Defusing American Anger: A depolarization endeavor

Looking for stories of reading people, either behavioral clues or logical deductions of what people say

Do you have interesting stories from your life or job of reading people and making useful deductions?

Feb 5 • Zachary Elwood

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January 2026

I work on reducing political contempt — and yet I have contempt for Trump. Is that a contradiction?

Polarization means there will be much contempt and anger. The question is what we do with those feelings.

Jan 29 • Zachary Elwood

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Learn how news platform Aemula hopes to reduce polarization

A visual demo of Aemula from its visionary creator Don Templeman

Jan 21 • Zachary Elwood

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Groups in conflict inevitably have differences. Recognizing this can lower our contempt.

This is not a chess game; groups have different ways of moving.

Jan 21 • Zachary Elwood

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December 2025

A Short Course for Navigating and Defusing Toxic Conflict

Resources for those who wish to disagree and advocate in healthier, less polarizing ways or mediate others' toxic conflicts

Dec 20, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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October 2025

Like my polarization work? Vote for me in this essay contest

Contest ends at midnight tonight; appreciate your help

Oct 31, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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September 2025

A polarized nation is volatile, at risk of being destabilized by non-representative acts of violence

How we build our narratives that "The other side are the violent ones!"

Sep 21, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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July 2025

When in conflict, we craft elaborate, false, and conflict-amplifying stories about our adversaries and our allies

Humans are storytellers, but our emotions when in conflict lead us to weave simplistic and conflict-amplifying stories

Jul 13, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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May 2025

Polarization makes us more paranoid — and paranoia makes us more polarized

On the self-reinforcing relationship between conspiracy-minded thinking and us-vs-them mindsets

May 28, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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Polarized views on Covid, guns, and George Floyd: We can assign very different meanings to tragic, violent events

Polarization leads us to assign different meanings to tragic events... and that can make us seem increasingly alien to each other

May 22, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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What if American polarization gets a lot worse?

What if our enemies are doing horrible, unforgivable things? What then?

May 13, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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"Newsroom" scene: Telling people what their moral priorities should be angers them

When we righteously speak as if others should share our political views and priorities, we'll drive them away.

May 9, 2025 • Zachary Elwood

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