Nuance or Nothing

a natural remedy for polarization

The only way out of our polarized times leads through the middle.

At the rate polarization is driving us apart these days, unity’s embrace might end up out of reach sometime soon. As the planet is heating—a divisive issue really putting the “polar” in polarizing—it feels like we’re all heating with it: families redraw the Thanksgiving table’s seating chart according to vaccine schedules while politicians on TV oscillate between shouting and screaming as the aisle widens into a chasm. In our panic, we’re dropping all sorts of things into that abyss: empathy, diplomacy, and a whole lot of middle ground.

Nuance is a natural remedy for polarization that works almost everywhere, and lives in words like “almost.”

Left or right, right or wrong: sometimes you have to pick one or the other, but you can’t make humble pie with only one ingredient. Nuance, the relative truth between the absolute truths we like to claim so obnoxiously, is the glue that keeps arguing parties from drifting beyond a reasonable distance. The middle between extremes. And not everything is nuanced—because that would be an extreme, and this is nuance right here—but most things are. In a colorful world, the largest part of the spectrum is between black and white. Maybe too much nuance becomes nuisance, but looking at our societal dearth of grades and shades, I can’t help but finish this sentence with nuance and start the next one with nuance.

Nuance is a way of seeing, a way of balancing, a way of admitting. Nuance is differentiation and pragmaticism, helps along understanding and reasoning. You can put it in conversations and hypotheses, extract it from philosophy and even science.

Take philosophy: utilitarians theorize that only the consequences of our actions matter, while deontologist claim the same for intentions; but common sense dictates that you need to take both into consideration. Certainly, the outcome matters even if you screw up with the best intentions. And just as certainly, the intention matters if you succeed by shitty means.

Science, a discipline seemingly firmer than philosophy, struggles with absolutes too: light is as much a particle as it is a wave. So, if even reality doesn’t always know perfect truths, how could we? As long as we are inching towards any final clarity, nuance is a solid middle ground to inch on.

Nuance is a natural remedy for polarization that works almost everywhere, and lives in words like “almost:” from diffusing emotions that aggravate personal conflicts to aligning opposing rationales that keep academic theories and political policies from practical implementation.

Take the theoretic debate around the truthfulness of photography (summed up and decided decisively with a lot of nuance in my article Photography Is an Honest Lie): yes, cameras reflect reality by harnessing photons; no, they are not an accurate instrument of truth depending on how they are employed.

Nuance isn't as glam as sensationalism. But it’s sexy like nonchalant understatements.

The crux is that theorists have neither the ability nor the ambition to accurately capture reality's nuanced complexities in their entirety. Schools of thought are built on radical intellectualism by design, because only extreme positions stand out. Everybody in those halls wants to be somebody, wants their name attached to some academic paper or book or plaque. You have to be a fundamentalist to revolutionize old thinking and pulverize bedrock institutions.

But where theory ends and practice starts, middle grounds take center stage. Nuance is a chisel. If you sculpt with a sledgehammer, you might break the whole construct.

Nuance doesn’t start revolutions—but it ends them by solidifying their ideals into actionable solutions. Nuance isn't as glam as sensationalism. But it’s sexy like nonchalant understatements. It is what distinguishes empathetic rationales from populist polemic: facets against fascism.

Speaking of politics: neither liberals nor conservatives have it completely right or wrong, both communism and capitalism have their flaws, and while dictatorships have a bad rap for good reasons, democracies aren’t without fallacies (a benevolent dictatorship could be more humane than an ignorant democracy).

Looking at political orientation, I usually think that the left is right, but I believe the right can’t always be wrong, and that there are overlaps we don’t even notice: when conservatives cling to traditions, liberals cringe, cuss, and cry out against regressive policies; but they will be the first ones to advocate for the preservation of indigenous heritage as part of a progressive agenda. Nuance par excellence, bordering on paradoxicality.

In a polarized nation, the political pendulum swings forth and back, forth and back, every time the clock strikes election day. Two steps forward, two steps back. Advancing one agenda, rolling back the other—switch, rinse, repeat. To successfully navigate the complexities of democratic consensus, politicians would need to chart a middle course. No easy feat, to be sure. Not very rewarding either if polarized citizens like to play the blame game and decry policy convergence as spineless (many times rightfully so).

Either way, politicians can’t ever win as long as voters shun nuance and don’t differentiate between political failure and circumstantial consequences—something far less blamable. The world is complex. A globalized world more so. Invisible dynamics and unforeseeable circumstances complicate political decision-making and factor into the things that go right or wrong, the situations that turn out well or not so well. Politicians are dealt cards by the times they preside over. And those aren’t tarot cards, and politicians aren’t psychics. Nations aren’t steered by clairvoyant navigators, but by fallible human beings.

Give me nuance, or me give nothing.

Without nuance as a force of balance, we lose the ability to lean one way or another without falling over and landing awkwardly on one side. Humanity’s digitalization enforces these binaries because algorithms reward sensationalism with engagement, and punish moderation.

Nature knows extremes, but it lives of balance. Nuance is natural. A natural remedy.

In an increasingly digitalized and polarized world, we need more nuance and less yelling if we want to reach across the aisle, academic hallways, and the dinner table. An ability and willingness to see the other side goes a long way in building bridges.

So, give me nuance, or give me nothing.