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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue

@daviddeighton.bsky.social
14 followers 1 following 224 posts

I fight political polarization using art installed in America’s National Park free speech areas. My art installations share non-confrontational ways for people to dialogue with estranged friends, family or even strangers when taking about politics.

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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/02/2025
My take in fighting political polarization involves in-person communication with MAGA. I use art to attract their attention in public spaces then I ask them: “How can a person exit their echo-chamber?” Works every time
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 04/02/2025
My experience shows differently
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 01/02/2025
The MAGA I meet have poor critical thinking skills, so before they can “realize their mistakes” they will need to discover their own biases. And let’s not forget to look at our own biases.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 30/01/2025
“Amid the name-callers, finger-pointers, and bad actors stand a majority of good citizens, looking for a better way. Discontent is contagious, but so is optimism." -- Mary Powell,
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 30/01/2025
Polarization can be driven by how we talk with like-minded people about those on the other side. Too often, we stereotype, dismiss, or ridicule our fellow citizens who support the other political party, its leaders, and its policies.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 30/01/2025
Why do we lack such basic understanding of why people on the other political side believe as they do?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 30/01/2025
Why don’t we see MAGA as they see themselves instead of as we choose to see them?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 29/01/2025
How do you “denazify” a nazi?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Question: when are we finished finger pointing at MAGA and offer better solutions so we don’t loose the next elections?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I should. Too busy preparing the spring series of installations.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
In my case it’s experiential not empirical research. Ive had a few cry saying I was the first person to ever listen to them. Some adjusted their POV. Behavior or voting patterns I don’t know. You can listen to a couple hundred interviews and hear for yourself youtube.com/@triptych-di...
youtube.com
TRIPTYCH DIALOGUE - David Deighton
This channel is an art experiment in fighting political polarization by redefining how we talk to one another! It is abstract and evolving. Subscribe to see what happens. Its name? The Triptych Dialog...
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
You are out there. Real.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
That’s a good point. I’ll make good use of that privilege at my installations. It would interesting to see how the public treats you compared to me. How do you identify?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
You forgot middle aged and foreigner
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
No problem. I haven’t figured out you to get back to a thread yet
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I don’t know.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
What did I do?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I will follow your advice.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
It is not of my opinion that polarization and exclusion are viable solutions in averting irreversible conflict. The program you laid bare I have heard before. The MAGA crowd would agree with it.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I’m not a good communicator. I am however fascinated by our ability to lodge ourselves into echo chambers. I wonder how we exit them. What if we don’t recognize them? Are we any different than MAGAs in their own epistemic bubbles?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Can we agree that having a different opinion doesn’t have to mean picking a fight?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Oh thank you you are so kind 🥰
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
What’s your solution?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
100%. No need to debate. It’s not worth the effort unless the setting is made for a debate team. Everyone wants the higher ground, conflict arises from the first trigger word. How do you deal with exchanges with your political opposite?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
What would you do to spark critical thinking in an irrational person?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I think you’d agree that rationality is learned. Im finding in my public interactions that with irrational people I need to go to the basics: so I focus on critical thinking. Especially learning to ask questions. Most people get it. I usually only have a few minutes with a person though…
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
You’re right. First I show them that they are in an echo chamber and it’s much smaller than they thought it was. It’s a start. Get them to question the box they are in. If I get to that, then it’s a win. If it resonates we keep going. I use an art installation as a guide
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Nope bad choice of location. I use free speech areas in national parks. Fascists also visit old faithful and the Grand Canyon.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Agree 100%. Not much I can do about that all on my own. I do what I know and that’s art installations that attempt to bring people out of their epistemic bubbles. (And yes I’m in one too)
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I hear you and sorry if I jumped to conclusions. I don’t know what you do to fight fascism. My work is visible if you want to take a look. It’s Triptych Dialogue project
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Thank you for your concern for my safety. It won’t stop me from fighting MAGA face to face though. First let’s stop taking comfort from your social media echo chamber here. It’s time to get out of the cave.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
You aren’t born a nazi. It’s learned. I’m fighting the lesson plan.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I get it and I fell the same way. When I interview a MAGA there is always a word or two on the emotional level that I can relate to. (Chaotic, liars, corrupt…) I may interpret their words differently from them. I tell them that. It’s a first step for them out of their echo chambers.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
Eco’s writings on Newspeak are spot on. MAGAs aren’t the only ones to use it though. What do find appealing in U. Eco’s work?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I think you are using the Tu Quoque Fallacy where one avoids criticism by turning it back on the accuser. Correct?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
I’m wondering which logical fallacy you used: Slippery Slope? Appeal to Emotion? Or Begging the question? Please try a different reply than The Burden of Proof Fallacy.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
All MAGA are nazis now? That was easy. Which bias did you use to get to that conclusion?
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
How about we stop scrolling our echo chamber feeds and engage our political opponents in person? I do it non violently and it works for me.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
Your statement is a False Cause Fallacy. MAGAs use them a lot. Already you share something in common. You could use that in an exchange. (I’m serious: you could join me at an event. Face to face with some MAGAs)
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
Staying in a comfy bubble doesn’t help fight fascism, right? Be in their face, in person, don’t give up or write them off. It ain’t pleasant, you take some punches but in the end you’re the one standing rather than scrolling down a useless algorithm feed
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
You got to get the temperature just right otherwise you end up with a shit cake
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
I don’t talk about facts. I ask questions, they answer. I actively listen. Take a stated emotion from them that I share, say frustration. Tell them I feel the same and we start from there. I can’t change them right then and there. I can however show them a way out of their echo chamber
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
Then let them get stronger? You should join me someday when I engage someone stuck in their echo chamber. It’s a powerful event
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
It was hard not to be triggered at the beginning. The goal is helping them exit their echo chambers and is a great way to exit our own bubbles. It creates bridges. They realize that I’m not as evil as they were taught to think. Some even cry after being heard.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
It’s worse than that: I ask them 3 non confrontational political questions and actively listen to their answers. I try to find one thing in common, tell them I think the rest is shit BUT there is that one thing. I do this in person in art installations I exhibit in national parks.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
I talk to MAGA folks regularly as part of my art project TD. If anything we touch on ways to step down from our political polarization by engagement
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
They wouldn’t be too few if we each turned off our digital devices and went outside to talk directly with MAGA folks. Without engagement we are simply feeding the very beast we claim is devouring us.
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
All of our accumulated progressive comments won’t change the fact that we need to get out there and engage MAGA one on one in person. Everybody bitchin in their echo chambers ain’t going nowhere
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
Or progressives need to get off their digital polarization devices and go engage with some MAGA in person. Nothing is going to change by just commenting and sharing
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D. Deighton Triptych Dialogue @daviddeighton.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
I think we should get off our digital devices and engage people in person. That will be a good step in fighting MAGA fascism
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