Spiral of silence: Why are we still not talking about it?
I recently rediscovered the spiral of silence: we stay silent with our opinions that we sense are in the minority. As a result, we keep our opinions and emotions to ourselves, especially about issues that we feel might be contentious, like climate change. Or the Israel–Hamas war and its effects on Palestinians, Israelis, the Jewish diaspora, and beyond.
In this blog, I dig into the spiral of silence and ways opinions shift. I share my own experience of staying silent and how that shows up in my body. Then I dig into climate change as an example. Finally, I explore how our felt sense and Focusing practice can help us change the pattern of who we are and what we have the courage to talk about (and do!).
Why we stay quiet
The spiral of silence theory was proposed in 1974 by Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, a German political scientist. The theory states “that we are more willing to communicate our ideas to others if we believe that most people in the group hold the same view, that is, if we believe that our opinion is in line with the perceived majority opinion. On the other hand, if we think that our opinion is different from the perceived majority opinion, we are more likely to stay quiet about what we think.”
The theory further states that fear of isolation from social interaction is behind our decreased willingness to speak out which leads to the spiral. See the diagram. As a result, we suppress our dissenting views to ‘fit in.’
I was very interested to learn that Noelle-Neumann attributed the ability to assess public opinion of an issue to the so-called "quasi-statistical organ." That is that individuals unconsciously assess the distribution of viewpoints and the chances that certain viewpoints will succeed over others. This sounds very much like the felt sense!
Our silence allows us to appear to share the majority position and continue to fit in and not be isolated from our friends and family. As such the spiral of silence perpetuates the dominance of prevailing viewpoints.
There are criticisms of the theory, such as people may conform more to group norms and social identities, or cultural and situational contexts, among others. My own experience shows some of these differences.
Felt Sense Body Card: My silence experience
In writing this blog, it was interesting for me to find this felt sense body card about experiences a few years ago. It shows how my body stops me from speaking—and sometimes also thinking.
The pressure in my chest is like something in me pushing on myself, pushing me back, as shown with the pink hands that come around and create the stop sign that says “no.”
This was a really interesting realization, as in the past it felt like that pressure came directly from society. But this time it felt like it came from within me; from “internalized cultural oppression” as my colleague Chiara Borrello calls it.
The X on my mouth indicates not arguing or disagreeing. Sometimes I’d also have a lack of thoughts, shown as the cloud in my headspace. There’s a feeling of being frozen or numb.
The experience also includes tension in my shoulders and temples. As well as a feeling of being scared at what will happen if I do share what I think, felt as a knot in my belly. The thought was I don’t “know they won’t explode,” and this is felt by my inner hurt child.
My experience includes fear (being scared: what if they get very angry?). However it is fear of being hurt by others, rather than isolated as in the spiral of silence theory.
Tipping points: Moments that spark change
Society isn’t static. Over time, we have seen many movements result in social change: the abolition of legal slavery, the right of women to vote, and the legalization of same-sex marriage, at least in some places around the world. There is often a key moment in this shift from old to new pattern, and these create the space for people to speak up or protest; this can happen quite suddenly.
Actress Alyssa Milano’s ‘me too’ tweet in 2017 was one of those moments. Following her tweet, survivors stepped forward en masse. Within 24 hours, more than 12 million women who had also experienced sexual assault and harassment had responded. The #MeToo movement continues to address sexual harassment, bullying, and other toxic conduct.
Similarly, the murder of George Floyd in 2020 spurred the largest protests in the United States since the Civil Rights era with estimates that between 15 million and 26 million people had participated. The protests forced Americans to face the racial inequality, police brutality and other racial and economic issues. The resulting “racial reckoning” is fighting systemic racism, with mixed results.
Taking a closer look at climate change
These movements that flare up after important moments show that there are a lot of people who care and when given a “safe enough” opportunity, will break their silence. But what about the ongoing issues that haven’t yet had such a moment? I would argue that in many ways, climate change is one of those movements that is overly silent and hasn’t had the kind of key moment that would spur climate action commensurate with unfolding climate impacts.
For example, the Fridays for Future marches initiated by Greta Thunberg, led to a series of climate strikes in September 2019. Reports vary from 6-7.6 million worldwide. So those efforts did not lead to the majority of people feeling like they can talk about climate change (although their protests probably did move the needle and create space for the Inflation Reduction Act in the US).
In fact, nonviolent protests that engage “a threshold of 3.5% of the population have never failed to bring about change.” For the United States, that number is about 12 million people… the same amount as the #metoo tweets, and less than the George Floyd protests. We need many more people to speak up for the climate movement to create change.
Media influence is a one of the things that gets in the way. It moulds our sense of where the majority opinion is. And yet polling data shows there is a disconnect between what people are feeling and how an issue is portrayed. The media has been especially problematic in this regard with climate change, showcasing guests with a false balance or bothsidesism.
Despite a lot of work at the global level, with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Conference of the Parties (COPs), collective action is not on track to achieve net zero by 2050, as called for in the Paris Agreement. So we don’t just have a disconnect in the media, it’s also in what we say we collectively want to achieve at the UN and policy action at the country level.
We’re not talking about climate change
In a recent Nature article examining the effects of conversations to catalyze collective climate action, they shared how little we are talking about climate change:
sixty-seven percent of Americans—approximately the same percent who are worried about climate change—say they “rarely” or “never” discuss climate change with friends and family.
So while most people are now concerned about climate change, they are still not talking about it. The majority view remains hidden.
That Nature study found that Americans’ hesitancy to discuss climate change reinforces their incorrect perception that others are not concerned about it, “resulting in a self-perpetuating spiral of silence and pervasive underestimation of others’ support for climate mitigation policies.”
Concern gap: our sense of others is way off
This disparity between actual and perceived worry in others can be seen in the following survey data from ecoAmerica, which shows that three times the number of people are very concerned about climate change (42%), while people think only 1/3 of other people (14%) are very concerned. These inaccurate perceptions of others' opinions is called pluralistic ignorance, and it contributes to the self-silencing among those concerned about climate change. If you add the very and somewhat concerned, it is 72% of the population in the study, nearly three quarters!
How can the felt sense help us speak & act?
“What is true is already so. Owning up to it doesn't make it worse. Not being open about it doesn't make it go away. And because it's true, it is what is there to be interacted with. Anything untrue isn't there to be lived. People can stand what is true, for they are already enduring it.”–Eugene Gendlin, page 162 of Focusing
We have seen that people stay silent for fear of isolation, and that their perception of what is true for the majority can be wrong. How can our felt sense and Focusing practice help us? If we tune in to know what is really true for us, we can gain clarity about our opinions. Furthermore, our felt senses can also be used to tap into the confidence and courage to share our truth. Our felt sense knowing can be so strong that we share even if we disagree with our group. Brené Brown, in her book Braving the Wilderness, calls this “true belonging and the courage to stand alone”.
For me personally, teaching Focusing and speaking about these issues in this blog is part of that journey.
For some of us, being the first person in our group to start talking about a different opinion can be too big a step. In that case, you might see if you feel you can go second and encourage others to join. As I wrote in a 2019 blog, Show and Tell: It’s time to stop hiding our support for climate action:
But going second matters too. It’s risky to lead. So, it’s equally important to have a person who supports the initiative of another as the first follower. That means supporting others when they speak up for climate action. Voice your agreement rather than staying silent. And of course, voice your concerns as well! Join the discussion rather than avoiding it, even if it’s hard.
As the First Follower video shows, three random people can quickly become a dance party thanks to the courage of those first few individuals who follow the initial lone dancer. If your felt sense tells you you can’t be first, maybe it’s time to find someone to follow.
Speaking up and taking climate action
If we’re to end the spiral of silence on climate change, then we need to speak up! I encourage you to check out the great video resources out there on how to talk climate:
TED talk from Dr. Katharine Hayhoe
Trash Puppets one that reminds us to pause and breathe, listen with compassion that acknowledges their feelings, and ask open ended questions.
another video that emphasizes the importance of listening.
It’s interesting that the skills recommended in these videos are all ones we learn in Focusing practice!
Next, as the saying goes “actions speak louder than words”, and so it is important to use our agency and take climate action, as this inspires collective agency. In fact, this recent TED talk by neuroscientist Kris De Meyer encourages us to combine the doing and talking, and share the steps we’ve taken in taking our own climate action, to tell stories that help motivate people to feel “if they can do it, so can I.” Note, this isn’t telling people what to do. Again a very Focusing way of being.
Third, we have to remember to rest and take care of ourselves. This can be done with nature, by spending time in the outdoors or accessing our nature memories, by using an archetype to take care of us, by using our Focusing practice to process our climate emotions in a listening exchange, as well as traditional ways of self care (getting enough sleep, eating whole-foods, spending quality time with friends and family, etc).
Finally, participate in climate protests, which in many ways involve all three above. Let’s get to 3.5% and make change happen!
New patterns to create our future
“A society of pattern-makers is coming.”–Eugene Gendlin, page 187 of Focusing
When we do not conform to norms, we can be hurt by society. So it is understandable that sharing “new patterns” is challenging work. But more and more “people find that they have feelings that are far more complex than accepted roles either demand or offer” (Gendlin, page 184, Focusing).
In his final chapter of Focusing, Eugene Gendlin also says “It is a new step in human development when people can not only get in touch with their feelings but then also move through steps of unfolding and change. We are moving beyond conformity patterns.” This is individual work, and yet it spills over into society once a moment brings a tipping point as we have seen.
And so while there are multiple perspectives in society and always will be, overtime society does shift the patterns accepted by the majority, making room for ones that are more inclusive of diversity while providing people and other beings with more dignity. These new patterns go beyond people, for example to include the rights of nature.
Our societies has had some difficult conversations. When will we be ready to have other ones? And what moment might spur those conversations? While there have been many local climate change tragedies and worldwide protests, my sense is that we have not yet had a climate moment to tip our conversations out into the open and into action that is sufficient to heed the warnings of scientists (who are therefore increasingly feeling hopeless and broken, while others avoid the truth to ”stave off despair”).
Further, I sense that once more of us really tune into our felt sense, and gain clarity of what we know, and also build the courage to share those opinions—especially when they are creating new patterns—things will be able to shift even more! And we should remember that courage means doing things despite the fear. This work isn’t easy, but by gradually building our confidence to speak up and fostering a supportive environment for open dialogue, we can contribute to breaking down barriers of silence and promote a culture of authenticity and understanding that can build a more sustainable future.
Now I’d love to hear from you. Please share in the comments something you have been silent about, and feel ready so share here. Maybe this will give you courage to share it elsewhere as well. We do this often in Thinking at the Edge… we notice where and when it feels safe to share our ideas. Please also feel free to share what you’re ready to do!