Chris Bord April 8, 2016 Bits

Changing My Mind

When I started to learn stage lighting, my teacher preached a bright front wash, and thought an Altman Beam Projector was the Platonic ideal. I held those beliefs until my experience and aesthetic replaced them with new preferences. For a long time, I considered overhead lighting a design prerequisite, until I worked on a production that had a two-story set which prevented me from hanging anything – my overhead washes moved to footlights and side booms, and my thinking evolved. All of those ideas (and others) contributed to my recent work on the musical Chicago; I was happy with the result, and it struck me that I couldn’t have accomplished it 25 years ago.

We are culturally conditioned against changing our minds. Politicians who do are called “wafflers,” and I recently found myself in a Facebook discussion about whether Hilary Clinton should be criticized for not embracing LGBTQA issues sooner. (You’ve probably seen the memes of Clinton calling marriage a sacred bond between a man and a woman, circa [some previous date].) Gay rights activists have done a great job changing hearts and minds over the past few decades – should we criticize those who’ve come around only recently? Only if we want to hinder additional progress.

Facebook, that great virtual water cooler, is practically no-mind-change central. An otherwise intelligent friend posted something about a recent Supreme Court decision, indicating his dislike of unions. A host of well-informed, measured responses followed, met by my friend with fingers in his ears, “Can’t hear you! Agree to disagree!” I won’t soon contribute to his feed again.

One reason I love criticism is that opinions must be supported by words. It’s not just the stance, it’s the reasons on display; the reader can agree or disagree, or perhaps be persuaded. That’s why I change my mind – I become persuaded by arguments (or new evidence) over time. This isn’t waffling. It’s a mature response to the process of living (which might be why I change my mind more frequently than I used to.)

Changing your mind can have consequences. When I was young, I accepted a package of beliefs that came bundled with with my newfound practice of Evangelical Christianity. As I’ve changed my thinking on individual issues over the years, I’ve found myself increasingly alienated from members of that community. The separation has aroused shame in me, as if I were doing something wrong in thinking differently from the group. More significantly, my rejection of individual tenets of the faith has threatened my faith itself. Changing my mind about small things has led to changing it about much bigger things.

We don’t start out as experts, or having all of the information. We make decisions anyway, because that’s life. Changing our minds isn’t a bad thing – it’s essential for growth.

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1

Art Felshaw. on April 8, 2016 at 12:17 pm
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I think people like to be right. So changing one’s mind means they may have to admit they just could be wrong about something. I have been wrong about so many things over my lifetime, they can’t be counted. I often change my mind because someone will have a point of view I never even considered. It’s still hard to stop and say to yourself “Oh maybe I need to rethink this.”
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  Chris Bord on April 8, 2016 at 3:29 pm
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  I don’t remember seeing “I need to rethink this” too much, especially on Facebook. I get irritated when critics I read will write an essay that leans one way, then maybe a couple of years go by and the overwhelming critical response has been contrary to that critic’s, and the critic will then reference the work not in keeping with his/her original take, but will adopt the conventional wisdom – without recognizing the change.
  
  I used to NEED to be right – had to feel every thought and action was correct. I’m getting over that as I grow up.
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Paul on April 8, 2016 at 2:22 pm
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The educator/philosopher/author Mortimer Adler said (paraphrasing) that in order to meaningfully disagree with someone, you were obliged to show they were misinformed OR their reasoning was flawed. Since I was not a Poly Sci major, nor am I a “policy wonk”, I usually characterize my political opinions as “my sentiments”.

As a dumbass newlywed ~20 years ago, I made the mistake of sharing that thought with my bride. So every time we found ourselves spiritedly haggling over some matter, she would snidely point out (and rightfully so!) that I “was doing that thing” with her. 🙂

We both work in Computer IT and the Arts. And both wheelhouses contain numerous skill areas and knowledge areas. It never ceases to amaze me the number of people who talk on a given subject… on a level way above their ‘game’. It’s my pet hate when some will reassert an original statement by stating… “I stand by my position”. But without attempting to offer any kind of substantiation.
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  Chris Bord on April 8, 2016 at 3:35 pm
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  I also get irritated when someone will frame their position as, “Better minds than mine have thought about this and come to this conclusion, so who am I to disagree?” (Or in the case of one Christian pastor, “People have died for this belief, which is good enough for me.”) I don’t think Adler’s dictum works as well in the absence of absolutes – sure, we can argue about educational reform and cite statistics, but when talking about the arts we’ll fall back on our preferred critical framework (and many points of view can be “right,” as long as they are defended coherently.)

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