You sit across from your grandmother, you are in complete silence, it is a sacred space. Listen andtes you ask questions. It is just two microphones and you look each other in the eyes. As you know i microphone gives you the license to ask questions you do not normally get to ask. From the beginning of storycorps people thought if i had 40 bits left to live, what i say to this person . At the end of the 40 minutes you get a copy and another stays with us and goes to the American Folklife Center in the library of congress. Your great, great, Great Grandkids can know your grandmother through her voice and story. Because of the nature of what happens in these booths, it started in Grand Central then expanded across the country, we are collecting the wisdom of humanity. We have about 650,000 participate so far. It is the largest collection of human voices so far. We are a Public Service and nonprofit. We are here to serve people. One of the things we are encouraging a thanksgiving, and if you go to the google homepage there is a link to this. We are encouraging people for interviewing a loved one. This is the year we need to stay socially distant from elders, loved ones, people with preexisting conditions that make them vulnerable to covid19. Ifare encouraging people, you cannot be facetoface with a loved one, to record an interview. We have a special platform. Up until covid hit all of those 650,000 people who participated did so facetoface. Today, tomorrow, saturday, sunday if you cannot be with a loved one, we are suggesting you record an interview over our special platform and preserve it at the library of congress. Tell that loved one they matter to you. They will not be forgotten by listening to them and asking import questions. These are big like questions like how do you want to be remembered, who should you kindness in your life, what was the happiest moment in your life, hardest time of your life . The hardest questions. At thego to google, bottom under the search bar, you can record an interview. Meaningful they take 40 minutes. Have a meaningful 40 minutes with some who matters to you. That is a history of storycorps. One small step is very different. We have been thinking about this for years. Since before maybe about five years. How do we deal with the crisis of contempt across the globe . Is there a way to throw the storycorps methodology, which is about connecting people, at this problem and try to make a little bit of a difference . Came up with something called one small step. Our oath is that we do no harm. We have been testing this intensely for years. We have worked in about 40 cities and again, i know i am giving viewers who do not know about storycorps a lot of information, but before one small step it had always been between loved ones. You and your grandmother, you and your kid, you and a friend. This puts strangers across the political divide. People who have never met before for a session not about politics, but to get to know each other. In the intro you talked about healing the country and i think that is an overstep. It is really about building a little bit of social capital. Taking one small step away from the of this we are facing because democracy cannot survive. You and your viewers do not need to be told whats happened the last few years. We used to disagree with the people across the divide. There are studies that show we hate and fear our neighbors more than our Traditional International adversaries. Things have gone a little bit bonkers in the country and this is just one small solution to try and help us see each other as human beings again. Groun not about finding Common Ground. We know the harm dehumanizing others can do to society. We are in four cities now, but anybody across the country can do it. You can also go to our website to find out how to sign up. Our dream is to convince the country it is our patriotic duty to see the humanity and people. The hardest thing we have ever tried to do, but given the state of the country, we are going to take a swing at it. A very long answer to your quick question. Host finding Common Ground and the one small step model conversation we are going to have for the next 35 or 40 minutes. Let me give the numbers for viewers to call. ,emocrats 202 7488000 republicans 202 7488001, independents 202 7488002. Dave isay, you gave the explanation and let me give viewers an example of one of these conversations you created in one small step. This is a conversation between two participants who participated in birmingham, alabama. [video clip] an example of how i think my personal belief structure differs from the perception of my belief structure, right . My wife and i for years led youth group in our church. Would participate in the march for life and somehow, because i would be outward with this idea that i would like to see a world where abortion is no longer an nowon, that one stance i am somehow this radical evangelical trump supporter. I see. Something that drives my belief is the same thing that drives my belief that we should take care of abandoned refugees at the border, the poor and sick in our own neighborhoods, but that is not the public persona of what somebody who goes to d. C. To march for that is. That is exactly why i wanted to do this. I will fully admit to having had that bias before. It is also worth mentioning please do not run out of the room i worked for planned parenthood. I cannot talk to you anymore. [laughter] deck is my blood going. None of us are simple enough to be throwing the bucket. We are just too darn complicated for that. I think we could do a better job of realizing the nuance. Nuance i want on a bumper sticker. [laughter] i think the end result of having these conversations and storytelling needs to be that. People are so many things. Being disabled as part of my identity, but just a part. Going to the march for life is part of your identity, but not the whole thing. Right. You are a father, husband, and i think if we can remember that we have is conversations, we will get somewhere. Host that was from one small step from participants in birmingham, alabama. Dave isay, how do you find these participants in are these people, if theyre willing to do this program, are they willing on and that Common Ground start to what youre trying to do . Guest people find us. Att happens is you sign up storycorps. You can also go to onesmallstep. Org. You fill out a questionnaire and talk about your politics, yourself, and we use this to match you with another participant. You also write a little paragraph about who you are. That is what is sent to your partner. Justet your partners bio, their first names you cannot look them up, and then you read hemr partners bio to t and they read it to you. A study for more and common, which is an organization that studies polarization, that says there is an exhaustive majority of 89 in the country who are tired of the divisions under looking for a way out. I would say they are within that 89 . That is most of us. On probablys built the most studied theory and history of psychology called contact theory. The 1950sloped in and says under specific conditions if you bring two people who are enemies together facetoface for a meaningful conversation, that feeling of hate can melt away and something can change. If you do it wrong, you can make things worse. But if you do it right, something extraordinary can happen. I think that as what we have. There is also the recalled brightness theory that says there are two conditions for tractable conflict which is what we are moving toward. Two conditions for it to melt away. One is that people are completely exhausted. I think we are getting there in this country. The second is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, i way to get through it. Just in a small way we hope one small step is a way that people can take a step, a courageous step, toward each other. People have said it is hard to hate up close. I think what we have seen over and over is the truth of that. We want as many people in the country to sign up. Yes, the people who do this are primed to want to listen to the other side, but i think that is the vast majority of the country. It is just the people on the hard edges. Interesthere are some who haveo interest in listening to others. Host plenty of callers. We start in missio michigan with tonya. Caller good morning. I wish i would have the book available now. Someone that was a professor in some California College or university and his theory for talking to people is to talk to them about something they like. When you open a conversation you find some sort of mutuality and then you can develop your discussion further. But if you go after a person with hard i like this or you are wrong, you are never going to succeed. Ive been trying to follow that. It is very difficult in this time because i am absolutely amazed at how one person can alienate half of the country practically. It is a terrible thing that families cannot meet and enjoy one anothers company. Through the years weve talked about politics and religion in such, but i have never seen anything that has engendered such hate and animosity as i see now. It is a shame. I wonder if you might have some thoughts on how to correct that. Thank you. I enjoyed this topic very much. Cspan, we love you. Host thank you, natasha. Love to you as well in michigan. Guest that advice is absolutely right. That is how one small step works. I want to say if you want to onen up, go to take smallstep. Org. The goal is not to argue about politics. We ask them not to talk about politics. It is just to get to know each other. That is why we call it one small step. Topics into the harder of politics is difficult. If you do talk about politics, we suggest you come at it in a slant way. Questions would be what is it you think the other side does not understand about your side . What do you respect about people and the others . Those sorts of questions. What you read was completely right. Nobody has ever screamed, yelled, called somebody a nazi or snowflake or whatever name and changed their mind, ever in the history of humankind. The only way we can begin to see and hear each other is by listening. That is the core of what storycorps is about. It is in the initiative about listening to each other. Show dave, we are going to on the screen some of the primary questions that one small step participants are given in these interviews. We will put those up as we hear from jb in arkansas, a democrat. Caller good morning. I imagine half the people listening to the show today probably believe that this country was involved in some kind of International Conspiracy to fix our elections. Judging by the callers that we had the first hour i just want to make one simple point. I will get off the phone after that. If that was actually true, you would see the justice department, the fbi, the cia, the top level of this American Government involved in trying to find out if that was real or not. You do not see that. You see five private lawyers led by a man who has not been in a courtroom in decades backed by a president that i think it is paranoia. He believed he could not lose unless he was cheated. Go ahead . Host let me ask you will go ahead. You said your point is what . Caller you see all the top levels of the u. S. Government looking into this. Questions thate participants in the one small step program, one of the primer questions is, do you feel misunderstood by people who have different beliefs than you . Have so . Caller i feel misunderstood, yes. I think they are misunderstood. It does not make sense. The claim about this National Conspiracy nobody is checking into it. Have you seen bill barr lately . Host that was jb in arkansas. Dave isay, what you take from that . It is a little bit off topic for one small step. Aughs] people are angry and i think we do not understand each other. The question is can we sit together and start getting know to know each other like human beings . I am sure the person we just heard has an interesting life story. If he could sit with someone who has different political views and maybe thinks the election hisstolen or whatever concerns are about how people see things on the outside, if they could talk a little bit about their lives and who they care about and their kids and grandkids, maybe they could have a conversation about the election that was a little bit different than just shouting at each other. Out, as weuld turn heard in that clip, a little bit of nuance to everybodys beliefs. Who knows . The way it is going in the country right now is not working and this is another way of going at it. It is about having the courage to listen, having the courage to listen to people who are different. Host barbara in North Carolina, you are next. Caller good morning. Mi there . Host yes, maam. Caller thank you, cspan. Loved natasha. Is that her name . She had everything involved in communicating. I think the end of the conversation is really education. I think cspan and the storycorps needs to go to the mountains of North Carolina and talk to these people. I know you mentioned you do go around in buses, but i think it is the core of everything to communicate. Peoplenot hear from you and a lot of people in this area do not get internet. How can they even get tv . Line isthe bottom really education. We need to focus on that. Thank you. Host that was barbara in North Carolina. Banner elk North Carolina in the western part of the state. I will pull up the map so viewers can see where it is as we hear from dave isay. Guest i think barbara is right. Because of the virus there is no getting into the mountains for facetoface conversation, but we hope we will be able to reach people all across the country. I think part of the problem in the countrys people feel like they are not being listened to. Likeuntry is people feel theyre not being listened to. Listening is one of the best ways to show respect. , our goal isains to get as deep as we can into the country. Education, ims of think this is more social and Emotional Learning education. Helping us build those muscles of compassion and empathy for one another and we live in a world where there is a multibilliondollar paid industrial complex. It is incredibly profitable to hate. Ows and sow there has to be a counterbalance where we can find the humanity in each other. Host do you think we would be better off without twitter or facebook . Guest i am not on those platforms. [laughs] i do not know facebook that well. Seems to be a really dangerous tool and obviously it just has huge effects on our brain chemistry. Every time you write something nasty about someone the more likes you will get. You get dopamine hits from that and it is a little bit of a casino in our brain. It seems like twitter is probably pretty harmful. Host back to michigan this is margaret, a democrat from detroit. Caller good morning. Thank you for cspan. I really appreciate you guys because you keep it real. My thing is this. We can learn from kids. Along, theyo get love each other, there is no animosity and anger, ok . But adults, there is the anger coming from, love . Understand because somebody does not agree with you you have siblings, cousins, uncles and so forth, right . They do not always agree. Kids do not always agree, but know do n but they do no their part of the human race know they are part of the human race. That is all i have to say and thank you for having me on the phone. Host dave isay. Very that is the storycorps call. Elders andning to collecting the wisdom of humanity and i think that is an example of listening to wisdom. She is right. We have a lot to learn from kids. We have a lot to learn from each other. Thingsthink one of the one of the things we want to do with one small step is remember that none of us is the worst thing you have ever done. Try to see the best in others and that is something that kids have the ability to do up until a certain age. E should be reminded of one of the lessons of storycorps the traveling around the country recording stories of regular people everywhere is that when we are recording these interviews between grandparents and grandkids, kids and their parents, we have facilitators who work for storycorps who are in the booth. They call a bearing witness. We have had hundreds and hundreds of them as we worked with hundreds of thousands of people across the country. When they come back to for aorps after serving year or two years if you ask them what they learned, everyone gives some version of the anne frank quote that people are basically good. There is truth to that. That is a piece that we need to remember and again, seeing the good in others and remembering that there is a light in all of us and trying to help that flame burn is bright as possible. One way to do that is by treating one another with dignity always in respect always. Host back to the mountain state, this is carl in west virginia. Caller good morning. Democrats havet, got to be vicious when it comes to politics. If you do not agree with my philosophy, you are a racist. They are throwing that around so much it does not mean anything anymore to me. For a lot ofedia this going on because the majority of the Mainstream Media is one way. Our kids in school are being taught the socialist philosophy. Difficulting pretty to even have a conversation with a democrat. The first words out of their mouth if you do not agree, you are a racist. It is getting to be a bad situation. I am 82 years old. I was a democrat when i was a young person. There philosophy was pretty good back in those days. Now it is if you do not agree with me, i will hurt you. I will go to your house, i will demonstrate in front of your house. I will create a commotion your neighbors will want you out of the neighborhood. To. Is what it has come it is crazy and i just hope, well, i agree with President Trump because he did a lot for the blacks in this country. It because thew Mainstream Media do not tell us. Host dave isay. Guest again, i hope you will go to one small step. Org to sign up to participate so you can test your theory. I hear a lot from the media about what one side is like and what the other side is like. We do not spend enough time actually having facetoface conversations. Go to take one small step. Org to sign up and have a conversation with some of the across the political divide. Maybe well be what you think, maybe it will not. One of the reasons we are alive is to be surprised. Areously both sides convinced of certain things about the other side. The caller just articulated it beautifully. A lot of this is fueled by the media. The question