Liberals vs. Conservatives explained

I was pointed to this by magik_sometimes. A TED talk by Jonathan Haidt that looks at the inherent differences in mindset between liberals and conservatives. Fascinating! And, I think, largely on the mark.

And especially, perhaps strangely, on the mark for writers. I found myself thinking about the portrayal of fictional characters as I listened to this. Haidt says that one thing you must keep in mind if you wish to change the mind of someone from an opposing point of view is that you can't go in with the "I'm right and you're wrong" attitude. You must understand that the other person believes they are right.

When writing believable characters, that's exactly what the writer should keep in mind -- if you don't want your work to fall in polemic, or to be your cliché 'black vs. white, good vs. evil" dichtomy. Every character believes he or she is right, that he or she is doing good, that he or she is on the correct side of the issue. In their mind, even the horrible despotic and vicious leader who is the antogonist of the story believes that he is doing what he must do for the good of his country. He is not evil; he is, in his worldview, morally correct.

And that is how you, as the writer, should portray him: as someone who believes he is doing right, even as your protagonist is valiantly fighting against him... for the "evil despot,' if you allow yourself to be in his point of view, believes that the valiant young woman who is the hero of your story is the one who is morally corrupt, the one who cannot see that order has its costs, that the destruction of that order will inevitably cause things to be worse for nearly everyone, and so on. To the despot, she is the one who is on the 'wrong' side.

There are no (or very, very few) black and white characters in life. Nearly all of us contain shades of gray -- and those shades shift if we look at people through the eyes of the 'other side'.

The same should be true in fiction.