Jason Hartman uses this 10th episode to host Sally Kohn, CNN political commentator, host of The State of the Resistance podcast, and author of The Opposite of Hate: A Field Guide to Repairing Our Humanity. They discuss the growing hatred in the US and how we need to work as a nation to come up with solutions.
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Welcome Come to the show. This is Jason Hartman, your host and every 10th episode, we do something kind of special kind of different. What we do is we go off topic so regardless of which show it is on the Hartman media network, whether it be one of the financial shows economics, real estate investing, a travel, longevity, all of the other topics that we have every 10th episode, we go off topic, and we explore something of general interest, something of general life success value. And so many of our listeners around the world in 164 countries have absolutely loved our 10th episode shows. So that’s what we’re going to do today. And let’s go ahead and get to our guest with a special 10th episode show. And of course, on the next episode, we’ll be back to our regular programming. Here we go. It’s my pleasure to welcome Sally cone. She is a CNN political commentator and former Fox News contributor hosts of the state of the resistance podcast, founder and CEO of the movement vision lab, and internationally recognized feminist liberal activist, author of the new book the opposite of hate, a field guide to repairing our humanity. Sally, welcome. How are you?
Sally Kohn 2:16
Hey, I’m great. Thanks for having me on.
Jason Hartman 2:18
Good. Good. It’s good to have you on and you’re coming to us today from New York City area, right? I am indeed. Fantastic. Well tell us a little bit about the book and kind of the general thesis and let’s take it from there.
Sally Kohn 2:29
I think a lot of people paying attention even nominally to the world around them today, I think we can all agree that we have a problem with hate with the ways in which we historically in the past and habitually still today, demean and dehumanize other people or other groups of people because of their identity or their ideas. And it’s been a problem for really honestly, since our nation’s founding in the United States, a country that in so many ways was founded on Ever since has been shaped by hate by acts of hate, and institutionalization of hate. And at the same time, just because it’s been bad before been maybe worse in the past doesn’t mean it’s not bad enough, we have to do something about it now. And I think we can all look around and say that the level of toxicity in justice and equality authorizing incivility has reached a real boiling point, and we need to stop it.
Jason Hartman 3:26
I like that word. You just use other rising. That’s, that’s interesting. And you know, you’re certainly Right. I mean, it’s very fair statement that you talk about, like, okay, so you could certainly argue that it’s better than it was it many times throughout history, but that doesn’t mean it’s good enough, right. I mean, especially with the advent of social media, internet in general, you know, a lot of bullying, a lot of trolling. It’s sort of weird. I remember years ago, Sally when I was getting my driver’s license many years ago, actually. And I remember I remember seeing this hokey little film and driver’s education. You just reminded me of it where it was like this Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde persona that really is part of all of us, where, you know, we’ll be nice polite people when we’re meeting someone in public. But we get behind the wheel of a car where we’re kind of insulated in this metal box. And we become a different person more aggressive and rage oriented. And you know, this was years ago, we are you could argue that it’s worse than that nowadays, for sure. And the same is true, I would argue of the internet, the internet allows people to do drive by shootings, you know, hit and run type commenting, right? This is definitely part of your overall worldview on this, isn’t it?
Sally Kohn 4:38
Absolutely. Look, I mean, again, you’re right. We could argue or talk forever about when was the worst and which side doesn’t work? Which group doesn’t work cetera, et cetera? I have opinions on that. But to some extent, it doesn’t matter who did it first, or who did it worse? It’s who right so maybe we can stop it. Who’s gonna write exactly what two
Jason Hartman 4:55
wrongs don’t make a right I’m sorry. I said that backwards. Your way. Yeah.
Sally Kohn 4:59
It works both ways, right? Because it you know, neither way shape or form does it cancel out what you’re doing yourself and your own piece of the puzzle. And you’re exactly right. Again, if you compare online trolling and bullying or even online hate to mass incarceration or slavery or the genocide of American Indians, it’s not comparable in any way, shape, or form. And at the same time, it’s still bad enough that we should stop doing it in addition to the more severe institutional forms of hate in our society. And the fact is that there is a way in which technology does tend to make us feel more anonymous and able to act out on those mean or hateful or uncivil impulses and, but again, it’s not just that we can’t also just blame the technology because those impulses are there. They come out in other forms. They come out in more impactful form. In the way we run our businesses and teach kids in school and run courts and police systems. And so it’s about taking responsibility for and noticing and addressing and having honest reckoning with hate in all those different forms, online and off.
Jason Hartman 6:16
Yeah, we both agree, Sally, that the argument of it was worse in the past does not justify what goes on in today’s world. Right. I certainly agree with you there. I just want to say a kind of a however, to that, though, when you look back around history and some of the stuff you mentioned about the US and the things that went on here and, and so forth. When you look around the world Back then, I mean, I don’t know. You know, there are many places around the world now where we still have slavery. We have all kinds of oppression of women, especially in the Middle East. You know, in Asian some Asian areas. I mean, I don’t know you know what it is at least be fair to give us some credit in the American Society some credit is I’m not saying it’s perfect by any means. don’t hear that. Please don’t hear that. You know, but isn’t it better than a lot of places or no?
Sally Kohn 7:10
Well, I mean, on some level, yes. On some level No. And on the third level, who cares? I mean, in other words, look, we’ve still never elected a head of state, who’s a woman. And while several Muslim countries have, it depends on sort of how we’re doing the measuring and also depends on to me, the question is, why does that matter? That I think one of the reasons we often certainly in our political discourse in the United States, we tend to do this sort of, well, we’re better than thing is to take away any sense of responsibility for doing better on our hands, right? Like, give us a pass. Why don’t we be the absolute best at this and the entire friggin universe like let’s you know, as opposed to any sense of resting on our laurels, and again, I think when you actually scratch the surface Have that, you know, look at the scandals we have with with me too, and with harassment, and assault of women, by men at all levels of industries and businesses, right? That shouldn’t happen in a country that’s supposedly, as great as ours look at the epidemic of police violence against black and brown people in our country that shouldn’t happen in a country that has our values. And that says, We’re as good as we all know. So we still got our own work to do.
Jason Hartman 8:26
So. I mean, you would have to argue that that is institutionalized, right? Because there’s always a one off, there’s always a Rodney King, right? It’s always gonna you get 300 and 20 million people together, or 7 billion, and there’s always going to be bad apples, right? There’s going to be some bad cops that do some bad things. But we have to be saying this is institutionalized. Right. Is that what you would say?
Sally Kohn 8:53
Well, yeah, I mean, I think the problem by and large is that hate inequality in justice Whether it has to do with race or sexuality, or gender, or religion or immigration status is indoctrinated within and infects our institutions, our systems, our structures, our policies, our politics, our culture, way we run businesses, the way we raise kids, I mean that in a larger sense of institutionalization, that it becomes sort of the air that we breathe, and that then gets exhaled into every facet of our existence. And at the same time, that’s done by people and the danger again, this is where, you know, I think these things do matter. And the idea that there are bad people is a very interesting idea. Right? And not to get too spiritual about this, but it is also it has political ramifications. But you know, for example, one of the things I did in the book was I looked at examples of people and stories, people who had left extreme, extraordinary lives of hate behind one of those examples of both people And then a larger place situated institution even that had managed to make that transformation is in Rwanda, where in 1994, they had the fastest genocide in history. 100,000 people killed in 100 days. And one of the things that sort of took my breath away that someone said to me in the book, a philosopher just says to me, you know, we don’t have mass atrocities because those handful of psychopaths there weren’t enough psychopaths in Rwanda, or in Germany or in Serbia, or you name it. We have mass atrocities because masses of people participate in them. The truth is, is we understand the institutionalization of hate, we understand that hate this is where we have to get beyond the sort of superficial notion of hate as the overt bigot or the overt racist or what have you, that if we understand hate at it’s more extensive and nefarious, conscious and unconscious, big and small ways. You Then we understand that this isn’t about good people or bad people. That’s the way we we push out the implications of this. And we say, Okay, I’m a good person. So I have nothing to do with this. Well, the truth is the reason we have the kind of extensive inequality and injustice we have in our world, and in our country, isn’t just because of bad people. It’s also because of good people. And when we’re talking about the institutionalization of hate, and inequality and injustice, and we’re talking about what good people are doing, whether they mean to or not,
Jason Hartman 11:30
yeah, well, there’s certainly a dangerous mob mentality. I don’t know that that’s specifically what you’re talking about here at all. But you know, I just want to point that out. The mob mentality is always a dangerous thing. They’re just sort of subtle teas in life that, you know, like the worldview that people have that they don’t even know why they do things always. I mean, I certainly don’t I’ll talk about myself, you know, because, you know, we just come from a worldview and that’s the context in which we think and live and everything comes out of there. Right. But you know, maybe I probably should have asked you this at the beginning. Can you define hate it because your book is called the opposite of hate. So maybe by telling us the opposite is also a way to define. just define that if you would. I know it may sound like a very basic question, but
Sally Kohn 12:16
no, no, it’s a great question. And I’m not defining it in a political a real sense of you hate brussel sprouts, or you hate country music or you hate your ex girlfriend or your ex boyfriend, that what that’s fine with me. That’s your own business. What concerns me is, as I alluded to, before, the history in the past and habits in the present, that we have individually and as a society, of demeaning and dehumanizing people, and especially certain groups of people because of their identity, or their ideas. That, to me is what we should be concerned about. And the fact is, there are ways in which all of us are the victims of hate. And also the perpetrators of hate. We all fall on some end of both sides of that. And we therefore all have, we’re all part of the problem, we all figure out a way to be part of the solution.
Jason Hartman 13:13
So give us some examples of like, which groups and, you know, maybe don’t give us the totally obvious examples that everybody probably should know if they don’t. But you know, maybe some of these more subtle things we talked about. I look
Sally Kohn 13:28
at one example is definitely partisanship right now in the United States, right. So, and this is one I think we can all locate ourselves in right now is not just you know, okay, I’m on this end, or that end of sexism or this end of that end of Islamophobia or whatnot. But we think about partisanship. And the reality is that in the case of extreme partisanship, which more and more and more and more and more of us are falling into whichever side you’re on, you tend to not just disagree with the other side. But how Have a desire to destroy the other side and a certain Glee even at the prospect of their destruction or any evidence of their destruction. So you end up with situations where you’re questioning, you know where the right questions that patriotism or even belongingness in the American experiment of the left, you have the left characterizing the right as stupid as all hateful. Horrible, right. So yeah, so you That to me is also a kind of hate it. So this other kind of as to use that word again, other rising is extreme other rising and writing people off not based on any particular personal interactions, not like your ex who did whatever to you and you’re mad at them. This is I’ve written off groups of people who I don’t even know because they belong to this political party or viewpoint or voted for this person, and it’s making Then just that. And then demeaning, dehumanizing, attacking, condemning them based on that narrow understanding of who they are.
Jason Hartman 15:10
Yeah. So you agree that this happens on both sides of the aisle? Certainly, like you do. Right. Okay. Now, just out of curiosity, and I’m sure you have an opinion on this sort of maybe depends which administration is in office right at the time, you know, which for eight years work, Ron, but does one side do it more than the other? Is it worse on one side than it is on the other?
Sally Kohn 15:31
Yes, it is. I happen to believe it is. I also happen to believe it doesn’t matter. In other words, who started it or who did it first? You know, as I alluded to, before, we can argue about that till the cows come home. You know, listen, what matters is that we stop it that we take in the part of the dynamic here. Listen, I’ll tell you how hate when I one of the things I found in this book, how hate works is that most people, by and large, don’t wake up in the morning, intending to be hateful. Most people don’t think that they’re hateful. Most people though, That, that other side, those other people, they’re hateful, and anything that you do that maybe is, you know, less than kind is nonetheless justified because those people were hateful, they started it. And we feel that way about them. They feel that way about us, right? There’s even research by the way that this is true of people we would think of as obvious members of overt hate groups like neo nazis and current terrorists, that ISIS and Al Qaeda don’t like radical Islam, right. I mean, I talked to a woman who worked in the army, he was a terrorist interrogator for the US Army in Afghanistan. She said, Look, most people believe that their motivations are good. They see their own innovations as good. And so when we’re always fixated and focused on the other side, and what they’ve done to us and how hateful they are, or how much they’ve wronged us, or etc, etc, that they did it worse than first, then we never take responsibility for whatever our piece is of the problem, even if it’s a smaller piece. write whatever you believe, because if we’re only ever pointing fingers, we’re never actually solving problems.
Jason Hartman 17:06
Yeah, definitely, definitely talk to us a little bit about feminism if he would, I think one of the things that people really failed to distinguish, they sort of throw that word around. And they don’t distinguish the differences between first, second and third wave feminism. And I’d love you to talk about that, because you’re probably an expert, I assume. You know, I’d just love to hear a little bit more about that. Because I think our culture, really just sort of, you know, with me, we throw a lot of words around it. I just love to get your thoughts on
Sally Kohn 17:36
that. In a way terms and definitions are one thing, what they mean to us and what they come to mean in society is another No, but I have always thought of feminism as a core idea that women are equal to men and should be treated equally. I’m not saying equal doesn’t mean the same. Right. But you know, it’s like saying, religions should be treated equally, doesn’t mean they’re the same, but they should be treated equally. And the recognition that as a society and feminism stems from the recognition that as a society, in our culture, our business, politics, etc, we have not done that, that we have failed to do that, that, for instance, the reason that every single president we have elected in the entire history of the United States is not just because they were the most qualified of all the human beings, but because they were right that that was in fact deemed to be that they were we live in a society where we have historically in the past, and still today, after this, though men are superior to women,
Jason Hartman 18:39
but you just don’t think maybe we just have maybe we just haven’t had the right female candidate yet. That’s kind of like saying we haven’t elected a libertarian president, either regardless of their gender, I mean, right or
Sally Kohn 18:49
No, wait. So you don’t think that the 45 presidents we’ve elected in the history of the United States were elected, not exclusively, not solely, but certainly in part because they were men.
Jason Hartman 18:59
I don’t know the answer, but they’re the ones running. I mean, there’s a lot more that happens before the election. Right. There’s the primaries and going way down to the whole political career. And it’s only been a fairly recent phenomenon that women have really risen up in politics and public life. And, you know, I mean, we certainly had one that most of the country thought would win Hillary Clinton last time around, right. You know, she won the popular vote by fairly small margin, but she still wanted, you know, if the campaign had maybe strategized a little differently, she’d be President. I mean, there’s no doubt about that. Everybody thought she was gonna win pretty much I I know, that’s a figure of speech, everybody, but you get the idea. It’s not like there’s a institutionalized conspiracy to bar women from participating in the system, or is there I mean, I don’t want to know that there’s one on women for most of the United States history, more of our history than not women weren’t allowed to vote. So that’s, that’s so we we fix that
Sally Kohn 20:00
It hasn’t even been a century, this country that women have been allowed to vote. So that’s that’s not about but for more of our country’s formal history than not women could vote. That’s a fact. So that we could call that sort of overt institutional discrimination, right? Certainly. And at the same time, look, what we’re getting to hear is when we talk about and you were alluding to it before, you asked the question about sort of institutionalized hate hate institutionalized forms. And that is to say that you’re right that there may not be as many thankfully, hopefully, there may not be as many people today, men and women, by the way, because when we talk about sexism we talked about that’s something as I said, was the air that you breathe, this air we all breathe, the air, I’m gonna breathe in, you’re gonna breathe, so that we’re both gonna end up walking into a voting booth as products of this long history and culture in the United States. Where we’ve been taught men, our leaders, men are better leaders. We’ve been taught it by history, we’ve been taught by what we see we’ve been taught by who runs the businesses who is in positions of power. It’s what we’ve been taught. And so You and I both breathing that air, we’re gonna exhale that air we’re gonna, it’s gonna affect who we vote for. And I’m not saying it doesn’t mean that I won’t sometimes vote for a woman, you might not sometimes vote for a woman. But the pattern that history, it takes some toll on us individually. And as a society, you don’t just snap your finger history is context to be leader to you, but then we all believe otherwise. That’s why and you need to actually do something about that.
Jason Hartman 21:29
Okay. So history provides context. You’re right. I mean, like you said, You gave I love the the metaphor you just gave about, we breathe in the certain air and we breathe out the certain air, and that’s context. So I get that. But isn’t that just like, going back to the example you gave before of it sort of doesn’t matter who started the fight or who’s more right or who’s wrong? I mean, yes, that is history. We all know that history is there. It’s been a long time. What do we do now though? You know, what do we do now? Do we vote for You know, woman to be president, even if she’s not the best candidate? Like, should people feel guilty about that, that Hillary didn’t win? I don’t know. You know, I just kind of don’t know exactly where to go with that. It’s certainly women are not barred from the system today. Are they? Or are they?
Sally Kohn 22:13
I think, no, I think you’re right, that it shouldn’t sort of hamstring us and we shouldn’t be sort of lost and just lamenting how things have been. I agree with that. Yeah. Okay. But look, I also think that a realistic I mean, there’s, there’s much more complicated, we’re going to run out of time on my end, but there’s no problem after I get it. But it begins with me, it begins with luck. I would like us to get to a place where we didn’t argue as a whole, not just you and me. I mean, in general, where we didn’t argue about the reality of the hate and discrimination and inequality and injustice, those gotten us to this place, so that we can look at, for instance, people running for office, and who were more or less likely to vote for just just one tiny example here. And we can say hi That is not just like we don’t get to start fresh at every moment that reality is, in fact, contextualized by history. So the fact that for instance, we know from research, we don’t have to speculate on this, we know from research, you take the exact same resume, exact same resume, put a man’s name on top, put a woman’s name on top, send them out the resume, exact same resume, with man’s name on top, we’ll get twice as many calls for interviews. Now, that is because of that air that we breathe that has been pumped through history, and funneling each of us that we all then exhale in various different ways, not always, consistently, not always exactly the same way. But to me, it would be great if we could get to a place where we acknowledged, look at this, this inequality and injustice as hate is continuing to replicate itself, whether we mean it to or not. And instead of arguing about that reality, let’s get to a place where we’re debating how to solve it.
Jason Hartman 23:54
I would absolutely love to have a debate with you sometime on the pay gap issue because I think that Issue, although it’s, you know, the 77% concept, they miss a lot of points in that debate. I don’t know, there’s just a lot of and I know you don’t have time, but I would just love to talk to you about that sometime. I really appreciate a lot of your points I very much do. And I think you are right on so many things. I just think the only thing about this concept of Okay, it was the way it was idea that you brought up before does not mean it’s okay. Now, just because we’re doing better than other places or other times in history. You’re right. It’s not an excuse. I just think that it deserves a little credit, though. It’s kind of like a kid, you know, you got to reinforce the positive. Sometimes, and
Sally Kohn 24:40
I don’t think America is a bad country. I think it’s a good
Jason Hartman 24:43
country. I think it’s been surprisingly open. I mean, in the civil rights movement with MLK, there were tons of white people supporting that, you know, and
Sally Kohn 24:53
sometimes that just
Jason Hartman 24:54
doesn’t feel like they get any credit.
Sally Kohn 24:56
They’re all made out to be bad evil people, you know, on a second hand On a second see I’m not making out anyone to be bad or evil. Right? Okay, that’s that’s the thing here is not actually saying any of this necessarily conscious. And by the way, look in the, you know, 1940s 1950s. You know, a majority of white people opposed. integration, a majority of white people supported segregation. That’s the truth. Now today, majority of white people are opposed to segregation and to racial discrimination. That is progress. There’s no question. That’s progress. So yeah, we can pat ourselves on the back. And now, let’s move forward. Because I also don’t think by the way, there are good countries or bad countries, right? We all have the capacity just like people in countries and institutions and families all do good things or bad things. The question is, do we rest on our laurels? How many of them we think we have? Or do we push ourselves to do better? Very good discussion,
Jason Hartman 25:50
and I think that’s a good wrap up to it. So yeah, absolutely. So we give out your website, tell people where they can find out more about you and the book courses on Amazon. Sure. It’s Sally cone co h en.com. That’s Sally cone. kayo h and.com. And thank you so much for joining us today. Appreciate it.
Sally Kohn 26:07
Hey, thanks for the great conversation. Appreciate it.
Jason Hartman 26:11
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