This week, we bring you an episode from Feet in 2 Worlds and its series Immigrants in a Divided Country, which explores the current political landscape from the perspective of immigrants. In this personal audio essay, writer and audio producer Boen Wang goes looking for answers. He always thought his mom—an immigrant from Mainland China —was brainwashed by the Chinese Communist Party. His mom, on the other hand, thinks he’s been brainwashed by the New York Times and CNN. To break the deadlock Boen interviews his mom about the evolution of her political beliefs—which are on the opposite end of the spectrum from his.
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Can Trump just order new names for Denali and the Gulf of Mexico?
Jan 30, 2025
President Donald Trump’s executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska’s Denali, the tallest peak in the country, has resulted in lots of discussion. While for some, such renaming might seem less important than the big problems the country faces, there is a formal process in the United States for renaming places, and that process is taken seriously.
Usually, so people don’t get confused, official, agreed-upon names are used by the government. In the U.S., place names are standardized by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, which is part of the U.S. Geological Survey, the agency in charge of making maps.
In his executive order, Trump asks the Board on Geographic Names “to honor the contributions of visionary and patriotic Americans” and change its policies and procedures to reflect that.
Usually, renaming a place starts locally. The people in the state or county propose a name change and gather support. The process in each state is different.
Lake Bde Maka Ska, formerly Lake Calhoun, is the largest lake in Minneapolis. YinYang/E+ via GettyHow to change a place name
Minnesota recently changed the name of a large lake in Minneapolis to Bde Maka Ska, which the Minneapolis Park Board described as “a Dakota name for the lake that has been passed down in oral history for many years.”
The board voted to change the name and took its request to the county commissioners. When the county agreed, the request was then sent to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, which made it official for Minnesota. Then, the state of Minnesota sent the request to the Board on Geographic Names, which made it official for the entire U.S.
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It’s a lot of paperwork for something so seemingly minor, but people get passionate about place names. It took 40 years to rename Denali from the name established in the late 19th century, Mount McKinley.
The state of Alaska requested the name change in 1975, but the Board on Geographic Names didn’t take action. Members of the Ohio congressional delegation – President William McKinley was from Ohio – objected over many years to requests to rename the mountain, and the board did not act on those requests.
The president appoints the secretary of the Interior Department. The secretary works with the heads of related agencies to appoint the Board on Geographic Names. Current committee policy states, “Input from State geographic names authorities, land management agencies, local governments, and Tribal Governments are actively pursued.”
In 2015, President Barack Obama named a new leader for the Department of the Interior, Sally Jewell. Just as Obama made a trip to Alaska in late August 2015, Jewell declared the name change official under a law that allows the secretary of the Interior to change a name if the board doesn’t act on the proposal in a “reasonable” amount of time.
“This name change recognizes the sacred status of Denali to many Alaska Natives,” Jewell said. “The name Denali has been official for use by the State of Alaska since 1975, but even more importantly, the mountain has been known as Denali for generations. With our own sense of reverence for this place, we are officially renaming the mountain Denali in recognition of the traditions of Alaska Natives and the strong support of the people of Alaska.”
You won’t find the Gulf of America on any map. Sean Gladwell/Moment via GettyIf someone objects to a name change, they could ask the courts to rule on whether the name change was made legally. Going back to Bde Maka Ska, some people objected to changing the name from Lake Calhoun, so they took the state natural resources agency to court. Eventually, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that the name change was done correctly.
Alaska’s two U.S. senators and prominent state figures have strongly objected to Trump’s renaming attempt.
How not to change a place name
Renaming the Gulf of Mexico is a different kind of case, however, from renaming a geographic place within U.S. borders.
The gulf is not within the territorial U.S. On the coast, the first 12 miles from shore are considered part of that country, but outside of that is international waters.
The Board on Geographic Names could change the name to Gulf of America on official U.S. maps, but there is no international board in charge of place names. Each country decides what to call places. And there is no official way for the U.S. to make other countries change the name.
It’s possible that the U.S. could formally ask other countries to change the name, or even impose sanctions against countries that don’t comply.
If the names were officially changed in the U.S., the government would use the new names in official documents, signage and maps. As for all the people and companies in the world that make maps, they usually use the official names. But there is nothing that would force them to, if they believed that a certain name is more widely recognized.
On Jan. 24, 2025, the U.S. Department of the Interior issued a statement on the name changes:
“In accordance with President Donald J. Trump’s recent executive order, the Department of the Interior is proud to announce the implementation of name restorations that honor the legacy of American greatness, with efforts already underway.
"As directed by the President, the Gulf of Mexico will now officially be known as the Gulf of America and North America’s highest peak will once again bear the name Mount McKinley….The U.S. Board on Geographic Names, under the purview of the Department of the Interior, is working expeditiously to update the official federal nomenclature in the Geographic Names Information System to reflect these changes, effective immediately for federal use.”
Can Trump just order new names for Denali and the Gulf of Mexico? was first published by The Conversation, and was republished with permission.
Innisfree McKinnon is an Associate Professor of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Stout.
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Getty Images / Andrii Yalanskyi
We Need to Rethink Polarization Before It Becomes a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
Jan 29, 2025
It’s time to rethink the notion that we Americans are too polarized to work together and get things done. And it’s time to get clear-eyed about what’s really holding us back and what it will take to help us move forward together.
A few years ago, I engaged cross-sections of Americans from all across the country in 16 in-depth focus groups about how they were feeling about their lives, the country, and our future. These conversations resulted in the report Civic Virus: Why Polarization is a Misdiagnosis.
We released the report at a time when political pundits, researchers, the news media, and others had created a constant drumbeat, saying that Americans are polarized. The initial reception was positive; I appeared on MSNBC’s Meet the Press and had op-eds slated to run in national publications. Then Russia invaded Ukraine and all the attention went to covering the war.
Now, just as Merriam-Webster declared “polarization” their 2024 word of the year, I’m noticing an increasing number of voices, such as pollster Kristin Soltis Anderson for The New York Times,claiming that we aren’t as polarized as we think. Or others, like this data scientist writing for The Daily Beast, stating that the prevailing narrative on polarization gets things wrong.
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I know our “politics” are polarized. Yet, I believe the drumbeat that Americans are polarized has increasingly become an excuse for not engaging with one another and, at times, even a smokescreen to justify actions by those who seek to win at any cost. We must get beyond these traps.
When I engaged Americans in our conversations, I discovered something more profound than polarization. The findings reflected years of larger, underlying societal shifts taking root in society. And they were consistent across the country from rural Kansas to urban New Orleans to suburban Connecticut. The report may be even more explanatory and insightful about what’s going on in the country today than when we originally published it in 2022. Rather than finding that people were polarized, we discovered three overarching points:
- People are separating and segregating themselves from one another due to unrelenting fear and anxiety about what’s happening around and to them.
- Many leaders and media are intentionally manufacturing and stoking divisions for their own self-interest, with social media helping create and amplify these divisions. This is producing a ceaseless surround sound that is engulfing people, subjecting them to an alternate reality that confuses, disorients, and destabilizes them.
- Seeing no way out, people are in an instinctive fight-or-flight response, many breaking up into smaller groups and camps to protect themselves and gain validation, while others retreat from engaging at all.
Notice the term “fight-or-flight” in that last bullet. That isn’t a phrase I chose to describe what people told me during our Civic Virus study; it’s one that Americans from across our conversations repeatedly used themselves.
It’s not that people don’t care about what’s happening in their communities and the country; they care deeply, intensely. As one Nebraska woman shared, “People do want to come together and help each other, but they don’t really know how anymore.” If we’re serious about moving forward today, we must recognize that the divisions in the country are intrinsically about social and psychological conditions—such as fear, anxiety, alienation, and a lack of empathy and belonging—rather than about political polarization. We’re facing a particular human dilemma.
As a result, so many people of good faith have thrown up their hands in frustration and retreated from public life. They’re fearful of raising hard issues, disagreeing with others, and being cut down for what they say. Others have decided that the way forward is to come out fighting and seek to win for their side at any cost.
So what’s the answer to this dilemma? I believe what we’re missing today in American society is a way in which people can come together, figure out what they can agree on amid our real differences, and take action. We must build together; talk alone is not enough. This very act of building generates a sense that we’re in something together, we have a shared humanity, and we each hold a sense of agency in moving forward. As we take shared action, we can demonstrate proof that progress is possible—because belief is based on proof—and that we have the capacity to step forward and get things done together.
This missing piece is what I have come to call the new civic path and I believe it must begin in our local communities, where so much of the significant change in American history has originated. In its absence, we will remain a splintered, divided nation.
How we move forward is not easy. But the choice is basic. Surrender to fight-or-flight. Or come together and get things moving again by taking action on issues that matter to people in their daily lives.
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Even in victory, Republicans should listen to their opponents
Jan 29, 2025
In the wake of Donald Trump’s election, many people have discussed Democrats’ mistakes—from being “out of touch” and insulting, to focusing too much on Trump, to Biden’s “arrogance” in running again. It’s good for political parties to ask tough questions about how their approach may be driving people away and how they can better serve people.
As Republicans continue to celebrate their victory, will they be brave enough to ask themselves similar questions?
No matter the election results, what hasn’t changed is we’re deeply divided—almost down the middle, in terms of voters. If Republicans fail to reflect on those questions, in a few years they risk finding themselves back where they were in 2020: out of power and mired in resentment. If that happens, will they blame “the establishment” and other external forces for their losses? Or will they consider how their rhetoric and approaches may have alienated Americans and led to setbacks?
Much of the recent toxicity centers around Trump. Many Americans see him as a uniquely irresponsible and dangerous figure—and that perception obviously won’t go away with his return to power. Republicans should think deeply about these concerns—and avoid the urge to denigrate and mock them.
To be clear, this isn’t to argue that one must have or agree with those concerns about Trump. It’s to argue for the importance of understanding and respecting American citizens’ concerns. That is just a good thing to do, regardless of one’s political beliefs or partisanship. When we fail to do those things, we’ll find that we deepen divisions and amplify contempt.
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For example, consider the election distrust fostered by Trump and other Republicans after Trump’s 2020 loss. Many embraced the narrative that the election was “stolen” by Democrats, despite a lack of substantial evidence. Trump’s victory in 2024 undermines those claims.
As Mark Antonio Wright sarcastically put it in National Review: “If Democrats stole it in 2020, why didn’t they steal it this time?” Regardless of your views of Trump or the 2020 election, hopefully you can see that Trump’s recent win highlights the illogical nature of the more dark and paranoid narratives about powerful anti-Trump forces working behind-the-scenes to rig our elections.
Pessimistic thinking happens across the political spectrum, and our emotional divides make such negativity more likely. Regardless of how they view this topic or objections that “Democrats have done it, too,” Republicans should be able to see why so many Americans were deeply concerned by such behaviors. Promoting a narrative where one’s opponents are stealing elections amplifies fears and can fuel violence; at a large enough scale, it can threaten a country’s stability. That’s why concerns that “democracy is being threatened” resonated for many Americans.
Of course, not all responses to such concerns are equally good or helpful. Some efforts to “save democracy” can easily be criticized as partisan and polarizing—like the attempt to remove Trump from the ballot. The partisan nature of some of those efforts can make it easy for Republicans to view all concerns about Trump’s actions as unreasonable—as either having political motivations or being overblown.
That is just how conflict works: our hostility will lead us to filter for and find evidence of why our opponents’ concerns shouldn’t matter — why they’re laughable and worthy of mockery. And in a huge country like ours, finding examples of behaviors that strike us as unreasonable and outlandish will always be easy.
But when political parties focus on mocking opponents’ concerns and fail to take Americans’ grievances seriously, there is a price to pay—just ask the Democrats who are soul searching after their recent losses.
If Republicans want to lower political toxicity, or even ensure long-term success, they must avoid gloating and indulging in “we won, so deal with it” attitudes. Instead, they should take this opportunity to acknowledge the valid concerns of those who view Trump’s behavior and rhetoric as dangerous. Understanding those views doesn’t require agreeing with them—it simply requires empathy and respect.
They should also examine their views about Democrats as a group to determine if they are overly pessimistic. For example, claiming that Democratic stances on immigration are motivated by a desire to win elections is as reductive and insulting as the claim that Republican stances on immigration are driven by racism. All of us must resist the temptation to reach for worst-case assumptions and to “mind-read” our opponents’ hidden intentions: these tendencies only deepen mistrust and hostility.
Winning an election will never guarantee permanent victory—and speaking as if it can will only amplify tensions. Trying to understand and speak to our opponents’ concerns is not weakness; it is how we build a healthier, stronger country and avoid worst-case outcomes. It also happens to be how we can better advocate for our goals.
Pearce Godwin is politically conservative and the founder of the Listen First Project. In a piece advising Republicans to work to reduce toxicity for their own sake, he writes: “As we vigorously contest visions, values, and policies, never surrendering our convictions, we can uphold a basic respect for the humanity of our opponents and all fellow Americans.”
If more leaders and activists—Democrats and Republicans—can rise to that challenge, we may find a way to bridge the toxic divides that threaten our nation. If we can’t, we risk remaining trapped in a dangerous cycle of hostility and contempt. The choice is ours to make.
Zachary Elwood works with Builders, a nonpartisan organization aimed at overcoming toxic polarization. He’s the author of “Defusing American Anger.”Keep ReadingShow less
Honor The Past Without Shame: Anniversaries Pass, Trauma Remains
Jan 29, 2025
Even as the wildfires of California continue, having affected an estimated 200,000 residents and resulted in 27 deaths, the memory of the Northridge Earthquake of January 1994 and the mass devastation and destruction afterward still linger three decades later.
The fires raged recently on the anniversary of the earthquake in the San Fernando Valley in California, when 33 people died and 7,000 were injured with a damage cost estimated up to $40 billion. The loss of life, livelihood, and long-term lingering trauma experienced has been widely recognized by mental health professionals and the lay community as well.
As a community, many not only understood the physical loss but understood that many would be impacted throughout their lifetime. Many became disabled by the earthquake, some temporarily, while others indefinitely.
As a neighborhood, we understood, grieved, and we were compassionate and kind, because we saw this mass disaster with our own eyes, and could hear the devastation as it happened. It has been widely recognized by researchers as a factor in collective trauma.
For the estimated 16 million survivors of domestic/intimate partner violence and their children each year, their earthquakes happen in the shadows—creating physical and psychological trauma—or chronic PTSD. While this is well-documented and recognized, culturally, the effect of the trauma is often minimized or dismissed.
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Recent research shows that few survivors receive positive support as they are often expected to “move forward,” “work through it,” or simply “get over it.” Some survivors express they also have experiences of loss of life and cope with long-term psychological trauma and disabilities.
Communities do not always welcome them with open arms, compassion, empathy, or understanding, because of societal perceptions and individual beliefs of deservingness as documented by extensive research. The immediate and long-term effects of stigmatization set the foundation for developing Complex PTSD and means people will experience significantly more emotional dysregulation issues.
These are negative perceptions, further reinforcing an already internalized sense of devaluation, leading to discriminative responses when seeking assistance. Negative labeling and stereotypes result in victims of domestic/intimate partner violence reporting experiencing discriminatory practices when seeking housing. They are perceived as unstable, experiencing evictions simply due to their victimhood.
This is in stark contrast to the treatment of victims of mass natural disasters, like earthquakes and wildfires.
Survivors of domestic violence report that they often reveal in detail to the larger community the abuse and violence they experienced. They must also have to prove it, to be believed, or risk being discounted. If believed, they can be shuffled throughout a multitude of short-term interventions and treatments with the expectation of overcoming their trauma.
They are expected to “complete treatment,” “graduate from group therapy,” and be recognized by others by becoming a “thriver.”
Unfortunately, as a culture, unlike earthquake survivors, survivors of domestic/intimate partner violence are somehow not afforded the same grace of empathy, compassion, and acknowledgment, of long-lasting trauma.
Many survivors report they are shamed for remembering, judged for their inability to move forward, and shamed for their acquired disabilities. Their trauma is long-standing, their wounds and loss internalized. Their grief is silenced, and their loss is insurmountable.
A study revealed in detail that victims' of domestic/intimate partners experience shame within the context of their abusive relationship, often anticipating how others will respond to their victimization. This significantly amplifies their internalized shame.
This shame—often tethered to social shame—can lead to detrimental effects for the victim by adversely impacting their need to reach out and access much-needed supportive services. The social shaming mimics and often parallels the dynamics of power and control their abuser exerted over them.
Yet with a disaster like the 1994 earthquake, the difference of how people are judged by their reactions is clear: a mass natural disaster is out of their control. Domestic/violence is seen as the outcome of an individual's inability or unwillingness to see the red flags, that they made a choice and they were in control. They stayed and it happened.
But, the effects on the mind and the body of a survivor of intimate partner violence are as traumatic as an earthquake. Until this is recognized within our culture, it will take so much longer to heal.
Elizabeth Vera is a Domestic Violence Survivor, founder and CEO of Vera Strategies Training and Consulting, national speaker with 30 years of advocacy and a member of The OpEd Project Public Voices Fellowship on Domestic Violence and Economic Security.
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