Communication Ethics Literacy and Difference-chapter 12

This chapter has a section about the pragmatics of dialogic ethics that states, "Dialogue requires that one know the ground from which one speaks, meet the Other with a willingness to learn, and learn about the ground from which the Other's discourse emerges". (223) To me this statement is at the heart of difference in literacy. This is the point that makes or breaks dialogic ethics within it's pragmatics. When we are not open to learning about the place that someone else is coming from we will close down communication, that "dialogue hides when we demand that another vacate the ground that offers meaning and vision for a given standpoint." (224) Dialogue will not hide however if we are open, request, and respect it, it will emerge. In communication ethics literacy, when people disagree they need to ask themselves what and how they can learn from the other's position and how the other's view can add to the view they hold themselves. By opening yourself up the these questions communication among people on opposing or differing sides can negotiate and change. This is a necessary part of crisis communication because at a critical point ethics guides us to listen and attend to that moment and seek new possibilities, not to stand firm and approach with an unwillingness to learn about where the other is coming from. I think that this is illustrated in almost all major topics that people debate or take sides on. When people start a dialogue with someone who doesn't stand on the same side of an issue or topic that they do, there is an instant wall that goes up. They hold tight to the belief that their standpoint is right and that there is nothing that the other can say to change their minds. Most conversations aren't had with the intent that they can engage communication and learn something from the other side, or that something could add to their standpoint. People tend to take a side and do whatever they can for that view, they want to push their agenda as quickly as possible instead of try and learn from open communication. The issue of gun control, as the book brought up, I feel does just this. There are two sides and neither one wants to hear what the other one has to say. Instead of communicating with a willingness to learn and finding a more educated common ground, than just the far left or the far right. I know even for me personally, I have a tendency to not engage communication with the willingness to see the other's standpoint. Up to this point, do you think that society is failing in the topic of pragmatics of dialogic ethics? Are we failing to engage dialogue with a request and a willingness to learn instead of with a demand for change?