The Dignity Index hopes to change how we talk to each other

JOPLIN, Mo. (KOAM) - Election season can cause rising tensions not only on the political stage, but often in your own home. But Northeastern Oklahoma A&M welcomed a guest lecturer who hopes to ease some of those tensions by changing how we talk to each other.

Timothy Shriver is the Chairman of Special Olympics International and has worked with the organization for decades. He says his work with the athletes led him to reflect how we treat each other and inspired him to co-create the Dignity Index .

"People with intellectual and developmental disabilities are treated with so much separation and humiliation, and yet they often bridge," says Shriver. "So I thought, okay, you can show me how to do it. Maybe we can find a way to bring their gifts to our politics and our culture and our families."

The Dignity Index is a tool designed to help ease divisions and solve problems by analyzing how we speak to each other. The index scores phrases on an eight point scale from contempt to dignity.

For example. level one has the most contempt, escalating violent words to violent actions.

Level eight, with the most dignity, is a refusal to hate anyone and offer dignity to everyone because you can see yourself in every human.

An example of level eight speech provided by the Dignity Index is, "Each one of us is born with inherent worth, so we treat everyone with dignity--no matter what."

"It's a very simple way of helping people try to use a little more dignity and a little less anger, and hatred and contempt when they're disagreeing with people on the other side of any issue, including in your family or in your community, but also in your politics," says Shriver.

For attendees like NEO student Ethan More, Shriver's talk inspired him to look deeper at his own word choice.

"I think I'll be more conscious about whenever I dip into the negative or the other side of maybe I shouldn't say that, or maybe I'm not giving them the value that they deserve," says More.

And with election season upon us and politically charged conversations to come, Shriver says a tool like this has never been more useful.

"The culture wars have brought a lot of division to our families, to our workplaces. We're starting, I believe, as Americans, to look for a change," says Shriver. "Write of email to your candidate's team and say, try to raise your scores on these things. We want more dignity and less contempt. When we people demand change from our political leaders that's when we'll get it."

He says no matter your politics or background, everyone can take steps to speak with a little more dignity today than they did yesterday.

If you are wanting to reflect on how much contempt or dignity is in speech, the Dignity Index has a daily challenge where you score language from leaders and others in popular culture. The source of the quote is not revealed until after a score is given to remove biases towards a certain person when initially scoring.

COPYRIGHT 2024 BY KOAM NEWS NOW. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.