美国国家公共电台 NPR Finding The Middle In The Incivility War

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Last week's special congressional election in Montana got national attention for more than the issues. A journalist has called for police to investigate Republican Greg Gianforte for assaulting him, an encounter captured in a recording 1 and witnessed by others. It's the latest example of hostility 2 toward journalists. It's also sparked a round of discussion about civility. NPR's Vanessa Romo reports.

VANESSA ROMO, BYLINE 3: The violent incident that went viral instantly has people wondering if an invisible line has been crossed. Reaction in the social media world from all sides raised three questions. The first - how did we get here?

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

GREG GIANFORTE: I'm sick and tired of you guys. The last time you came here you did the same thing.

ROMO: Some blamed Gianforte. Some sided with him. Others pointed 4 to President Trump 5, who's called the mainstream 6 press the enemy of the people. But the root of it, according to author Deborah Tannen, is the animosity in the political divide, which she traces back more than two decades to the ideas in her book, "The Argument Culture: Stopping America's War Of Words."

DEBORAH TANNEN: I was making the point then that we are more and more approaching everything in an adversarial spirit. We conceive of ideas as warring camps - war on cancer, war on drugs.

ROMO: As a linguistics 7 professor, she says the use of the word war in this context planted a seed that's in full bloom now, that there's no middle ground and everything is a battlefield, as Americans experienced through the 2016 elections. The second big question - where's the ref in all this? In the political arena 8, the ref never seems to step forward, though Paul Ryan, speaker of the House, came close this week.

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PAUL RYAN: Should the gentleman apologize? Yeah, I think he should apologize.

ROMO: But he was roundly criticized for not outlining any concrete repercussions 9 from the party. Rabbi Jack 10 Moline tried to get in the middle during the highly incivil 2000 presidential election when the Interfaith Alliance, a group of religious leaders, bonded 11 together to tackle the problem. But...

JACK MOLINE: We started getting calls from all over the country asking us to enforce what people considered to be violations 12. And they demanded that Interfaith Alliance step in and call these people out publicly.

ROMO: The alliance was overwhelmed and they couldn't figure out how to force people to be more civil, so they dropped it. The final outcry online came after Gianforte did apologize. What good is your sorry was the gist 13 of it.

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GIANFORTE: Last night, I made a mistake.

ROMO: Gianforte won, and the apology to Jacobs came wrapped up in his victory speech. Cindy Frantz, a social and environmental psychologist, studied what makes a good apology. Overall, this contained important features.

CINDY FRANTZ: He clearly expressed that he understood that what he did was wrong. And he clearly expressed that he will not behave that way in the future.

ROMO: But the timing 14 was off. Gianforte had already denied Jacobs' account and blamed him for the body slam. Plus, Frantz says, it's not really for Jacobs.

FRANTZ: He was talking to the public.

ROMO: As it stands now, Gianforte is headed to Capitol Hill, but not before a court appearance. He's been charged with misdemeanor assault and could face up to six months in jail. I'm sure Twitter will have plenty to say about that. Vanessa Romo, NPR News, Washington.