sides of the aisle. when consultants and campaigns try and make us angry, it s no longer today to try and resolve problems. it s because they know this perpetual rage will propel us into the voting booths. it will propel us to donate money. but it won t necessarily make us happier. so what does research tell us about how you can end the cycle of uncontrolled anger? well, there s a really interesting series of studies that come out of israel. and israel is kind of an interesting place, because they have been living with anger for many years. and the conventional wisdom on how you resolve this was something known as the contact hypothesis, which basically said, if you take people who are angry at each other and you put them in a room together, and you allow them to speak civilly, they ll eventually figure out how to get along. they ll humanize each other. and the researchers in israel said, well, anyone who came up with that theory has never been to jerusalem before, right? there s a
happening right now with president trump or political cob su su consultitants on both sides of the aisle. they know this perpetual rage will propel us into the voting booth, propel us to donate money, but it won t necessarily make us happier. so what does research tell us about how you can end the cycle of uncontrolled anger? there s studies that come out of israel, and israel is an interesting place because they have been living with anger for many years. and the conventional wisdom how you resolve this is something called the contact hypothesis, which basically said if you take people who are angry at each other and put them in a room together and allow them to speak civilly, they ll eventually get along. and researchers said anyone who s been to jerusalem, that
in this country bh wh it comes to guns. it is called the contact hypothesis. boiled down, it is the theory that what is needed for understanding between polarized groups with differing views is contact. but we don t need science to tell us that personal relationships and personal experiences change us. look at the same-sex marriage debate. if you know someone who experienced racism or homophobia or prejudice, chances are you feel differently. if you could put a face or name to a hardship chances are you feel differently when it is that personalized. a washington post analysis found 150,000 students attending 170 primary or secondary schools have experienced a shooting on campus since the columbine high school massacre in 1999. so let s do a quick math. take those 150,000 students with firsthand experience. and give them each ten friends and relatives and now you are up to 1.5 million people who could put a personal face to gun violence in schools. now give those 1.5 million
people another ten friends and relatives. you see where we re going. no up to 15 million people which is two degrees of separation from gun violence in schools. and that number sky rockets when you start adding in teachers, administrators and other people who have been touched by other forms of gun violence. we re reaching the point where soon everyone will be less than six degrees separated from some sort of personal connection with gun violence. arguably we may already be there. and if you are the nra and worried about protecting your political turf, the contact hypothesis may be very concerning to you. we ll be right back. stay with me, mr. parker. when a critical patient is far from the hospital, the hospital must come to the patient. stay with me, mr. parker. the at&t network is helping first responders connect with medical teams in near real time. stay with me, mr. parker. .saving time when it matters most. stay with me, mrs. parker.
showing that empathy, we saw it at the cnn town hall. i don t think it helps the nra. howard, we have seen this happen, the boycott movements and corporate america is basically so afraid of polarized america, that they all just fall in line. i have a few we can show you, these are ones that just in the last few days have dropped their nra membership gives you special issues, a la aaa. and that s a problem for the nra. they have been main streamed for years. main streamed and yet somehow under the radar at the same time. what they can t stand is the visibility that they re getting. yeah. because they operate best with the money and the influence behind the scenes in washington. they don t want stuff to get that public. i think when they i think something happened, you talked about contact. yeah. is changing. contact hypothesis, if you can do it through television, those