Points of View Are Not Facts; We Need Both and We Need to Understand the Difference

Apparently during a meeting at the White House about funding for the wall last Wednesday, the following interchange took place:

Democrat and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen: “I reject your facts”

Nielsen to Pelosi: “These aren’t my facts.  These are the facts.”

If people are unwilling to acknowledge, let alone accept given facts, then how can we ever have a discussion, let alone resolve differences or solve important issues?

Unless we wish to discuss apples and oranges as if they were the same thing, we must be willing to accept facts – things that provably exist.  That is not to say that we must have the same opinions of those facts, but we must all begin discussions of issues with an acceptance of those things that simply are.  Then we can express differing opinions about those facts and their significance to the particular issue that we are discussing.  It is during that presentation of differing views that we have the opportunity to learn from those who seem to disagree with us.  It is that sort of discussion that allows differing sides to move forward to a compromise of or solution to their disagreement, a solution that might change for the better facts that exist in the future.

But, if we are unwilling to accept given and provable facts, if, instead of arguing about their significance, we choose to dispute the indisputable, we are unlikely to move forward.  If we dispute pure facts themselves, then the dispute is essentially some version of "I am right and you are wrong" and each side simply tries to convert the other side to their “facts”; when the conversion does not occur, the conversation ends.  There is no solution to such a dispute.

However, if we begin by accepting the provable and certain facts, then we can evaluate those facts from differing viewpoints and perspectives.  We can accept the relevant facts on an issue and also the fact that differing experiences often lead people to interpret facts differently.  That is the beginning of a rational discussion and hopefully a rational resolution to a problem. 

Here’s a quick example.  Let’s say I run a stop sign, and there is no dispute about the location of the stop sign or a nearby tree, that I ran through the stop, and (we are assuming I’m truthful here) that I assert I did not see the sign.  Those are facts.  What we might dispute is whether, given the location of the sign and the tree, I should have seen it, or, whether the city should have placed the stop sign in a more visible location.  Those are interpretations of the basic indisputable fact of the sign’s location.  But if we spend our time disputing where the stop sign was located or if there really was a tree located near it, etc., then we will never get to a resolution of issues such as whether I should pay for damage I caused by running the sign or whether the city should move the sign or trim the tree that may have blocked it.

So, when we discuss immigration, there are certain facts that, while we might not like them, are indisputable.  Things like the numbers of illegals in this country; the numbers crossing our border both legally and illegally, the numbers in custody; the numbers of children; that some are criminals; that some families are separated at the border; that border agents have rescued aliens and that some aliens have died in our custody; that sanctuary cities protect aliens from ICE; that there are a variety of reasons why migrants seek to enter America, both legally and illegally.  These and many other facts can be specifically supported with statistics and other evidence.  Similarly, the laws and their requirements can easily be read.  These are all facts.  If we are going to actually have a productive dialog about immigration, then we must accept the facts that exist – all the facts, whether they further our argument or not -  and discuss their significance to our country in light of varying views and interpretations of those facts.  We can try to understand those views that differ from ours and try to persuade those who hold them to perhaps see some of the facts from our perspective instead. 

But, if we are going to reject those actual facts that don’t support our position, if we are going to turn facts we don’t like into something refutable that belong to the other side of our issue, then any attempts at discussion must go nowhere.  Facts, indisputable evidence, is not something about which we can rationally disagree.  And so statements such as that made by Speaker Pelosi are simply a way of blocking any rational discussion of the immigration issue. 

We can have both facts and points of view on an issue.  Indeed, that is what our democracy relies upon – an acceptance and encouragement of diverse voices on an issue as we move forward to correct problems related to provable facts.  But, we can’t make up the facts.  We can’t choose which facts to accept.  The facts simply are.  It is the picking and choosing of facts to make up a narrative pleasing to one side or another and then an assertion that only that narrative is correct, that creates the impossible animosity that grips our country today.

It is easy to assert that our views are facts.  But, simply, they are not.  And, until people can accept that fact, until they can distinguish the two, there is little hope for resolution to issues and much likelihood of continuing hostility toward, instead of tolerance of, those holding differing views.