Members of both political parties from throughout Central Illinois are invited to participate in a new Peoria-based chapter of a national bipartisan organization that aims to ease growing tensions between Republicans and Democrats.
Bill Poorman and David Pittman are co-organizers of the West Central Illinois Braver Angels, set to launch formally next week with a purpose of giving people tools for “disagreeing better.”
“The ultimate motivation is just seeing all the polarization in our politics, seeing all this division and rancor,” said Poorman, who will act as the group’s moderator. “There is another way, right? We can find ways to work across differences and to get along, so to speak.”
The volunteer group intends to use skill-building workshops and in-person discussion groups as a pathway for getting people from all across the ideological spectrum to talk through their opposing viewpoints.
Pittman said the push to strengthen communication and bridge the gap is a long-term process.
“This is an effort to look beyond the headlines, beyond the month-to-month process, and look at some of the deeper reasons and solutions for how we can get to talk to each other again,” he said. “It’s breaking through that Grand Canyon of divide.”
The inaugural public meeting of the West Central Illinois Braver Angels is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. on Jan. 28 at Peoria Public Library’s Lakeview Branch at 1137 W. Lake Ave.
Formed in Ohio
The national Braver Angels organization formed in Ohio about 10 years ago; the other closest chapter is the East Central Illinois group based in Champaign. Prior to a 2020 name change, the organization was known as “Better Angels,” derived from Abraham Lincoln’s plea in his first inaugural address for “the better angels of our nature” to foster national unity.
Pittman said the Peoria group’s regional territory will extend south from Interstate 80 and east from the Mississippi River, covering most of the 16th and 17th Congressional Districts. He suggested interested residents in the Bloomington-Normal area can be active in both Central Illinois chapters.
“Braver Angels has a structure where the meetings are mandated face-to-face,” said Pittman. “They try to make it as depolarized as possible to start with by having an equal number of self-identified ‘red’ and ‘blue’ people in the room.”
Poorman said they’re courting participation from both rural and urban areas, but one major challenge is achieving that ideological balance in the number of participants.
“I think it is a struggle that the organization has nationally, to attract ‘reds’ who are interested in having this conversation. We have that sense; we hope we’re wrong,” said Poorman. “We hope that we’ll get an outpouring of people from ‘quote, unquote’ both sides to be part of this. It’s a tricky thing to strike that balance, but we’re confident we’ll get there.”
Poorman said through his involvement with the Braver Angels national organization, he believes there’s a large “exhausted majority” that has grown tired of increasingly heated rhetoric.
“Yes, you do have these extremes, you have these forces of chaos that are committed to dividing us,” he said. “But in that middle, I firmly believe there is that ‘exhausted majority’ that look around and say, ‘What is going on?’ and are open and ready to receive the message that Braver Angels has.”
After the Jan. 28 meeting, Pittman said there will have a follow-up meeting in February as the organization starts to gauge how ambitious the group will be.
“The real hope I have for Braver Angels is that we provide structural communication tools so that you can talk to anybody in your family or anybody in your workplace about these issues without seeing escalation,” he said.
“For me, that’s the heart and soul of Braver Angels. It’s not a ‘get out in the street’ protest group; it’s not trying to change the minds of anybody. It’s trying to give everybody a tool to talk to each other.”
