Parker Palmer's The Politics Of The Brokenhearted

As the world grows more interconnected on a daily basis, it is imperative that people learn to seek out the light in the world when surrounded by the darkness that violence, politics, and social tension brew. In the essay titled “The Politics of the Brokenhearted,” Parker Palmer emphasizes the issues that negatively affect society today as well as promote fear of each other. In his essay, Palmer’s purpose is to provide insight to others about the current and crippling state of democracy, and the need of its supporters to save it from destruction by viewing politics and social issues with an open mind and heart. Through Palmer’s personal experiences alongside historical and present day events, he is able to convey to the audience the necessity

Violence has removed the humanity from solving problems through communication, and instead has led people into a state of dismay and dystopian style resolutions; the one who can survive is the one who gains control. When describing the violence that he has seen in his life, Parker Palmer states, “I have lived through McCarthy’s communist witch hunts; the pushback to the civil rights movement; the political assassinations of the 1960s; the burning of our cities … ” (2). These moments in the United States history have shown the progression of a weakening democracy due to a lack of communication and integrating humanity into solutions. Instead of talking in a humane way to suspected communist, Americans decided to purge them and take violent actions against them; instead of trusting democracy to represent the majority opinion Americans took violent actions against political leaders when they could have communicated their opinion. Violence takes away room for communication and humanity in social and political issues. Palmer’s address of the “dark” in today’s society also is present in the current political state; politicians treat it as a game rather than a staple for a civilized form of government. Palmer states, “When all of our talk about politics is either technical or strategic, to

Palmer addresses the fear installed in American society because of attacks on American democracy, and the actions of turning against one another as a result. In response to this issue Palmer suggests that Americans must trust each other, and never give up hope that democracy will fall. In his essay Palmer references a quote President Lincoln once made: “If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide” (8-9). In order for American democracy to fall, Americans must lose the hope and dream that it can succeed, however; Palmer advocates and expresses the need for Americans to never give up that hope and dream because democracy can not fall if they are unified and can envision the light that democracy shines down on their national community. To lose hope or give up on a dream is to enter the darkness, straying away from the light. In addition to Palmer’s proposal of never giving up hope for democracy, he also asks reader to “see the light” of a reformed democracy by rediscovering our sense of community. Palmer states, “But so also is [found within us] the heart’s alchemy that can turn suffering into community, conflict into the energy of creativity, and tension into an opening