that this latest attack against Jewish people comes just 10 days after two Americans who worked for the Israeli embassy were shot dead in Washington D.C. by a man yelling “Free, Free Palestine”—and six weeks after an arson attack on the home of Josh Shapiro, the Jewish governor of Pennsylvania, by a man claiming that he wanted to “stop having [his] friends killed” in Gaza.

Let me be clear: Those perpetrating acts of hate against Jewish people, while claiming to support their “friends” in Gaza are blind to the reality that the two million people living and suffering in war-torn Gaza need to be freed not from “Zionists”—but rather from the Hamas terrorist organization’s brutal reign of terror against their own people.

Of course, it’s fair for people to criticize the Israeli government—I know a number of Israelis who are critical of their government’s policies across a wide range of issues. But it’s not fair to claim, as some have, that there is moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas. And it’s not fair to insist that Israel should compromise with those who seek its destruction. In the words of Israel’s first female Prime Minister, Golda Meir, “They say we must be dead. And we say we want to be alive. Between life and death, I don’t know of a compromise. And that’s why we have no choice.”

The challenge we face is great, and the stakes could not be higher. But we need to remain true to our values, especially now. If we respond to these attacks by hardening our hearts—or by becoming consumed with hatred—then our side, the side of love and light, has lost. Even if we win on the battlefield against evil, we will have lost our souls.

I’m reminded of what Nova massacre survivor Yuval Raphael sang just a few weeks ago, winning her second place in this year’s Eurovision contest:

In the face of these tragedies, it’s ok to feel sad. It’s ok to cry. But please, don’t cry alone. Let these acts of inhumanity bring us closer to our families, our communities, and our shared humanity. And help us find the courage and compassion to counter ignorant hatred with righteous love.

Am Yisrael Chai! The people of Israel live!

Bion Bartning is an entrepreneur, investor, and co-founder of the Prohuman Foundation. He previously co-founded and led the launch of eos Products, a personal care brand best known today for its iconic egg-shaped lip balm. Bion earned his MBA from Columbia Business School, and graduated magna cum laude with a degree in economics and environmental studies from Occidental College.

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Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) practitioners face a reckoning amid political pushback and doubts about efficacy. The retreat prompts a question as well as an opportunity: Is there a better way to engage with social justice and diversity education? For me, this question is not new. It’s one I’ve been wrestling with long before DEI became a ubiquitous acronym in 2020, sweeping across corporate America and academia.

As a multiracial individual, my investment in racial healing and justice in America is personal. As a K-12 educator, college student affairs administrator, and reconciliation speaker and trainer, it’s also been a professional calling. My interest in the subject took a new turn around 2011 when I noticed a troubling pattern—students emerging from diversity training sessions often carried heavy burdens of anger or guilt, yet they lacked the tools to process these emotions constructively. In the conferences and workshops I attended, no one seemed to be addressing the emotional fallout. It struck me as a critical oversight—one that begged deeper inquiry:

Can you build a more just society on a foundation of unresolved guilt and anger?

I’ve come to believe the answer is no. Unresolved guilt festers into self-hatred and depression; unresolved anger hardens into bitterness and cynicism. Neither emotion, left unchecked, fosters the kind of progress we claim to seek. This realization set me on a decade-long journey to design training programs that confront these deeper issues—hurt, injustice, and the tangled emotions they evoke—while offering a path forward through forgiveness, reconciliation, and hope.

My approach found a natural home when I joined the Prohuman Ambassador program. Its core values—Growth Mindset, Positive Connections, and Social Harmony—mirrored the principles I’d been cultivating in my work. Rather than stoking division or dwelling solely on past wrongs, my programs emphasize storytelling as a bridge to compassion, courage, and connection. The results speak for themselves. 77% of participants in my workshops reported being “highly engaged” during the sessions, while 82% said they were “highly likely” to apply what they’d learned. Their written feedback illuminated some of the reasons why:

Only session of the day that wasn’t politically one-sided and offered some semblance of hope.

The most balanced session I attended. Offered documented and proven methods for moving forward. Not just a historical perspective, but a vision for a better future and a method for getting there. Very humbly presented and well researched.

I appreciated the balanced perspective. Mostly, it was nice to have a session that provided a sense of hope and some tools for addressing pain.

Cameron’s stories of hope and additional emphasis in this workshop on shared stories made me feel like some of the difficulties facing so many people today are possible to overcome.

This session filled me with hope. There are a lot of reasons to feel despair at this time, but Cameron’s session made me realize that we should and CAN have hope. We need this for ourselves, our students, our colleagues.

People crave real solutions to conflict and tangible pathways to genuine community. They sense, intuitively, that there are better ways to move forward than with guilt and anger.

Contrast this with the anti-racism framework that underpins many DEI initiatives. It casts human existence as a perpetual struggle between oppressor and oppressed—a worldview that constructs an inescapable caste system. Is this a compelling vision for the future? Has it ever demonstrably advanced justice, social harmony, or human flourishing? History suggests it has not. In America, the arc of progress bends toward greater freedom, with more people liberated today than at the nation’s founding—a testament to the agency inherent in all individuals, an agency that “anti-racist” frameworks often overlook or subvert.

Still, the decline of DEI programs has left many uneasy. Some see it as a loss—a step backward. But what if it’s an opportunity? These programs aren’t fading simply due to political shifts; many are being abandoned because they haven’t delivered. Organizations cite a lack of return on investment or, worse, an exacerbation of the very problems they aimed to solve. A building with a faulty foundation cannot be salvaged with a fresh coat of paint. When new information reveals a flaw, it’s not only acceptable to change course—it’s essential.

Social harmony, where fairness, understanding, dignity, and the humanity of all are honored, should be the goal. The Prohuman approach offers a blueprint. It speaks to meaning, knowing, and problem-solving in ways that transcend division. Consider Daryl Davis, a black man and Prohuman Foundation co-founder, who has spent years engaging in dialogue with those who hate him for the color of his skin. Through positive connections and a belief in the capacity for change (a growth mindset), he has forged unlikely friendships, leading many to abandon hate.

In the end, it’s about people—all people. Moving toward healing, wholeness, and community is what matters. As C.S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity:

We all want progress. But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be… If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.

The retreat from divisive anti-racist approaches to DEI could be our chance to turn back toward our shared humanity. Let’s not lose this opportunity to make sure we are on the right road.

Cameron Cox is a Prohuman Ambassador candidate. He holds a Master's in Higher Education and creates programs for students and faculty that bring a hopeful lens to racial and social reconciliation.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

In a demonstration of civic engagement and character, students from the Oakfield-Alabama Central School District’s “Seal of Civic Readiness” class have earned the opportunity to present before the New York State Senate Committee on Mental Health. Their initiative is a testament to the core values that the Prohuman Foundation seeks to advance—character strengths such as courage, compassion, and understanding. Recognizing the students’ efforts, the Prohuman Foundation awarded a grant toward their travel expenses to Albany, turning a unique opportunity into reality.

Tracy Schlagenhauf, a Global History and Leadership teacher, directs the Seal of Civic Readiness Program at Oakfield-Alabama Central School District. The program, sponsored by New York State, is designed to cultivate students' civic knowledge, skills, and mindset. For the 2024-2025 academic year, Schlagenhauf’s students chose to address the disconnect between outreach and treatment pathways for substance abuse and mental health. Through research, collaboration, and advocacy, they have not only gained a deeper understanding of the issues and captured the attention of state legislators, they have undergone personal growth—the kind of education that promotes self-governance and community uplift.

The Prohuman Foundation’s mission is to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity. This mission aligns with the students’ project, but more importantly with their process. The nine character strengths at the heart of the Prohuman Approach—Gratitude, Optimism, Grit, Curiosity, Courage, Compassion, Fairness, Understanding, and Humanity—were exemplified in each student’s contribution.

Elliana Emery, one of the participating students, reflected:

We needed to approach our group project with the utmost compassion. In society, mental health and substance abuse issues are oftentimes frowned upon and harbor lots of judgment. Due to all of these factors, my peers and I decided that we needed to be a support system and show that those struggling with these problems are not alone and deserve sensitivity as well as empathy.

More than learning civics, Schlagenhauf’s students are practicing civics in a way that embodies the foundation’s core values. Another student, Kendall Newbould, highlighted the role of optimism in pushing forward despite potential resistance:

While looking for change in how programs and organizations treat [mental health and substance abuse] disorders, we have to be optimistic, hoping that people will be open-minded to changing their treatment options. There is truly no other way we could have gotten this far…. Hopefulness has been such an important quality that I have personally seen in all of the members of this class.

Optimism and grit are essential qualities for robust civic engagement. So is courage, explains Jessica Sosnowski, commenting on her experience in the Seal of Civic Readiness Program:

[Seal of Civic Readiness] is not a class where students leave without acquiring valuable knowledge. Rather, this rigorous and demanding program aims to enhance high school students’ understanding of civic matters, readiness, and skills beyond the traditional classroom setting while motivating them to venture beyond their comfort zones and demonstrate courage.

The students’ journey to Albany is more than just an opportunity to present before state lawmakers—it’s a reflection of their commitment to civic engagement and their ability to lead with character. Their work serves as a reminder that civics is not just about policy—it is about individuals recognizing their shared humanity and building a shared future. The Prohuman Foundation is proud to support their efforts.

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Grants

Educators: Apply for $500 by April 27!

The Prohuman Foundation, in partnership with Civic Learning Week and National Week of Conversation is awarding $500 to schools teaching constructive dialogue. Learn more and apply here.

Visit our site for more grant opportunities.

Editor’s Note:

Advancing a positive culture that elevates our shared humanity is core to the Prohuman mission. Our programs, including a K-12 curriculum, teach character strengths that lift up people and whole communities.

The Great Hearts Classical Charter Network has, for years, been empowering students with the educational habits of heart and mind that Frederick Douglass might attribute to the process of ‘[uplifting] the soul of man into the glorious light of truth’—the very light that has guided America’s enduring trial in pluralistic self-governance.

Today we share an article by Carol McNamara, director of the Great Hearts Institute, on the classical approach to ‘solving the civics crisis,’ in anticipation of the institute’s National Symposium for Classical Education. The Symposium takes place in Tempe Arizona from February 19 to 21. We’ll be there. Tickets are still available and we hope you’ll join us.

See the full Symposium program, here.

How Classical Schools are Solving the Civics Crisis

By Carol McNamara

Public education in the United States is suffering a crisis of seriousness. Much like the population of Ray Bradbury’s dystopian society in Fahrenheit 451, American children are often no longer required to read the great books of history, philosophy and literature that form thoughtful human beings who can sort through the big (and small) human questions for themselves, in a way that prepares them to become responsible, self-governing individuals and leaders the country needs.

The appeal of K-12 classical education is growing simply because many parents want academic excellence to be the standard for education. Parents want their children to love school and to acquire the foundational skills of the mind and habits of heart that prepare them for clear reasoning, strong writing, and the ability to express themselves well in the robust exchange of ideas.

The Discovery Institute reports that between 2019 and 2023, 264 new classical schools were established in the United States, reflecting an average annual growth rate of 4.8%. This expansion increased the number of U.S. classical schools to an estimated 1,000 in 2024.

Growth has also occurred within existing classical schools. In a sample of 84 schools surveyed, total enrollment grew from 9,692 to 16,448 students between the 2018–19 and 2022–23 academic years. One forecast suggests that 1.4 million K-12 students—2.4% of the total U.S. K-12 population—will be enrolled in a classical school by 2035.

With this growing interest in classical education and the liberal arts, many wonder what it is, and what support it might provide for the necessary renewal of a civic education that provides students with the knowledge and dispositions that prepare them to be thoughtful participants in American civic life. Classical liberal arts education is conducted through the close reading, study, and discussion of texts and ideas across the curriculum–including the humane letters (literature, philosophy, and history), mathematics, science, the arts, and classical and modern languages, to which students are introduced in an order that corresponds with the natural stages of learning.

In The Lost Tools of Learning, Dorothy Sayers, calling for a revival of the medieval “Trivium” of “grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric,” argues that we should dedicate the first stages of learning–what we would call K-12 education—to inculcating the “tools” of learning. Sayers’ argument (in 1947) is that education had become formulaic and value neutral: we teach children to read, and about the facts of “subjects,” without teaching them how to learn, how to think through a problem and formulate their thoughts into a sustained argument. Sayers explains that education begins with the fact accumulation and memorization that young children find so easy and pleasurable. It proceeds to an argumentative, competitive and dialectical stage, ultimately leading to what she calls the “Poetic Age,” a challenging and restless period of youth, characterized by an obsessive desire to possess and synthesize knowledge into a whole.

This order of learning becomes a classical liberal arts education when it is paired with a curriculum that corresponds to the child’s stage of development. Great Hearts kindergarten students read Little Bear, Mr. Popper’s Penguins; third graders begin the Narnia series; by fifth grade, the students have embarked on Shakespeare; and in high school, they tackle the great epics, novels, and philosophic texts of the Western tradition, among them the works of the American Founding, U.S. literature, rhetoric, and political thought that form them into thoughtful participants in the American experiment. Along the way, they learn how to take up a text on their own and together with others in Socratic seminars.

The pattern of education characteristic of the Great Hearts classical charter network, and other classical schools, was introduced to ensure that students encounter the greatest ideas available across the curriculum. The result of such an education should be that students are unwilling to rest content with the unexamined opinions and conventions of our times, and instead become determined to think through all the serious alternatives for themselves in pursuit of the truth.

Perhaps that shouldn’t be radical, but it is always radical to have an independent mind. We want students to possess the skills and knowledge to challenge convention, not for its own sake, or even to be on the “right side of history,” but to take seriously the alternatives in front of us and proceed on the basis of prudence. This disposition to learn and judge wisely is the one students will need to become thoughtful American citizens and leaders in a world that is throwing at them the greatest challenges.

A version of this article was originally published by The Jack Miller Center.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.

In the days after the 2016 election, my family and I were on a quest for a new church. One congregation we tried had a reputation for being theologically conservative—the pastor was known for his thoughtful, moving sermons. We decided to give it a shot, accompanied by my mother-in-law, a staunch Democrat still reeling from the election results.

The sermon, when it finally began, was good. But before he got to it, the pastor spent the first fifteen minutes essentially leading a victory lap for Donald Trump’s win. My mother-in-law sat stiffly in the pew as the pastor reveled in political triumph. It was uncomfortable and ultimately alienating. We never went back.

That experience stayed with me—not for what was said as much as what had been left unsaid to express grace and compassion for those who had pinned their hopes on Hillary Clinton.

I thought of it again in 2024, when Trump’s re-election over Kamala Harris sparked a cascade of visceral reactions from the political left. In cities across the country, people gathered for candlelight vigils, for what they described as the "death of democracy." To an outsider—or a centrist like me—these reactions can feel performative, exaggerated, even absurd.

And yet, as easy as it is to dismiss these displays, I’ve come to believe they deserve more empathy than they often receive. The truth is, these reactions, however extreme, are rooted in something real: fear, grief, and a profound sense of loss.

Politics and Grief

Losing an election isn’t just about losing power—it’s about losing a vision for the future. For those on the losing side, the dreams they nurtured evaporate overnight. The defeat feels personal, like the end of a relationship or the death of a loved one. It’s not just what is that hurts, but what could have been.

When people lose a loved one, we don’t mock them for expressing grief in ways we might not understand. We give them space, compassion, and time to heal. Not so in the political realm. Instead of extending empathy, many reacted with ridicule, reposting memes about “liberal tears,” circulating clips of dramatic emotional “meltdowns.” The schadenfreude is as predictable as it is ugly.

The Case for Compassion

This isn’t about agreeing with every grievance or endorsing every dramatic outburst. Some reactions to political loss do cross the line into performance art or outright manipulation. Still, in most cases it’s worth asking: what’s the harm in meeting grief with compassion?

Compassion doesn’t mean abandoning your principles or stifling your joy. It doesn’t mean you can’t celebrate your candidate’s victory. What it does mean is recognizing the humanity in those who lost. It means acknowledging their fear and disappointment, even if you believe those emotions are misplaced.

After all, isn’t that what we would want for ourselves? If we want to live in a country where political opponents can coexist without vilifying one another, it starts with small acts of decency in moments like these. It starts with resisting the urge to gloat or mock and choosing instead to listen, to understand, and to show a modicum of grace.

Elections are inevitably divisive. But how we treat each other in the aftermath can either deepen those divisions or begin to bridge them. Compassion won’t solve all our problems, but it’s a step in the right direction.

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Opinions expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of the Prohuman Foundation. We value diverse perspectives and invite submissions from those who can enrich our understanding of topics close to our mission: to promote the foundational truth that we are all unique individuals, united by our shared humanity.