In my column last month, I chose to discuss a subject, Trump’s appointment of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Health and Human Services secretary, that I knew would be controversial.

As I had expected, the piece was met with a flurry of responses, many of which criticized the stance I took.

When reading these responses, a part of me was frustrated. I wondered if I had failed to make my position clear or had simply not been persuasive in doing so. Yet at the same time, I was also heartened to see people discussing a topic — public health — that we can all agree is important.

We are at a moment in our country’s history when this sort of discourse is desperately needed. Because, as far as I’m concerned, the worst possible effect that the next few years could have on our public discourse is not that we have more disagreements, but that we stop disagreeing altogether.

As distrust of public institutions has grown, it seems an increasing number of Americans have become apathetic, wanting to disengage in a political system that they believe no longer represents them. This is especially the case among Americans my age, many of whom are choosing to disconnect from politics because of how futile it all seems to them.

As political apathy begins to set in, it can be easy for us to substitute our personal beliefs for a set of values prescribed to us by a particular dogma or ideology, as doing so spares us from having to truly engage on important issues. Subscribing to a particular ideology can also be appealing because it means that we do not have to face the messy reality that our own values do not always align perfectly with a particular group or party. While it can be tempting to avoid this truth, it is not the best way to go about politics.

Right now, the topic of political discourse seems pretty timely, considering that Merriam Webster’s recently announced Word of the Year for 2024 happened to be “polarization.”

The dictionary describes polarization as “a state in which the opinions, beliefs, or interests of a group or society no longer range along a continuum but become concentrated at opposing extremes.”

Today, dogmatic thinking is directly leading to polarization. It pushes our beliefs further away from a healthy middle — where dialogue can still be had — to opposite poles where it becomes much harder to debate those positions with those with whom we disagree.

New York Times columnist Carlos Lozada touches on this idea in a recent column, in which he implores readers not to “agree wholeheartedly” with the things he writes, but to instead engage with them critically.

In the piece, Lozada notes that ironically, one factor leading to division among America’s different political groups is “the push for uniformity” within those groups. When one side “embraces lock-step dogmatism regarding, say, gender politics or violent crime,” Lozada explains, “it’s too tempting for opponents to take refuge in the precise opposite view. That’s how our views get clustered.”

I think this phenomenon can be seen just as much in debates about public health: While many on the left disavow RFK Jr., there are also some who agree with elements of his public health platform. Yet because Kennedy is associated with Donald Trump, it is hard for anyone to show support for his plan to tackle chronic disease without appearing to support some of his more extreme stances.

It’s this sort of all-or-nothing thinking that threatens our politics, as it prevents well-intentioned people from disagreeing about important topics with any nuance. When all discussions about specific issues devolve into debates about the merits of the two parties, it becomes very hard to make any progress.

The only way to defeat “the push for uniformity” within political groups that Lozada describes, I believe, is to be willing to express controversial beliefs, even when it is difficult. If a few people have the courage to say what they believe, it becomes much easier for others to do the same. That is how the veil of dogma is lifted, and eventually, how Americans become more interested in taking part in the political process.

The next four years are going to be a difficult period in public discourse, regardless of where you fall politically. Those who are unhappy with the direction the country is going in may want to give up on the entire process, and those who approve of the country’s direction may feel like they can ignore the concerns of the other side.

In times like these, it can be much easier to stay quiet than to say what we believe. But at the end of the day, as Robert Frost said, the only way out is through.

So, while I might not agree with the people who criticized my last column, I thank all of them for being willing to debate it, as they are helping move the needle of public discourse in the right direction. It’s going to take a lot to move away from the two poles and closer to the healthy middle, but I urge you to keep talking; that’s how we start the process.

Olin Rose-Bardawil of Florence is a student at the Williston Northampton School and the editor in chief of the school’s newspaper, The Willistonian.