Last week, as part of my consulting job, I attended a community meeting in north Denver where hundreds of local residents expressed their opposition to a project to rebuild the intersection of two major highways, calming but firmly stating the reconstruction project will have a negative impact in their neighborhood.
One after the other, neighbors, business owners, public officials, and community leaders asked local authorities to reconsider the project, arguing that any changes to the highway access will impact the quality of life in the area, for example, forcing businesses to close and, therefore, leaving people without a job.
Several speakers who grew up in the neighborhood where the meeting took place said they did not want any more changes to their streets or highways. Others said the proposed changes will increase the travel time from their homes to the schools of their children, creating potential problems for parents and students.
Everybody passionately defended his or her point of view and there were many references to “democracy in action.” However, in spite of that, or perhaps because of that, few of the neighbors knew, and many did not want to know, that the project they were so adamantly opposing is just in the early stages of environmental analysis, that there is no money yet allocated to the project, and that construction is scheduled for 2035.
In other words, everything these neighbors said was true, but it was a truth based on incomplete information about key elements of the project. I assume many of the neighbors that were so concern about the travel time for their home to the school of their children will have a different set of concerns when construction begins 26 years from now.
Everybody was courteous and respectful, but I left the meeting with the feeling of having watched not a dialogue about a common issue but just a series of monologues where each speaker showed his or her concern about how his or her present comfort zone and routine could be impacted, without any desire to receive additional and important details about the project and without any long-term thinking.
I left the meeting asking myself how we can improve our own country in the long-term if we only think about ourselves and about our present needs and we only focus our attention not on positive change and hope for the future but on keeping things the way they are because we do not want to face any inconvenience.
Had our ancestors from the remote past shared this kind of attitude, we would still be living in caves. In fact, if we insist in this kind of thinking, we would probably return to the time of the cavemen, regardless of how comfortable and luxurious our homes and highways may be.
True dialogue always includes an element of openness towards the others and, therefore, true dialogue always reveals our own vulnerability. There is true dialogue only when and if we are open to the possibility of changing because of what others say.