It seems easy for some folks, but I've always had a hard time classifying people as either entirely upright, good and moral or entirely evil and lacking in human decency.
Unless we're in a discussion comparing Jesus and Hitler, Gandhi and Charles Manson, Mother Teresa and Jim Jones, there's probably some middle ground on which people have disagreements, but where they fall far short of those extremes.
Don't get me wrong: There's an ongoing war between good and evil. It's just that very few people fall entirely at one end of the spectrum or the other.
Why, then, do so many public debates today involve castigation of those who differ with our own opinions as not just wrong, but corrupt, wicked or unholy? In other words, Democrats or Republicans, depending on one's perspective.
Does disagreement mean I have to hate you?
A memorable moment in Northwest Arkansas political history that speaks to this tendency came in 2012, when state Rep. Davy Carter, a Republican from Cabot, visited Springdale as speaker-elect of the House of Representatives. Republicans had just achieve a majority in the House and Carter was to become the first Republican speaker in Arkansas in more than 100 years.
He'd beaten a more conservative lawmaker for the speaker post. Some Republicans, in particular here in Northwest Arkansas, didn't like that Carter had gotten help from Democrats to secure the speaker's job.
Carter also made party members angry by hiring a former Democratic Party executive director as his chief of staff and keeping a former Democratic lawmaker on the legislative staff. He said it was a pragmatic move, since Democrats had more experience in the procedures of the legislative body at that point.
A woman serving as chair of the Washington County Republican Women at the time decried Carter's decision to keep a Democrat in a position of leadership.
"We feel like you've turned around and spit in our faces," she told Carter at the time. "We have morals and convictions and these guys do not."
Really? Then and now, it's hard to believe anyone thinks one political party or the other has the exclusive rights to being right and moral.
"Us vs. them" certainly makes it easier to stir people up. It sets up a world of impossible politics when most every debate boils down to how "their side" wants to destroy American and "our side" wants to save it.
It's healthier, I think, to look at our neighbors and celebrate that we're all Arkansans, first and foremost.
The Natural State has a long history as a rough-and-tumble, rugged place, certainly in the Ozarks. There's no reason to think the state's politics won't have the same characteristics. But I'll use phrasing a recent and former president almost ruined: There are good people on both sides. There are also good and bad ideas on both sides. If you're a partisan and you disagree, it might be time to re-evaluate how you analyze things.
Rodney King famously said, in the midst of the Los Angeles riots in 1992, "People, I just want to say, can't we get along?" Arkansas isn't dealing with riots, but the sentiment certainly carries weight. It's a question a whole bunch of religious faiths ask, even when they acknowledge human nature is working against us.
Hey, we're in Arkansas in 2022, so I understand if the Rodney King reference doesn't resonate. How about the more recent philosophical meanderings of Kenny Chesney, who put it this way: "Get along while we can. Always give love the upper hand. Paint a wall, learn to dance. Call your mom, buy a boat. Drink a beer, sing a song. Make a friend, can't we all get along?"