Free Expression

Doug Sprei has organized hundreds of debates reaching thousands of college students since 2018. One stands out. 

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Transcript

Michael Lee: [00:00:00] When We Disagree is a show about arguments, how we have them, why we have them, and their impact on our relationships and ourselves. August 28th, 1963, standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Martin Luther King Jr. gave among the most famous speeches in American history. The speech is remembered for its powerful message and King's powerful delivery, but King employed a not very well known, ancient rhetorical device That gives the speech extra emotional power.

Michael Lee: Let me give an example. He said, now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.

Michael Lee: Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children. Notice anything about the wording of these lines? The repetition of now is the [00:01:00] time? Let me give it another example, an even more famous one from the speech. I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

Michael Lee: I have a dream that one day even in the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will be judged.

Michael Lee: Not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream today. Hinging is using a very specific kind of repetition throughout the speech. It's the Speech's secret ingredient. The technical term is Ara, A-N-A-P-H-O-R-A, and it means repetition at the beginning of several sentences in a row.

Michael Lee: This kind of repetition can reinforce, reinforce a core message, and it builds tension and [00:02:00] excitement. In short, anaphora creates urgency. I'm Michael Lee, Professor of Communication and Director of the Civility Initiative at the College of Charleston. Our guest on When We Disagree is Doug Spry. He is the co founder and director of the College Debates and Discourse Alliance and vice president of Campus Partnerships at ACTA, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni in Washington, D.

Michael Lee: C. He also produces the podcast Higher Ed Now. Doug, tell us an argument story. 

Doug Sprei: We started putting our alliance together in 2018 when Braver Angels came to visit us in ACTA and we quickly started partnering up between ACTA, Braver Angels, and then added students from BridgeUSA into the mix to form what we now call the College Debates and Discourse Alliance.

Doug Sprei: And in 2018 and 2019, we had some early tantalizing examples of, of. When just discovering that students and [00:03:00] faculty are super hungry for debating and discourse and finding a civil way to have a conversation, a more constructive way to have a conversation about divisive and polarizing issues than they currently would be experiencing in social media.

Doug Sprei: And out in life. And so school by school, we started bringing this form of debating and discourse and opening it up and the program grew exponentially, even during the pandemic. And during the pandemic, we did dozens of debates on zoom. And then as the pandemic evaded, we started going back to campus live in 2023 in the spring, I found myself at UNC Greensboro in North Carolina.

Doug Sprei: Yeah. And the students were there to debate a topic that was coursing through the North Carolina legislature. SB 49, it's known as the Parents Bill of Rights. It's basically debating whether issues about gender, transgenderism, LGBTQ issues should even be discussed in public [00:04:00] school, or whether students should be protected from that, shielded from it.

Doug Sprei: So I walk into the room, and I'm going to be the chair of this debate, and The first thing we do is we have young people stand up and make some opening speeches. So a young man stands up and starts to, uh, give his opinion, um, you know, in support of the parents bill of rights. And basically asserting that transgenderism, transgenderism is an abomination.

Doug Sprei: It shouldn't be discussed. It's an aberration. Shouldn't be taught in schools. No discussion should be held about it. And he was heard and respected. And as we do in these debates, there was a place for him to speak his opinion and no one stood up to cancel him out. However, about a half hour later, uh, a woman stood up who is transgender and began to speak and share her point of view.

Doug Sprei: And she looked directly at him and with love in her voice and in her [00:05:00] heart and in her eyes, not a hint of rancor or resentment, simply said, This is who I am. When I was 15, I tried to commit suicide. The suicide rates are high in our population. But I've come to terms with who I am, and she just shared insights about her life, and in a way that was, I call it Christ like almost, because there was no anger, there was no resentment toward the young man and his hateful position towards transgender people.

Doug Sprei: And it was a very galvanizing moment for everyone in the room. Everyone became silent. And the note of listening, the, the atmosphere just opened up into just pure listening and two opposing realities coexisting in the same space, uh, it was one of those transcendent moments that we've had many times in these debates.

Doug Sprei: I've never forgotten it and it really symbolizes something for me. 

Michael Lee: How many debates have you [00:06:00] seen since 2018? 

Doug Sprei: I've lost count, but they're well over 300. We're close. We're closing in on around 350 debates on campuses and in the classrooms from coast to coast. 

Michael Lee: So, in north of 300 debates on college campuses since 2018, this sounds like a powerful moment, but I'd love for you to just explain why this one stands out amongst 300 plus.

Doug Sprei: Well, there have been many debates where we've had moments coming close to that. That just happens to be super vivid because. Again, um, what we're looking for is to create a space in which people who really disagree with each other really sharply on social and political topics can speak to each other in a way where everyone is acknowledged as a human being and as a participant in the American democracy experiment.

Doug Sprei: And we get to that level of [00:07:00] discourse almost every time we have one of these debates. Some of the topics. can be very, very emotional. And the ones that tend to be most powerful and kind of seared into my memory are the ones where personal stories like that are told. Another one would be University of Baltimore, an urban school in Baltimore, where the students were discussing the second amendment and students were standing up talking about how they themselves or their family or friends were affected by gun violence in the city.

Doug Sprei: You know, and when people tell stories like that, It doesn't matter what your point of view is. You start to acknowledge them as human beings and open up. a degree of critical thinking and compassion and listening toward them that doesn't usually happen out in the world. 

Michael Lee: Well said. In your role as chair in these debates, what kind of perspective do you take?

Michael Lee: You, you facilitate the debate, you set it up, you talk about the topic, and then you, are you [00:08:00] interjecting in one way, shape, or form? 

Doug Sprei: Well, The role of the chair is to conduct the debate and frame it in such a way that there are certain guardrails put into place through a light parliamentary style. So people who stand up will address the chair.

Doug Sprei: There's a little bit of a formality to it and students aren't used to that. 

Michael Lee: Okay. I 

Doug Sprei: just want to go one against one right away in this format. And it puts people in the position of having to speak one to many, not one to one. That immediately elevates the conversation into something a little different than, you know, a kind of an emotional heated exchange of people trying to win points against each other.

Doug Sprei: So we call it a braver angels debate, but it's not a competitive event. It's not a spectator event. It's very immersive. And the role of the chair is to bring that to life and, you know, um, teach people how to do it. And once they get the hang of it, they, they find a really wonderful way to engage with each other that's [00:09:00] very powerful.

Michael Lee: Why is debate, um, good for learning? In other words, do we have good data on it, increasing knowledge of issues or increasing abilities to have civil discussions, increasing passion or self efficacy around giving public speech and public advocacy? Take us through kind of the educational power of debate from your point of view.

Doug Sprei: Over the last six or seven years, we've worked with, Hundreds of faculty from coast to coast and gotten a lot of insight into the front from them about what's needed in terms of inflecting intellectual rigor into these debates.

Doug Sprei: And so some of our debates take [00:10:00] shape in the classroom itself as a lesson planning assignment as. You know, as an assignment for the students, they get course credit, they get graded for it. So when the students work on these debates with the faculty, they have to frame arguments, they have to do research, they have to construct speeches and also share their own personal point of view.

Doug Sprei: And it It really can bridge across almost any topic or any subject that is taught in college. We've had debates in biology classes, computer science classes, philosophy, political science, communications and rhetoric, economics, almost doesn't matter. So we're really, really keenly interested actually in what you brought up in terms of making sure that this debate exercise maps to pedagogy and the educational mission of its, of instructors and professors and the universities themselves.

Michael Lee: You mentioned earlier that there's a real hunger for this debate and your record of 300 debates in six years and many more on the horizon certainly speaks to that [00:11:00] demand. What do you attribute that to? 

Doug Sprei: I think after the 2016 election, when what was then called Better Angels was formed, that organization Later became Braver Angels, as you know, but they discovered that there is a hunger across the country in communities in all 50 states where people were just so tired of the rancor and polarization that came out on display in the 2016 election that Better Angels quickly germinated into something from just one small debate space in Cincinnati, Ohio area Into something that's taken root nationwide and similarly across the college landscape.

Doug Sprei: We've just been embraced by school after school. I think that educators, um, take delight in seeing their students, um, speak up courageously. A lot of the research has been showing that students tend to self censor when it comes to [00:12:00] expressing political and social viewpoints. This is a real antidote to that.

Doug Sprei: This really is an invitation for students to stand up, express who they are, what they think, be heard, be respected, and also learn to hear and respect others. So it really counters what, we call that phenomenon of affective polarization, where the person who disagrees with me is my adversary, my enemy, you know, that's rampant across the country.

Doug Sprei: But the experience, uh, in these debates and workshops that we leave is something lead is completely different. Uh, and I think there's a real hunger for that. I think that, um, we're going with nature, I think human nature and, uh, 

Michael Lee: Yeah, the kind of stereotypical point of view, especially from folks who are outside of college campuses looking inward and maybe they're, they're reading news media or they're watching news media, especially after last spring and the protests about Gaza and Palestine and Israel is [00:13:00] that the leading problem on college campuses is aggression is antagonism is shouting is encampments.

Michael Lee: In your point of view, and some of the points of view I've, I've seen as well in 20 years plus on a college campus, is that self censorship is also a massive impediment to learning, connection, and engagement. Is that something that you're expressing and you're seeing in your travels around the country?

Doug Sprei: Right, and it's kind of antithetical to the educational mission that some of the college presidents and faculty are expressing to us. I can think of Adam Weinberg, the president of Denison University, who really wants his institution to embrace the marketplace of ideas. And literally, when students set foot on campus the very first few days, Uh, to kind of inculcate into them a sense that this is a bastion of free expression, that you're here to deliberate and debate with people and, um, and be respected and [00:14:00] respect others.

Doug Sprei: So that's why Denison invited us to actually take our programming into freshman orientation, you know, with 700 students at a time. And I think that really sends a powerful signal to the students and really has a chance to affect the culture long term on that campus. so much. 

Michael Lee: Let's close with a quick debate about debate and a debate about what's productive in debate and what's unproductive in debate.

Michael Lee: In my role as a director of a civility initiative and in my role as the host of this podcast, And in my past, I have a debate background, so I obviously have somewhat of a, some skin in this game. I'm consistently surprised by the amount of anti debate perspective that I hear from folks. And in their minds, when I talk about hosting a debate as a solution or a way to mitigate polarization, they think, well, that will increase polarization, that will increase rancor.

Michael Lee: And then debate is about, Aggressively [00:15:00] arguing your point of view, no matter what the consequences are. Debate is a kind of win at all cost. Debate can also make people feel unsafe, and there is a kind of psychic violence that comes along with having to hear points of view, especially if those points of view deny your very identity debate is, um, as one side or the other side.

Michael Lee: In other words, it's reductive. It's about black and white solutions, not necessarily shades of gray. These in many arguments are arguments I've heard that are kind of anti debate pro dialogue perspectives. What's your take on those? 

Doug Sprei: I have two parts to this answer. Number one, the braver angels debates that we conduct prove that debates don't have to be this firestorm of, um, people trying to one up each other and have this competition and increase the rancor.

Doug Sprei: If, if people embrace the format and stay within the guardrails of the conversation, everyone who has an opinion and come into that [00:16:00] room, be heard, respected, and listen to others and an atmosphere of critical thinking and listening and something very electric. Unfolds during the course of that event. So the event, the debate itself as we conduct it show is proof of concept.

Doug Sprei: However, there are still plenty of instances where we've discovered that students also do want to pivot towards solutions and delve more into nuances and not have to take a hard left right affirmative negative side. So to that end, we developed something called ABCD, a Braver Campus Dialogue, which is not a debate pro and con, but more a deep exploration into a given topic, whether it be climate change or student mental health, many topics that students want to explore and Discover the nuances and complexities of it, and then talk more about solutions oriented, uh, thinking and get to a solutions oriented conversation.

Doug Sprei: So we get the best of both worlds through the [00:17:00] debate format that we have, but also through this new format, ABCD, which is being very quickly embraced in the higher ed space. 

Michael Lee: Last question. What is your wildest dream as it pertains to your work? If you could snap your fingers and make your work be most successful, how would the world change?

Doug Sprei: The wildest dream that we have on the College Debates and Discourse team is simply about scaling up. I mean, the demand has been so strong and we've grown very quickly over these six years. We're now a fully funded seven person team. But, you know, we've reached 12, 13, 000 students. We'd like to reach hundreds of thousands of students across hundreds of institutions.

Doug Sprei: That's going to take more people, uh, more funding. Um, and you know, just the whole pathway of, of scaling up to meet the demand. I think that it's really out there and you know, that's the dream that we have, but [00:18:00] it's also a model that we're following. 

Michael Lee: Doug, thank you so much for being on When We Disagree. 

Doug Sprei: I hope this was helpful and clear.

Michael Lee: When We Disagree is recorded at the College of Charleston with creator and host Michael Lee. Recording and sound engineering by Jesse Kunz and Lance Laidlaw. Reach out to us at whenwedisagree at gmail. com.