The midst of a coup might not seem like the best time to publish a book on creating dialogue. But Kurt Gray's "Outraged! Why We Fight About Morality and Politics" doesn't exactly fit that generic description. Gray is a social psychologist who’s played a leading role in redefining our understanding of moral cognition, or how we come to see things as right or wrong. Most of "Outraged!" is about that new understanding and how it fits into the larger framework of our ever-growing understanding of ourselves as a species. But the final third builds on that to point toward what we can do with this better understanding, and specifically how we can find ways to bridge our enormous social and political divides.
To talk about doing that in today’s toxic environment is morally questionable, and might serve to normalize a highly abnormal state, one aimed at ending America’s liberal democracy by subverting or uprooting the institutions of government and civil society. That’s not what “Outraged!” is about. It’s trying to lay the groundwork for a bottom-up peace and reconciliation process, something like what South Africa went through — if, that is, we can get through the current crisis, so that such a process becomes possible. And it does so by telling stories, and sharing them, to model what that might look like.
“The argument of this book is simple," Gray writes: "We have a harm-based moral mind. Our evolutionary past makes us worry about harm, but people today disagree about which threats are most important or most real, creating moral outrage and political disagreements.” His book, he adds, covers three big ideas, first, “why harm drives our minds,” going deep into our evolutionary past and our similarities and differences with other species; second, “how harm fuels morality,” even when that's not obvious; and third, “the practical takeaways of our harm-based mind — what can we do to better manage moral conflict?”
Each of these is explored in separate sections, and paired with the myths that Gray argues have blocked our understanding. First is the myth of humans as apex predators. Gray discusses the key archaeological find supporting that myth — Raymond Dart's 1924 discovery of the Taung child — an early bipedal human from about 2.8 million years ago — whom he assumed had butchered by another prehistoric human. But later investigations revealed that the site was littered with eagle eggshells — the child had likely been taken by birds of prey, not an uncommon fate for mammals of small stature.
Why does our evolutionary past matter for morality? “If we are predators, then morality might have evolved to make sure that the spoils of the hunt were evenly distributed," Gray argues, but a "prey-based morality would focus more on preventing [other] people from exploiting our vulnerabilities.”
“If humans are predators," he later continues, "then in modern life, when someone roars their moral outrage at us, it is because they are aggressive and trying to be threatening." But if we are by nature prey animals, "then modern moral outrage is just people trying to protect themselves from threats.”
"We have a harm-based moral mind. Our evolutionary past makes us worry about harm, but people today disagree about which threats are most important or most real."
It appears that for the overwhelming majority of people, this evolutionary foundation holds. As is typical of prey species, we banded together in groups, underwent a social transition and developed brains suited to our social environment — one where we could be harmed by other people — and then a sense of morality in response to those harms. Much more recently, and especially over the last 100 years or so, humans underwent what could be called a "safety transition," in which many childhood diseases and other threats to life have been greatly reduced.
Ironically, even as that has occurred, we’ve grown more sensitive to new threats, creating the widespread illusion that the world has grown more dangerous, when literally the opposite is true. This has created new divisions, as some people perceive new harms in different ways, while others dismiss them entirely. This is the origin of many of today's moral disputes.
The second myth is the concept known as "harmless wrongs." The classic example here is a single example of sibling incest: It's fully consensual, safe sex is practiced, it only happens once, no one else ever finds out. In lab studies by psychologists, most people will still say that was wrong, even with all obvious harms removed. Our moral sense is grounded in intuition, not reason, Gray argues, and in perception rather than objective reality. Our intuition reflects the social reality that incest is harmful, no matter what, and removing all harms in a thought experiment doesn't change that.
Liberals and conservatives differ in terms of harm perception, Gray finds. His research identifies four clusters of moral concern where this happened: around the environment, the divine, the powerful and the "othered." Liberals, as you might expect, see the environment and the othered as significantly more vulnerable to harm, with the powerful and the divine significantly less so. Conservatives see less difference, but in fact agree that the environment and the othered are more vulnerable to harm. So there's considerable common ground as well as notable differences than the powerful and the divine. But the differences were much smaller. So there’s common ground as well as differences.
"Stories of harm can help us bridge divides in part because they make us seem vulnerable. But actually sharing these stories — becoming vulnerable — is hard."
Gray's third myth is that facts are the best way to bridge our moral divides. That reflects, in large part, the Enlightenment heritage of Western democracy — but it turns out that facts are largely useless in this context. What can bridge divides is storytelling, which humans have used to explain and understand the world for tens of thousands of years. If you want to understand someone with a different moral perspective or a different sense of who or what is most vulnerable to harm, listen to the stories they tell.
“Stories of harm can help us bridge divides in part because they make us seem vulnerable, providing evidence of our humanity,” Gray explains. “But actually sharing these stories — becoming vulnerable — is hard.” His final chapter describes a framework for doing that. “For better discussions about morality and politics we need to connect, invite, and validate," Gray writes, and before describing what’s involved in each of those steps, along with supporting evidence. All of his ties into my previous writings about creating "deliberative spaces," which can be seen as the next logical step in translating civil dialogue into civic action.
It's undeniably jarring to read Gray's book, with all its encouraging evidence, in the midst of an ongoing coup attempt shaped by elites who seem to play by a different set of rules. Grappling with that disconnect was what I felt I had to do in interviewing Gray recently.
This transcript has been edited for clarity and length.
This is a bizarre situation, because I think your work is great, and I’ve been waiting to see it in book form for some time, and it's coming out as there’s a running coup underway in this country. It can feel like a book out of time, yet it’s literally grounded in millions of years of human history. Your basic argument is simple: Our evolutionary past makes us sensitive to harm, but people don't agree about the threats we see today.
It strikes me that the "liberal" harms you cite as are well grounded in empirical reality, while the conservative harms are less so. Conservative elites have a long history of ginning up harms and instigating moral panics, while liberal elites often try to deal with real-world problems and bring people together. So I see a different dynamic unfolding among political elites than among common folk, who are the primary subject of your book. Does that make sense?
Yes, it does make sense. Increasingly, when I'm on podcasts or fireside chats I emphasize the role of "conflict entrepreneurs." There's a distinction between elites and pundits and politicians, folks like Elon Musk, and what everyday people are trying to do. So the book's framework is to ultimately understand where everyday people are coming from and why they vote the way they vote.
"There's a subset of people, like 1% of the population, who are psychopaths, who are not worried about the vulnerable, who are worried first and foremost about cementing power and gaining status."
But there are bad actors who understand the power of threats and fear to drive mass mobilization. In some ways the book is trying to address the good guys, the people on both sides who genuinely trying to connect and make sense of other people. The elites have known this since the time of Machiavelli and even ancient Rome: Here's a chance to bring the insights of the power of fear and the power of threats to people who want to connect and want to understand across divides.
What can you say about how elites differ from ordinary people? You talk about some elements of that in your book, and I’ve written about related research into why lies and conspiracy theories may confer a coalitional advantage.
I think there are many politicians who are genuine in their perceptions of threats: the average state legislator, even the average member in the House, maybe most senators. But there's a subset of people, there's like 1% of the population, who are psychopaths, who are not worried about the vulnerable, who are worried first and foremost about cementing power and gaining status. Stories can mislead, like if there's a story that's not true or not statistically common, but that story is emphasized as truth and now it has the feeling of truth, even though it's not supported by the facts. I think of, like, Haitian immigrants eating pets.
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I see there a combination of elite power to gain material advantage and construct narratives that distract people from what's really going on. So that ties back to a question of elite control of discourse.
Absolutely right. “Outraged!” needs a companion book about how these are leveraged by elites to create a reality around everyday people, whose feelings of threat are genuine, their perceptions of threat are built on the evolutionary legacy and the power of stories in our minds. But people don't exist within a vacuum. If you grow up Christian and you believe there's a soul, you believe you go to hell if you sin, so those things make sense. But those worldviews are not just endogenous to groups. They're given by elites, many of whom are interested in creating division and maintaining their wealth at the expense of poorer folks.
You note that there's a whole literature about alpha males, and about coalitions forming against them when they get out of control. That seems to tie into your reference to psychopaths, as well as extreme narcissists. They are not necessarily oriented by harm, they are oriented by dominance — they are trying to threaten people. There’s some evidence there are more of them in the business world, and in politics, too, presumably. I wonder how they fit together.
It's a very good question. I don't think anyone has collected the data. You can imagine, if you grew up super elite and you see the world in a particular way, maybe you're still attuned to threat, but your moral circle has shrunk to where who is seen as a legitimate victim is just a small group. So you're still motivated by threat, but if you see most of America as suffering because of their own actions or inactions, or you legitimately see trickle-down economics as being the best — if you're rich, that's good for everybody — you could still be motivated by genuine threats. So I wonder if most elites are indeed still motivated by perceived harm.
Oh, I agree. I think most of them are. But there’s a gradient: Psychopathic tendencies have a greater hold the higher up you go, because of those factors that you talk about, a shrinking sense of the moral circle, of who's deserving and who's not.
There's super interesting work in the organizational behavior space about how having more power makes you have less theory of mind for people who are lower status. Like a CEO has less theory of mind for their employees.
Theory of mind — explain what that means.
In general, the more power people have the less they have the perspective to take what other people think seriously, or to worry about what other people feel. Because they control the resources so they don't need to make sense of how people are thinking or feeling, because they don't need to build coalitions. They don't need to appeal to someone or appease someone. They can just act and those actions get carried forward.
"The more power people have, the less they have to take what other people think seriously, or to worry about what other people feel."
You can even manipulate this with undergraduates. If I’m the CEO and you're the worker — Adam Galinsky has a study asking both people to write an "e" on the desk or on your forehead. If I'm high-powered, I write the "e" so that it reads correctly to me. But if you're lower-powered you write the "e" so it reads correctly to me. So if I'm super-powerful, I don't need to think about your feelings and thoughts and that allows my moral circle to shrink. It's not because I wish ill on people who are lower status. I just don't need to think about them. They're functionally invisible.
So, not to be an apologist for elites, I still think there is like more humanity and genuine thought and feeling among them, and that if any of us were put into that position we might be similar, even if there's still a difference between us and Elon Musk.
Oh, sure. I see a combination of two things. There are gradations of difference, and there are tipping points that you cross. Like with the psychopathy scale: It's a continuous scale with no sharp cutoff point, but you can see the different life trajectories. You have the ones who end up in prison and you have the ones in the C-suites.
Exactly. A similar point can be made about the tendency for interpersonal victimhood. People who are narcissists really see themselves as victims, even though they're powerful, I think that's a really interesting point. You can be incredibly powerful and yet see yourself as a victim. I think that licenses some of these things. You don't have to perceive the suffering of other people if you are suffering, right? So if you're a powerful rapper, or a senator or whatever, the vice president, then you don't have to think about other people's thoughts.
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So what can you add to the present moment to help us navigate it better? I guess one thing I can draw from your argument is that even people who are in violent disagreement may have some way to connect. So what can we do to accomplish that?
Especially in light of all these cuts that are happening. There are farmers who aren't getting reimbursed [with federal funds] and they're hurting. There's a reaction on social media about how "leopards ate my face," like, you're an idiot and it serves you right for voting for Trump. But I think these moments of shared suffering are a real opportunity to build respect and compassion across the other side. That's how you get people on your side and build coalitions.
If you want to build more of a class-based movement that helps wages increase and reduces inequality, then the way to do that is to recognize that the suffering is genuine. These people didn't necessarily know the impact of these policies, because who could guess? So there’s a chance to listen to their stories, validate that suffering and then maybe share your own stories. I think that guide map in the last third of the book is how you should act with people, for example, who are worried about Medicaid and Medicare.
With cuts already happening and on the horizon in so many different fields, is there a way to get ahead of that? As you just said, we're all in this together.
Shared suffering builds connection as long as you don't deny other people's suffering or blame the victim. I think there's a powerful tendency to blame the victim, especially if you think that they really deserved it. I think the left needs to not mock people who are suffering. We have data that shows what makes people the most pissed, basically, is when you deny the harms that people see and feel, and you mock them in their time of need.
A big part of right-wing propaganda is to paint liberals as scornful elites, which — sometimes there is some of that, it’s part of human nature. But what’s much more characteristic of liberal politics is programs like Social Security and Medicare that helped to lift everyone, without judging people. But liberals get painted as, "Well, they're the elites," as if Elon Musk isn't elite.
I know, like a man of the people! There's a broader conversation about how you get people to recognize that elites are actually elites, especially when they paint themselves as victims of the world order that maybe doesn't exist, except in their minds. But I think there's a way to get ahead of that. People need to genuinely understand people's fears, meet them where they are.
"These moments of shared suffering are a real opportunity to build respect and compassion across the other side. That's how you get people on your side and build coalitions."
I often have this conversation, "Well they repeat all these things — how do I convince them that they're wrong?" It's like every liberal is asking: How do I get conservatives on my side? Well, have you ever listened to a conservative and figured out where they're actually coming from? I was in the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, talking to the moderator. I, as a Canadian, was like, "Everyone is better off with higher taxes in general." And she was like, "Well, that's a very Canadian perspective, but conservatives distrust the government being able to spend that money. They're going to spend it on nefarious things. They want small government because they don't want government to have power to do bad things." I guess I never really thought about that, and I appreciated that point. But I think liberals are like, "Well, I know it's true. I know the facts. So let me educate them." No one wants to be educated by people on the other side.
Yes, even when it's actually true. It's irrelevant that climate change is a reality if all they ever hear is, "You're lecturing me."
Right, because no one likes moral superiority. We all like to feel like we are good people. If you come in like, "You're wrong, and that means you're morally bankrupt," people are going to push back against that. I wrote a substack about this, about taking an Uber with a Christian nationalist. You need to make sure that people feel heard and that they're rational and reasonable people. And then you can actually push back on them, you can challenge them. But you need to spend time first making sure that you build rapport and make them feel seen.
What’s a concluding thought you’d like to leave us with?
I'd like to leave with a hopeful thought, which I talk a little bit about, in the book. Sure America's democracy is under threat, but we're still far from Rwanda. We're still far from actual civil war along ethnic lines, where there's genocide. Yeah, people are real nasty on social media, and there's uncertainty about how much the executive branch is going to respect the judicial branch, or the judicial branch is going to uphold the separation of powers.
But for everyday people, you can still have a conversation on the subway and you can still talk to your relatives at Thanksgiving, so long as you follow some good steps and observe good norms. You can even have reasonable civil discourse with someone who's far away from you in Iowa who's struggling to make ends meet as a farmer. We're further than we were when it comes to democratic instability, but there's like a lot further we can fall, so let's think more gain-focused instead of about being lost. Because when people are are in the domain of losses, than they're super risk-seeking, they're almost like "Burn it all down." I don't think that's where people are in general.
What we need here in America is this: There's hope because you can still talk to people, you can still build allies, you can still build coalitions to affect change. You can still lean on people's better angels of their nature — maybe not as much as you could, but it's not fully gone, you know. So let's remember that.
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