Civility is Not a Fantasy

Changing political norms begins with committing to personal ones

holding hands by chinogypsie

Over the past few weeks, I have spoken at La Salle University, Brigham Young University, and Knox College about my book, Learning to Disagree. Given the book’s subtitle, “The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect,” it will not come as a shock to learn that I do in fact advocate for those postures in our engagement with one another. I also continue to foreground the civic aspirations of humility, patience, and tolerance that I wrote about in a previous book, Confident Pluralism.

All of this may sound antiquated, a bit too nice. Do we really need more gracious interactions with our adversaries when the stakes are so high? In a New York Times essay this week, Roxanne Gay argues that we don’t. Gay writes that “civility—this idea that there is a perfect, polite way to communicate about sociopolitical differences—is a fantasy.”

Of course, Gay is right that there’s no such thing as a “perfect” way to communicate about differences. But nobody I know who advocates for civility assumes perfection or universal politeness. Politics is messy, and people are imperfect. That means that our engagement toward civility is also bound to fall short.

Civility also has an asymmetrical dimension. Those in positions of power and influence should have a greater obligation to model and exercise civility even when others around them are less able or less willing to do so.

As Keith Bybee has observed in his book How Civility Works, there will also be times for “strategic incivility.” In an earlier post reflecting on Bybee’s phrase, I observed:

Sometimes, when calls for civility are used by those in power to impede change, disrupting civility norms might point to “a new code of public conduct.” And we have plenty of historical examples of successfully disruptive incivility, including Anti-Federalists, suffragettes, civil rights activists, and Black Lives Matter protesters.

But rather than viewing incivility as a strategic departure from a norm, Gay seems to think civility is always a cheap trick by those in power:

Calling for civility is about exerting power. It is a way of reminding the powerless that they exist at the will of those in power and should act accordingly. It is a demand for control.

Gay isn’t merely proposing a different strategy; she is asserting a fundamentally different premise. I assume that civility is a real norm—sometimes strategically suspended, sometimes reinforced, but always a part of the political grammar within which we operate. Gay rejects the category altogether, treating civility itself as a trap. That difference matters: if civility is merely a mask for domination, then the only real option is disruption. If civility is a fragile but essential norm, then the task is harder: learning when to resist it and when to sustain it for the sake of durable coalitions.

As I noted in my reflections on Bybee’s book:

Too much disruption—pushing the wrong words prematurely or without enough social context—can backfire. Strategic incivility may be more art than science, but it is not without its own set of rules. More generally, civility norms can only tolerate so much incivility before they collapse entirely, at which point strategic incivility will no longer be very strategic. There are certainly occasions for angry protests and disruptive speech. But it may be that complying with civility norms will prove more effective over time.

Gay thinks otherwise. She buttresses her argument for rejecting civility by pointing to the collapse of political norms:

Whatever political norms may have once existed have been shattered time and time again since the beginning of the second Trump presidency. In this new abnormal, we can only gape, with incredulity, at the many ways in which our democracy is being torn asunder—the undue influence of billionaires, the dismantling of vital government programs, the relentless pursuit of undocumented immigrants and ensuing incarceration in inhumane facilities and an ever-growing list of other, uniquely American horrors. But to speak these truths is uncivil, impolite, un-American. To speak these truths means you are one of them, outside the protection of the leaders of this country.

Gay is right to point out the shattered state of our politics, but she misplaces the timing. The collapse of political norms long predates January 2025. Many of the tools now wielded by the current administration have been made possible by the excesses of executive power and the problems of congressional disfunction that have emerged over the past few decades. Politicians, commentators, and funders on both sides of the political aisle bear much of the blame. And those of us watching from the sidelines—or venting on social media—have not exactly risen to the occasion either.

Regardless of your policy preferences or moral concerns, the future of our country depends on restoring some political norms. But that rebuilding project will take decades. In the meantime, we can start with more tangible ways of how we treat our neighbors, coworkers, and family members, including and perhaps especially those with different political views. I think that means more of this:

. . . and less of this:

Gay ends her essay by asking us “to reject the fantasy of civility in favor of repair.” But this a false choice. Real repair will take extraordinary coalitions and partnerships that can strengthen institutions, create strategy, and rebuild trust. And those relationships will in turn require empathy and understanding to practice the kind of engagement our national politics seems to have forgotten.

Real civility is only a fantasy if we let it become one.