A Surprising Reason Our Debates Have Turned Ugly

Hint: It’s the Technology

I recently watched the Nixon-Kennedy debate. I was struck by the fact that they talked almost entirely about actual policy and they did so in a way that was intelligent and well-reasoned. Each candidate had adequate time to answer questions and neither candidate interrupted the other. There were no personal insults. There was no audience — and certainly no audience members cheering when a candidate threatened to send the other candidate to jail.

And yet, the Nixon-Kennedy debate pails in comparison to the Lincoln-Douglas Debate. Here’s how Neil Postman described it:

The first of seven famous debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas took place on August 21, 1858, in Ottowa, Illinois. Their arrangement provided that Douglas would speak first, for one hour; Lincoln would take an hour and a half to reply; Douglas, a half hour to rebut Lincoln’s reply. This debate was considerably shorter than those to which the two men were accustomed. In fact, they had tangled several times before, and all of their encounters had been much lengthier and more exhausting. For example, on October 16, 1854, in Peoria, Illinois, Douglas delivered a three-hour address to which Lincoln, by agreement, was to respond. When Lincoln’s turn came, he reminded the audience that it was already 5 p.m., the he would probably require as much time as Douglas and that Douglas was still scheduled for a rebuttal. He proposed, therefore, that the audience go home, have dinner, and return refreshed for four more hours of talk. The audience amiably agreed, and matters proceeded as Lincoln had outlined.

In other words, the Nixon-Kennedy debate was shaped by the medium of radio. True, Kennedy “won over” the television audience. However, the lack of staging, visuals or audience suggest that they considered television as an afterthought. Since then, we have shifted toward far more entertaining and visually-appealing debates.

Marshall McLuhan described how “the medium is the message.” What we are seeing right now is a shift from televised debates to something different. We now live in a narrowcast culture with instant information and social media.

Our current discourse (from the topics discussed to the language used to the format of the debate itself) is a result of the narrowcasting echo chambers of social media, talk radio, and 24/7 news media. It’s easy to take shots at the opposite political side but this current climate is as much a technological issue as it is an ideological one. We can talk of civility or wax eloquent about an informed citizenry. However, our debates have devolved into the kind of discourse we see in the comment section of just about every political blog.

The real issue is the medium.