Whether you are celebrating Christmas or not, going home for the holidays often means that some dinner with family or friends is bound to happen. We know how talking with your family can easily become a political discussion in which someone might get hurt.
Inspired by BridgeUSA and their advice to ‘talk politics at Thanksgiving’ in today’s short Blog post we would like to reach out to you with a few pieces of advice for good practice when talking about politics at the Christmas table. Collected by our members, for you.
Luc: 1. Instead of focusing only on what divides you, try to focus as well on what connects you. For example with the Covid-19 crisis, try to find common ground on shared understanding such as the fact that science itself does not know much yet about all the proportions of the virus or that everyone has a hard time going through lockdowns/new waves of the virus in his or her own way.
2. Instead of trying to win an argument, listen to and ask questions that are oriented towards understanding the person's ideas better. In other words, try to understand where the thoughts of your family members are coming from.
3. This is Christmas, not a time to talk about the most controversial and provoking topics of the time. Instead, try to focus on what went well this year for everyone and how life is going for other members of your family. In that way, you can also understand where the person's ideas and arguments are coming from if these topics still come to the surface during for example dinner or lunch.
4. Instead of purely talking/catching up with each other during the holidays, do not forget to do other activities such as playing board games and going for a walk/run. Here, the attention can be shifted in productive to create empathy.
This is Christmas…try to focus on what went well this year for everyone and how life is going for other members of your family. Don’t forget to do other activities where attention can be shifted in produced ways to create empathy.
Miriam: This is not mind-blowing advice because luckily in my family we don’t have completely opposite viewpoints in politics but generally taking a deep breath and trying to turn it into more of a rational rather than emotional discussion can help from my experience. I’m vegan and a large part of my extended family hunts in their free time…so when we have Christmas often times there is a big meat dish and it’s usually something that they hunted at some point. And the topic comes up and at times we get into a discussion because for me it’s so odd that they hunt in their free time. But then I try to remember that for them hunting is a better choice than buying meat from a supermarket, for which the animals lived a worse life and it can also be part of a tradition.
Try turning it into more of a rational rather than emotional discussion. I’m vegan and a large part of my extended family hunts in their free time…
Konstantin: That's a tough one honestly. In my family it usually works quite well. Maybe one advice is to keep in mind in what time your grandparents and parents have grown up. And to see their statements in that light. For example when it comes to gender roles, my grandma is critical about girls only caring about their jobs and so on, and she says that they should also know “how to cook and take care of their husbands”. And everyone is always going crazy and saying “Grandma you can’t say that!”. But I know that she grew up in a time in which women generally did not work and depended on their husband, and they had a different role imposed on them by society. I believe I shouldn’t blame her for her opinion or tell her she’s wrong but communicate better how times have changed since then and how different things might be “important” now.
Keep in mind in what time your grandparents and parents have grown up. My grandma always says that women should “know how to cook and take care of their husbands”…but I believe I shouldn't blame her for her opinion but communicate better
Caterina: My father and I don’t see eye to eye on many aspects of the European Union and at times the discussions between us can become really heated, especially because we both draw on different ‘life experiences’, refer to different anecdotes to support our point and end up conflating several arguments in one. And it just keeps on escalating. But I’ve learned one important lesson: Establish common aspects that we both agree on at first to build our conversations from. This allows us to start from commonality rather than opposition and to engage more constructively with each other’s points. It really feels less like I’m trying to promote the EU no matter what and he’s trying to return to a Westphalian system of sovereign states. And no one storms away from the table.
Establish common aspects that we both agree on at first to build our conversation from. My father and I don’t see eye to eye on many aspects of the European Union…
Vlad: I haven't had any bad experiences with political conversations at a dinner table so far. The reason for that might be, that the areas of interest differ a lot between me and my parents. A family evening should not necessary be a time for arguments, but rather an occassion to learn from each other something new and share your views on things. Generational gap and differing lifestyles sure do create political disagreements. But it also means that you are simply interested and therefore competent in different things. This makes for a perfect opportunity to exchange experiences and learn from one another. If you come into the conversation with an open mind you most probably will leave it knowing a little more. Secret tipp: motivate people close to you to educate themselves and read more yourself. Chances are high, that you will start to have debates instead of arguments and exchange opinions instead of insults.
A family evening should not necessarily be a time for arguments, but rather an occasion to learn from each other something new and share your views on things.