The art of listening
An important and increasingly ignored part of the communication process is listening. And that became very clear during the conference Public Communication that Logeion recently organized when, after a short poll among the participants, a word cloud emerged with the word 'listen' in very large letters: for colleagues in the communications field, this was a major and perhaps the biggest point of attention of this time. During one of the panel discussions that followed, Miranda de Vries (mayor of Etten-Leur) made a passionate plea to engage in discussions and listen to various stakeholders before a decision is made or before communication is made. The emphasis should be on the broad middle group, which is often heard less than the more vocal parties on the flanks.
It was during the same conference Bart Brandsma, philosopher and writer of the book Polarization, once again emphasized the importance of listening to what he calls the 'silent middle group'. He explained clearly that opposites in a debate or discussion in particular are given a lot of space and airtime by the media and are therefore given the opportunity to express their opinion widely. Without their opinion being widely supported. The wide and quiet center should receive much more attention. Or as Lot van Hooijdonk, Groen Links councilor in Utrecht, put it in 2018: “What concerns me as an councilor in the municipality of Utrecht is how we can give the silent majority in the city a voice. A voice we need to make the right decisions in our democracy. That doesn't always work out well. You see that politicians are sometimes guided by 'the news'; news that is by definition about the exception. That has to be improved.”
Listening has perhaps become more important than ever. Good listening can prevent misunderstanding and hopefully also polarization. Or as Speaker of the House of Representatives Khadija Arib recently quoted German Chancellor Merkel in the program Eve who expressed her concern about the coarsening of language and indicated that this is a prelude to coarsening of behavior and, at a later stage, to violence. Listening better to each other, and especially to the silent middle, could be a way to bring this sliding scale to a halt. Where polarization and sharp contradictions prevail, it will become more difficult not to derail an issue and to find a satisfactory solution that fits the “silent middle”. We must accept increasing dissatisfaction on the flanks.
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