Dear reader,
“For every complex problem, there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” That’s H.L. Mencken for you. This prescient observation from my favourite American journalist and satirist, made in the 1920s, rings true more powerfully today than ever before.
Today, as people across the world deal with a super-complex world and its multi-layered problems, we paradoxically seem to be retreating into the comfort of what psychologists call “binary thinking”. That is, reducing multifaceted issues into simple “us versus them” narratives, particularly in matters of politics, religion, and social discourse.
The recent American election was a great example. If you’ve been watching it keenly, you’ll know that it was a tad difficult to look at the election from a purely binary point of view. It was not as if the Trump camp was pure evil, and the Harris camp was all about a liberal, free world. No, it does not work like that. A big chunk of the American working class, Latinos, blacks, Hispanics, women, teachers, and others voted Trump. This clearly tells us about the dangers of binary thinking.
But the world loves polarisation. And this isn’t merely a matter of perception. Take America as an example. A recent study by the Pew Research Center (Political Typology Study 2024), shows that the ideological distance between America’s two major political parties has reached its widest point in four decades. More tellingly, the percentage of Americans who see political issues in stark “right or wrong” terms rather than acknowledging areas of compromise has increased from 39 per cent in 2004 to 65 per cent in 2023.
The erosion of nuanced thinking shows that there has been a big shift in how we process and respond to information. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s research shows social media algorithms, designed to maximise engagement, systematically favour content that triggers strong emotional responses—anger, outrage or absolute certainty—over more measured, nuanced perspectives. His analysis of Twitter (now mysteriously called X) discussions shows that posts expressing “moral certainty” and absolute positions receive nearly 70 per cent more engagement than those acknowledging complexity or multiple viewpoints.
This trend toward binary thinking has deep psychological roots. Cognitive scientist Daniel Kahneman, in Thinking, Fast and Slow, explains how our brains naturally gravitate toward simple, clear-cut categorisations as a means of managing cognitive load. This tendency helped our ancestors in situations that required quick, decisive action, but it becomes problematic when applied to complex modern challenges like climate change, economic inequality, or religious coexistence. The consequences of this shift are far-reaching. We can see that the loss of nuanced discourse has affected everything from university campuses to international diplomacy.
The role of technology in this shift is important. Social media platforms, with their like/dislike buttons and algorithmic amplification of extreme positions, have created what technology ethicist Sherry Turkle calls echo chambers of certainty. Her research shows that exposure to opposing viewpoints on social media often reinforces rather than challenges existing beliefs, as users tend to interpret contradictory information as attacks rather than opportunities for learning.
Perhaps nowhere is this binary thinking more evident than in our approach to religious and cultural differences. There have been many studies that show that people now view religious differences primarily through an “absolutely right vs. absolutely wrong” lens. This hardening of positions correlates with the rise in religious conflicts and decreased interfaith dialogue globally.
Collapse of nuanced discourse is particularly evident in how the world perceives and discusses Muslim communities, especially in countries like ours where centuries of complex historical, social, and legal frameworks have been increasingly reduced to simplistic narratives. One such example, perhaps the most recent one I can cite, is the multifaceted nature of institutions like the Waqf Board—which manages Islamic religious and charitable endowments.
The current socio-political controversy and the social media and mass media debates around the latest edition of amendments to the country’s Waqf laws illustrate how binary thinking can oversimplify complex historical arrangements. What began as a sophisticated system of community welfare and religious endowment management, developed over centuries of cultural evolution, is now often reduced to polarising headlines and trivial debates about religious autonomy versus state control.
Clearly, that’s not the case. We know how media coverage of issues related to Muslims or Islam has shifted dramatically over the past decade in India. These days most mainstream media stories about Muslim institutions and practices frame issues in binary terms of “integration versus separation” or “modern versus traditional” unlike in the past. Contemporary debates about Muslim personal law, religious institutions, and cultural practices in India often suffer from what some sociologists call a “binary paralysis”.
This is a very reductionist approach, and it obscures the rich complexity of institutions like the Waqf Board, which has historically served not just a religious but also crucial social and economic functions in communities across religious lines. History has many examples. Take Lucknow, for instance. The city through time has showed us how Muslim institutions can seamlessly integrate with broader society, creating spaces where multiple communities can coexist and thrive. The city’s Waqf properties often supported not just mosques but also public kitchens, educational institutions, and healthcare facilities that served people across religious boundaries. Today, such historical examples of nuanced coexistence are often overlooked in favour of simplified narratives that focus on divisions.
This is why at Frontline we decided to dedicate this issue to discussing at length the nuances of the debate over the latest Waqf amendments. Our issue features essays by scholars such as Shaikh Mujibur Rehman, Faizan Mustafa, P.S. Munawar Hussain and an interview with Syed Naseer Hussain, MP and member of the JPC.
Read the essays and tell what you think because, looking ahead, the implications of society’s drift towards binary thinking are concerning. There is an urgent need to redesign our media spaces, especially social media, to reward thoughtful engagement over-reactive quick comments, to reform educational systems to promote critical thinking and complexity, and perhaps most importantly, to cultivate the personal courage to embrace uncertainty and ambiguity in our own thinking. As F. Scott Fitzgerald once put it, the test of first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
Wishing you that ability and a great week ahead,
For Frontline,
Jinoy Jose P.
We hope you’ve been enjoying our newsletters featuring a selection of articles that we believe will be of interest to a cross-section of our readers. Tell us if you like what you read. And also, what you don’t like! Mail us at frontline@thehindu.co.in
