SU Professor: rhetoric and polarization play into violence

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) — Right wing political commentator Charlie Kirk was killed at an event on a college campus in Utah. The assassination caused lawmakers across the political spectrum to condemn politically motivated violence.

This week on Empire State Weekly, Grant Reheer, a political science professor at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School, explained that political violence has increased since 2016. He explained that factors like political polarization, combined with other circumstances, are likely the causes for the violence.

“We’ve seen that polarization gets even deeper and so that has increased the heat, the level of emotion, the intensity of all the political rhetoric, and a lot of the antagonisms,” Reheer said. “And then you add to that the social media environment, once these events start happening and other people see them, they may be more inclined to partake in them.”

Also this week, Melinda Person, President of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), explained how schools are reacting to the recently required, statewide bell-to-bell school cellphone ban. She explained that before the ban, teachers lost significant instruction time keeping students engaged. She hopes the ban helps give students “their childhood back.”

“When kids are paying attention to their phone or the phone is buzzing in their pocket, it can be a real distraction,” Person said. “And so by putting it away in a pouch or a locker, you create this space for connection, for learning, that wasn’t there before. Now we can create a little space to bring that back to our schools.”

To see more from these interviews, here is a list of where and when you can watch Empire State Weekly in your area of New York: