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The Nonprofit Fighting America's Division With Adam Mizel · find your cause

• Joseph Smalzer: I would be really scared if 350 million Americans all agreed on almost everything. That would be a really scary place, I actually believe, right? So we get better ideas, better answers, better everything through constructive disagreement and dialogue, right? All righty, so thanks everyone for tuning into this episode of Find Your Cause. Today we are with a very special guest, Adam Maizel, who's the co-founder and CEO of Us United. Adam, thank you so much for your time today. Really appreciate you having me and look forward to diving in together. All righty, so per usual, we like to start with the mission of the organizations that we're interviewing. So what is the mission of Us United? Us United is a movement to build unity in America by giving all of us the tools we need to reunite our country. All right. We're going to get into that, but before we do, why you? Why is this something that you've taken up the charge of? Why me? I can tell you how I got here, right? So at the end of this story, so about five years ago, I was yelling at the television after George Floyd was killed. in the middle of COVID, if you can all remember May of 2000 and watching the violence and the protests and saying, this is not the country that I think we are. It's not the country that I love. We are far from perfect. But what I was watching on television, which felt like just this disintegration of society and communication and respect and trust, I'm like, we're not this, we're better than this, but there's a lot here that's led to this point. I'm like, but if we don't address this, and obviously all of the vitriol and issues in politics, it was all out there and it just culminated. And I sat down, I'm screaming at the television and my wife who's smarter than me was sitting next to me. said, Adam. You've been screaming at the television for 30 years about the Yankees and they never hear you. Now you're screaming about this. You think anyone can hear you. If you feel this way, what are you going to do? And literally I had this epiphany moment and I'm like, I stood up and like, you're right. I'm not going back to work in the traditional way. I've been in the private equity world. I run companies. like, I can't just write a check and make this go away in terms of my responsibility. I'm like, if some people with my background and, capabilities and relationships don't give the most valuable resource we have, our time, things won't change. And I said, I'm giving my time. said, I'm an entrepreneur, I figured stuff out, I don't know what that means, I'm going on a journey and I'm gonna figure it out. And that's led me on a hell of a journey to here. You mentioned something in that responsibility. Why do you think it's a responsibility? What in you? built you to the point where you kind of took, like felt like you needed to take ownership and responsibility in this area. ⁓ and I think my background, I most of my life in businesses, as I said, in private equity and then running public digital media, entertainment companies, starting companies. Whenever as an investor, you back people, you back management teams to build a business and to make something happen. And I looked at what was happening on the screen in front of me and I looked around the country and said, some set of people, not one person or one group alone, but if some set of people don't ⁓ address this divisive culture, this fighting, this anger, then we can see where we're going in the ditch we're in where it was only gonna get deeper. So I said, I'm gonna think about this like a business. What's the business that I would start if what I wanted to do was change culture in America and build unity at least to be as valued as division, right? So what's the business? I'm gonna build it. That's what I do. I build businesses. So I think that was me saying now it's to build a business to make the country a better place versus to build a business to make X dollars of return, but the principles are the same. One of the things that I've been battling with over the past couple of years has been looking at how things have been going and just saying that this is normal, not normal, but this is a repeating historical thing. There's always going to be disagreement. There's always going to be a political spectrum and people are going to fall on one side or the other. And there's just going to be hard, sometimes communicating with both sides. And then there's another part of me that's saying, this seems a lot different than what I would imagine historically has happened. It feels different, but again, I don't have as much historical context. Is this normal, just a normal season that we're experiencing of just division in the country or is this even more severe than maybe previous seasons of something similar? I think it is both normal and more severe. I think it's both because you're a thousand percent right throughout our history and throughout any country's history. is division, there's disagreement, there's fighting. That is normal. In fact, that's good. I would be really scared if 350 million Americans all agreed on almost everything. That would be a really scary place, I actually believe, right? So we get better ideas, better answers, better everything through constructive disagreement and dialogue, right? But what's happening now is not that. And that's what's not normal, right? And I do think part of what, we're in a different environment. technology has a huge change that it used to even 20 years ago, if you had an opinion or an idea, you could shoot your mouth off at the bar. You could go scream it or other and 50 people or a hundred people heard what you had to say and maybe get on TV. But like there was a limit to the scalability of whatever it is. Now we have platforms with unlimited scalability of sending out a message to millions to hundreds of millions to billions of people. And We have less editorial oversight. We have less ability to discern fact from fiction. And that's now, by the way, and that's just social media and the expansion media as we know it today. Now it's, I want to add the next layer that's happening. We have AI, right? And AI is a whole new platform for the manipulation of information if people want to do that, right? You can read a lot of articles now of different organizations from countries and governments down to other organizations creating websites, creating publishing materials in ways that they know the large language models will read them and then report them so that the answer when you search on what is going on in the war in Iran, you're going to get the opinions that people want you to hear because they've been structured in a way that the model presents it to you, right? Or you go on now and you're like, hey, how do I've just read this article yesterday in the New York Times and it terrified me and it should terrify every single human being with biologists and biological scientists who have been hired at times by the AI companies but also on their own to test what queries you can make in these large language models and get information. And they basically have concluded you can go into any of them and they will tell you how to create some of the most deadly chemical weapons, biological weapons known to mankind, how to most mass effectively distribute them to kill the most amount of people and do it in a way without getting detected. They're like, this is terrifying. This information has never been out there in that way and that simple a way to access, right? That's just that. Add to those things that you'd same thing. And if you said, how do I divide America? Here's exactly the steps to do. These are all things that didn't exist. And so what you felt was normal political or social or economic discourse at one point in history was limited by how you could communicate that. And there was validation of ideas and facts and points. That's gone. And so why it feels worse is we're in a world in which it can potentially then as a result be magnified at a level and with limited information validation or verification that never existed before. ⁓ Now, those are also tools for good. If you took it what us United is trying to do, we can also use those same tools to bring people together. But that requires a culture change because human nature is, I like watching the fighting or someone makes this outrageous claim. That's more interesting than Adam going on and saying, Hey, let's hold hands and get along. And I'm not saying that by the way, but I'm using an example, right? Like you have to basically, you're always marketing your message to people in a way that can engage them. And that's good. And that's bad. But I think that's part of why it is both normal and not normal. that makes sense. Yeah. In terms of what you mentioned about the example of AI companies hiring folks to kind of define the narrative of whatever narrative they want to tell. How do you as a just normal citizen or human combat that? Because I feel like the simple logical quick answer would be just get off of social media so you're not influenced or the narrative is ingrained in you through the algorithms of things that you're exposed to. But I feel like that's an unrealistic action. could not be. But the alternative is doing your own research. But hopefully the research you're doing is through outlets that tell the true story. Obviously experienced in firsthand or whatever you're trying to learn is the best option, but for things you can experience, like how do you combat that? You have these AI companies that are forcing a narrative. You don't want to get off social media, but at the same time, you want to be able to know truth. Sure. And it's very hard. And I want to back up. I don't think the AI companies are forcing a narrative. think that these, but these large language models, they are basically sucking in all of the information that are produced across. people across humanity and that is published and that they can access to. So the example I was giving, I actually did read this specific example, the Israeli government had created a dozen or 20 different websites with scientifically identifying the language that the models would most likely read and understand and made multiple situations of similar language and reporting of information so that the models would read that and view it as a more valid source and report that as part of how they describe to you an answer to a query. Right? Again, and that's not necessarily bad. I'm not saying, but I'm just saying you have to, that's, there's so many more tools out there to gather information, manipulate information and spread information, right? Which gets to the ways to try to, the bad guys seem to always be ahead of the good guys in using things. It just feels that way. But to your question, I think a couple things, right? One is, yes, it is incumbent upon all of us to think about the sources of which we are getting information from. and their credibility, right? And the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Post or the LA Times or the Dallas News or whatever, there's an element of you reading any of those. They're going to have different views on some of the same issues, but they have journalistic standards. They have liability for what they print and publish. And because if they knowingly publish false information, they could be sued and they're going to lose, right? There's a, so that's, those are sources and there's many more that at least you understand there's a, there's more factual basis in what you're reading than my Reddit post or my sub stack posts that I can say whatever I want. And basically there's, have no liability for publishing my opinion and sub stack Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok, all of them have no, liability for what's there. They're they've section two 38 or three 38, the telecommunications act. shields these platforms as from being considered publishers versus effectively bulletin boards. So you have to understand if you're reading information. So if if Metta or YouTube or TikTok or any anything on Substack or Reddit, they have no responsibility for what's on there, no liability for that, right? Because they're just effectively legally thought of as a bulletin board. So think of it that way. If you go look at people pasting all kinds of different stuff on a bulletin board. You don't look and say, must be true. It's on the bulletin board. Yeah, I don't know. It's on the bulletin board. Right. But that's the way you should think about what you read on social media. It doesn't mean you shouldn't read it. It doesn't mean you shouldn't listen to it, but it does mean you understand the limitations and you might need to do more research if there's something there that you say resonates to see if that's really true. Yeah, I think this is something that is not common knowledge to the average human, including myself is. explaining what that liability is that these publishers have to abide by. Because I think there's so much of a lack of trust of people in media now, big news outlets, big publishers. And I think just this knowledge alone should at least ease some of that concern and lack of trust because there's liability. So can you just give us the one on one of what that is since you come from the industry? Yeah. If you are a media and news organization that is putting out newspapers, magazines, news stories, publishing news, broadcasting news, you are considered as a broadcaster. You have the liability and responsibility and liability for what you say. And underneath that, you have an obligation to be presenting what you have researched and believed to be truthful and honest. You can give opinion and you're clarifying that you are giving opinion and that's fine. If you watch Fox News or you watch CNN, are able, those news anchors are giving opinions and they're allowed to do that. And you know you're getting an opinion. They're not telling you the fact, but when they report fact, they gotta be right. Just Fox lost a lot of money when Dominion Resources proved they slandered them after the 2020 election. That's because Fox knowingly printed information that was not factually correct. That's what the jury thought. Fox doesn't want to do that or CNN, right? I want to do that both from a financial and a reputational because they're liable and responsible. Other side of the coin. Every social media platform out there is legally considered, as I said, the bright metaphor is a bulletin board. You anyone can post information. They're not responsible for what's posted because they don't know whether what Joseph or Adam said is true. They're just saying, hey, you have an account. You can post your information, read or figure out what you think of it. Right. But to your point, most people don't. Think of it that way. If I read something here, sounds pretty logical. It must be right. There's no, if you, you have no liability if you're wrong. Unless again, if someone could prove you maliciously lied and slandered them, different. But if you print an article about what your opinion is on the Iran war or on solar panels, and you say whatever the heck you want, right? Research, cause you're just putting it on the bulletin board and buyer beware, reader beware. That is not to your point. I don't think people fully understand that. So to me, by the way, one of the things back to us United and building a movement for unity and things that one of the last summer I spent two and a half months in a purple and white pickup truck driving across the country with a film crew. And we were talking to sheriffs because we have a sheriff's unity network and thousands of everyday Americans. And one of the questions I asked everybody, I'm like, hey, I'm going to promote you to president. You may think it's a demotion, I'm promoting you to president for a month. What's the first thing you do if you're the president to try to build unity in America? And that's it. People have all kinds of ideas and people say, what's your answer? And to what I just said, what I would, one of the first things I do is change section 238 of the telecom act to give, to treat the digital social media organizations as publishers basically. not as bulletin boards, because if Metta or TikTok or YouTube or Substack or any of these other groups were held to be responsible legally and liable for the accuracy of what they allowed to be posted on their bulletin boards, as the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal or Fox or CNN are, any of the most outrageous offensive conspiracy-theoried information that is out there that drive people crazy, but draw people into believing this stuff would no longer be there. Yeah. And back to your question 50 years ago, you could have that same conspiracy theory. You could go into the bar and get drunk and tell everyone and they would laugh at you. And maybe one person might believe you. Great. You can't cause mass damage, but now you can go out there and sound really smart and reasoned and piece these together and millions of people can believe you or the Russians can come in and obviously, or, and hack elections and do that, or the Chinese or the North Koreans or the Iranians and try to manipulate us. If meta had liability, that wouldn't happen to the same degree. Yeah. And this is very timely because I was listening to a podcast and there's a, and I pulled it up here, a Pew research study where among us adults, 55 % now say they regularly get news on TikTok. And that number is just very quickly increasing. And so if that's where people are starting to get there, and it could be like Fox's TikTok channel, but it could be just somebody's individual personal account. And so if that's where we're getting as close to truth as we could sometimes find, that's kind of concerning that they're not beholden to that specific liability. But I feel like for your policy change recommendation, how would that be enforced from a social media perspective? basically if Congress changed the law that said you have liability for what's on your platform, then basically if a social media company is allowing a publishing of something that's that they haven't researched to be reasonable, then they're going to be sued for publishing something that's false. The same thing. It's the Fox example. If If Dominion Resources was, Fox basically reported his news that Dominion Resources and basically their machines are, I forget, hacked and that the voting was irregular. Fox, there was lots of evidence that Fox knew that not to be true, but they wanted to report that to create a narrative around the 2020 election. They lost, I think it was an $800 million judgment against them. St. If that, law were different and Metta or YouTube or TikTok or whomever had liability for that on the platform, they would not If they published Joseph saying in all of his assertions that Dominion Resources had done this, or they had published the Fox story that was also untrue and proven in court, they would also be held liable and you could sue them and you can win millions of dollars, right? Whoever you are, right? Dominion Resources in that example, because they were the damaged party. So all of a sudden, those social media companies would have to have much larger staffs whose job it is to research things that are being published for their accuracy or their truth. Now they probably could also create labeling that says, is what Joseph Spalzer has said, there is, we do not know if this is true. Either you have to put massive disclosure so that when Adam goes to read what Joseph has put up there, there's a disclosure that says, this may be not true. We don't know. it would change how you consume information. would reduce the things that are out there and it would remind you even, at least on TikTok or on Instagram or on Facebook, that what you're looking at is one person's opinion that is not held to the same journalistic standards as the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times or whoever, whoever. And just that would... make you realize that you should think a little longer before you read on social media. when he initially said that, I want to that's potentially sense, censusing or limiting your free speech. But if it's more so through the lens of the cigarette companies have to have certain labels on packaging, it's just so like it's there so you know, so it's at least there's at least a pause moment. Do you read it and know that it's opinion piece versus factual base. That could be really interesting. And I feel like in the age of AI, that's something that is, is now even more possible than ever to have done, but it's more of what's the truth database that is like the pure research. just Googled it right now about that, that TikTok reference. So what would be credible knowledge basis to have AI reference to be able to put that tag of this is accurate or this is inaccurate. Here's the sources. This is an opinion piece. That's really interesting. But you also said something that, and I don't know the answer to this, and it's a complicated legal question, but your right to free speech. Your right to free speech says, you can go, back to my example, you can go into the bar or into the town square and express your opinion. I think so and so is a complete jerk. I think so and so is the greatest in the world. I think that... Aliens have landed and here's why and I have this proof you can say that Wherever you want that is free speech the question and when the Constitution was written free speech meant you could tell 50 people maybe right? where's free is free speech say that you can get onto a platform that is available to millions or billions of people and say whatever you want and Where's that line? And I honestly don't I think it's an illegal discussion, but free speech doesn't mean you can say or run and tell billions and billions of people that same thing. It's a fine line because we need debate. We need the servicing of information. what we look, we can look at the system we have now and see it's broken. Look, you can get out. There's lawsuits already where teenagers have basically spoken with AI models as therapists and been convinced to kill themselves. I mean, what? Like we have a lot to figure out on how we manage and regulate incredibly powerful, potentially incredibly beneficial tools. But right now we haven't figured that out. And so they're able to be used for very nefarious, very dangerous things, whether that's AI and whether that's social media, right? We can see the result. We're living it. Yeah. And I think this is a really good tangent that we went on because it's setting the foundation of us United. And one of the ways that I believe you're cracking that case of uniting people and that is firsthand experience. So let's get into us United and the founding and what were some of the activities and programs that you wanted to for sure launch with and why and how that's evolved. Sure. So we started when we started when Chris shared Chris Watson from I'm Flint Michigan, who was my co-founder and I, when we started US United, there were a few things that we looked at as core challenges and principles that we had to address. And first one, we were just talking about it, right? We tend to live, work in social media and ever shrinking bubbles. And outside of those bubbles, we then categorize people and we label them. Not bad, right? It's a complicated world. But when's the last time you or anyone listening sympathized or compromised with a label. You haven't. You do that with a human being. need that direct, whether it's you and me on a video call, on a Zoom, or whether it's on a phone, or whether it's in person, best in person, we need to interact with people with different backgrounds and experiences than our own to just understand the gray, right? To understand the different perspectives that are out there and not always supposed to be so, because we base right and wrong often on our own experiences. None of us have had all the experiences and none of us can know what the impacts and I can now share some stories in a second. So that was principle number one. Principle number two, we looked at it and said for unity in particular, we looked around and there's no, where's there a brand of unity? My hat, us united, we're building a brand of unity. Cause if you look around, there are a lot of brands for division. Everyone listening can think of, usually, we can all start with Republicans and Democrats basically at this point, but we can keep going. Coke, Pepsi, all the brands. Where's their brands of unity? And they're not there. How are you going to build it without a brand? To rally behind, right? To where? To show that I'm part believe in something. Storytelling, content, ideas, hope, inspiration, leadership, all those things. So we said, movement for unity, we got to deal with both, we got to deal with the bubbles, we got to deal with lack of brand and lack of storytelling content. And the third really is change culture. What we've been talking about, right? Media. and politics are incentivized and rewarded for division. But wait, everybody knows this. I'm not, I'm no secret. I said I drove across America and I talked to thousands of people and everyone knows this. Most Americans don't think we're as divided as the media and the politicians are presenting because they understand they're incentivized to do that. Politicians for power, media for money. Okay. And so we looked at it said, how do you change the culture? And it will make unity at least has aware and relevance as division. We're not getting rid of it. People like to watch fighting. It's other things. Like, you know, ⁓ the plane landed safely is never on the news. The plane crashed is on the news, right? Okay. But Unity can be. So what still unifies all of us? Sports, biggest. Music, food. And I usually have golden retrievers. I have a really cute one. No shortage of love and attention and unity when I'm walking him. let's think of sports music and food, right? So we said at us United, how can we tap into those to bring those examples and messages of unity into culture, into the world? So that's principle wise. So things that we do, right? We have a lot that we do, but some of the biggest focuses right now we have, and it ties back to our social media. We have a unity pledge. Take this unity pledge, but that's obviously that's easy. quote unquote, what do you do to honor that unity pledge? Our simple message, change the algorithm. So back to what we said about social media. What if once a week, you, me, everybody took one or two minutes, that's it, and posted a story of compassion, community, kindness that you did or you saw around you in your community. If literally every American did that once a week, We would change the social media algorithm, not literally the algorithm. We change what the algorithm produces for us. Yes. Right. We would change what traditional news media talks about. If even not even if one million people did that every week, much less 10 million or 50 million, we would literally change all of that. And now we would get access to different information. We would see different things. Culture would be different. So we said, Evelyn, take the uni pledge. Change the algorithm, right? Simple act. I heard this all summer when I was driving across the country. People be like, Adam, what am I gonna do? I'm not the president. I'm not a billionaire. How am I gonna make a difference? And I would always say, you vote, don't you? And like, most people say yeah, which is good. Your one vote alone doesn't matter, but 150 million Americans voting obviously matters. This is the same principle. Yes, if only you and I post something nice. compassionate community building once a week, it's not gonna make a huge impact. But if a million or 10 million or 50 million people do, it makes massive impact. you don't have to be president, don't have to be billionaire, governor, or senator to make change. That is the power and beauty of our country, of democracy, of individual worth and rights. So start with that. Then we said, how do we gotta keep getting that message out there? So we said sports. So we've done this dozens of times and expanding this across the country, Unity Seats. Think of every time you went to a sporting event or a music concert, there's four or five seats set aside as Unity Seats. And we work, as United helps with our share of Unity Network and with teams and others, put in those Unity Seats, two groups of two people who don't know each other, different backgrounds than each other, and say, look, if you go watch I'm a big Yankees fan. can see behind me. I got a Mario and jersey, but pick your team. Yankees, Knicks, Giants, Rangers, Rams, Dodgers, Cubs, Bears, whatever it is. If basically you go watch a sporting event with a couple people you don't know for two or three hours and you're cheering for the team, your team, you're building unity. You're building a relationship, respect, a little bit of trust, foundation. When you have When a tougher topic comes up, even in the game or some other thing you're talking afterwards, you're not going to say, you're wrong, I'm right. You're going to listen because you're not someone you like. We have something in common. I'm going to listen to you. I got out of my bubble. I'm cheering for the same thing. Or by the way, even better if you're rivals and you're teasing each other the whole game. But at the end, as a Yankee fan, my life would be a lot less fun as a Yankee fan without the Red Sox. And if I'm a Red Sox fan, it's a lot less fun than the Yankees. And we can taunt each other, but After the game, we can and we should be friends. That's the message of sports. So we're saying Unity seats, simple, get you on a scoreboard when you're there, honor that, elevate that. Unity got me great seats to see the Yankees or the Red Sox or the Dodgers. Division, I'm home alone on the sofa. Now I'm sending that message into culture, Unity gets rewarded. And the message I'm sending in the stadium or the arena and on the socials and online all around that is take the Unity pledge and change the algorithm. Now I'm making a difference, right? Now we're elevating unity. making examples. We're giving hope and inspiration. We're giving reward. And we're giving you something simple you can do to help bring the country together. That's what we do. I think this is really important. I believe, I think, I know this is really important. because of one thing you said as well. said that when you did the tour of the country, people know people are not as divided as the media is portraying. And also one of the things that helped me and my wife have positivity through COVID when it happened was, I don't know if you remember some good news, John, it's- Loved, loved. John, if you're listening, come work with us. Cause I literally, we should be doing this week in unity in America every week we can have a show. Every week. And it was, I looked- forward to that and so many other people did too. And I think that is just a metric that people have a deep down desire for this. I'm an optimist, but I think that people want to be happy. The majority of people want to be happy and making and having things that are achievable and attainable and kind of low level of effort to do like a unity pledge are just ways that people could do this. and start small and then expand this. So I think there's issues appetite and there's issues need. And if we don't do some of these things sooner rather than later, we're just going to kind of get taken over by a lot of these more, yeah, more negative and more just the AI examples you shared, not being able to change that is, is I don't think leading to a positive outcome. This is amazing. Yeah, look, you're, you're right, because the challenges that we face as a country and as individuals, as humans, are only increasing, whether it's climate change, whether it's AI, whether it's social relationships, whether it's how we, in particular AI, we deal with employment and income and tax policy and wealth redistribution, all complicated questions. There is not a simple or a single answer to them. But what I know is if we don't solve them, as a collection, as a unified country, we will not solve those and we will have much, much worse problems. And unity never, it doesn't mean unanimity. It doesn't mean we always agree, but it does mean we listen. It does mean that we respect each other. And to me, respect is one of the most important words. We interviewed Shaq on our road trip and incredibly thoughtful and human, and he very much focused on respect. underneath unity and I agree with that. But I heard that from so many people. But respect and listening, a belief in teamwork, a shared purpose and or goal, a compassion and empathy, all words that are part of what unity means. And for everybody, it's slightly different. But what I did here on my road trip is didn't matter what everyone didn't matter who, what, where you some subset of those words that I was describing in a few others, right? That's. If we do, then we can address these problems and we will get to the best answers through discussion, through honest debate, but listening and finding the best solutions. Cause I don't have all the answers. I don't have all the experiences to have all the answers or all the knowledge. There's different things, you know, and that's what we have to do together. And that's that that's, and that's why this is so important because if you think it's been tough the last five or 10 years, it's only going to get tougher. But if we do it right, it gets better, right? AI can be a solution to problems. Climate can be addressed in a solution, right? All of these things are things we can work through and make a better society, but we have to do that. Yeah. Yeah. There's two more things that I would love to get your opinion and thoughts and experiences on. ⁓ Number one is the ⁓ constructive dialogue. So with the Unity Seats example, ⁓ you bringing together sometimes two different parties that maybe have never had an in-person conversation with somebody of a different opinion in a specific area. I don't know how you filter out who comes, but what have you seen have been the benefit of in-person dialogue and for people that are growing at a growing rate, the younger generations who don't have as much in-person. conversations, how to have a constructive dialogue and how to take things personally or not taking things personally or how to just approach that whole situation. Yeah, great question. And this came up a ton on our road trip, as well as in Unity Seas. People would ask me, say, Adam, help. It doesn't matter. like, so-and-so won't ever listen to me. Or the other side won't listen. They just want to tell me they're right and I'm wrong. They're not listening, they don't care. And no matter what I say, nothing changes. Like how do I talk to people? And that is part of it is a skill. what I always try to say, start with, tell me, you're talking to people, are you telling them, you start with exactly, this is, I'm right, you're wrong, this is why. I like, because if I do that with you, you're not gonna believe me, right? You're gonna shut down. You're wrong, I'm right. As soon I say you're wrong, your ears are closed. So here, what I would say to everyone that I talk to, and this is what, I practice and it's a work, I am, it's a work in progress. I can tell you a lot of stories where I don't do this even today. You think you're, I have no unity, new unity, perfect master. But I say start with, when you're talking with someone who you know you're on a controversial or topic that you might not fully agree, start with listening. Truly listen. Don't jump in, don't interrupt, listen. Ask questions. Before you say right, wrong, and different, ask questions. Hey, why do you think that? Why do you feel that way? What led you to that belief? What happened or whatever it be? And truly listen, because if you listen to people, they start to let their guard down because people want to be heard. And then if and when you disagree or your view is different on something, don't go with, hey, I disagree with you or hey, you're wrong and this is what I think. The best way I've found is to share an experience, to share a story that's happened to you or to a family member, to a friend. that is contrary to what someone else's belief or what they just told you. Because again, if you tell me a story, hey, and I'll give you a couple examples from a road trip and 30 for us and things we do. If you tell me a story of why your experience is different than mine, I can't tell you you're wrong. It's your lived experience that happened to you. By definition, it's real, it's right. And that's a lot more likely to make me opened my mind a little bit to a different perspective. a couple of examples of that on a road trip. We were in Florida, actually, this is in Florida. I was talking to a gentleman outside Doe Campbell Stadium in Tallahassee, Florida state, and he was former Marine. And we were talking about what union means to him and are we getting more united and divided and how do you connect with people? And he said, look, I try to be very open and listen to people and but I draw my line when people burn the flag. So if you burn the flag, basically you're dead to me. I can't talk to you and you are my enemy. And I said, I pushed back, said, but man, that's a question. I said, look, I hear you and I get that. I said, I don't like condone burning the flag. said, but you fought for people's right to do that. The Supreme Court has said that is constitutional and you as a Marine fought to protect the constitution. And one of the rights the constitution provides is the right to burn the flag. I said, you don't have to agree with it. You don't have to like it. I said, before, why can't you ask them why so awful that they feel like that's their only place to go? What's the reason that you go there? And you can be clear, I don't like it. and we talked for a while and he said, you're right. I can ask the question. I don't have to agree with them, but I have to understand what has them believe that what that bad word nuclear option or whatever is so. what they have to turn to because if you understand that you're starting to understand them. Right. So example another one we did we do something called 30 for us where we get people together either in Zooms or in person have a put you in a random group of five Americans. We have a topic that you're talking about in a little bit of structure icebreak but a topic so that you out of your bubble hear things. So one we did a session we did this one in person. This is in Michigan. And the question was if you were president for a day what would be the one change you would make. And so we had a group of five people and diverse range, white, black, brown, older, younger. the woman, third woman we spoke was pre-med student, black woman, and said, if I were president for the day, I would truly ban redlining at every level. Interesting. But what happened next was really interesting. The other four people in that group who were white said, it's redlining. Yeah, I knew that was going to be. And this woman, eloquently explained what it is and how over 50 years her family was forced to move, couldn't own real estate or had to sell it, and never had the chance to live somewhere of quality and effectively build wealth through owning real estate, which is one of the ways that Americans have built intergenerational wealth. And as a result, lived in poverty and struggled. And everyone listened. Then there's an open discussion as part of 30 Frust for 15 minutes where you just talk about people's ideas. Everyone gets to answer that prompt. And at the end of that 30 minute session, every single person in that group said, you know what, we've changed our answer. If we were president for the day, we would do what you said and we would ban redlining. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Wow. He's exactly right. And that happened not one because they heard a person in direct contact explain what redlining is. They didn't hear someone on the news. or someone on the internet or someone on social media give their view with a slant and all the other stuff and probably include facts that weren't facts and act like they're of that. They heard a story and then they saw how it impacted multiple lives and said, that is wrong. And we're going to, we would change that too. That is how you talk to people. And again, those are incredibly powerful, stark examples. Most of the time it's not going to be that black and white, but If I change your mind on something 10%, 15 and 20 % because of my story, I may never know it, but I did. That's getting out of your bubble, right? And when you come next to whatever that issue is, whether it's guns or abortion or taxes or military or AI or any of the things that abort, all this stuff that divide us, quote unquote, if you've changed your mind 20%, cause you heard a different experience and that's how we get to unity. That's how we get to progress. Yeah, that's a great example. And my last question I have here is, because I love your opinion, is I feel like they're, and maybe this is just me personally, but I have a sense that it's more than just me, but to change one's opinion, there's so much pressure for people to set in stone, set in concrete an opinion. I don't know if it's a social media pressure or a political pressure, but being thought as a flip-flopper. quote unquote, at least in the political sense, is seen as negative. And I feel like seeing that as negative means that you're unable to learn, which doesn't incentivize curiosity, doesn't incentivize learning, because why would you if learning means you change your opinion and change your opinion is bad thing? And so I had an aha moment when you're using that example where the woman explained redlining and had a story behind it. And I feel like that story for the people that did change their opinion is what is the key that helped them unlock that. Because in the future, if somebody in that instance had a belief that they wanted to keep run mining, but didn't maybe have a story as to why, now has a story in there and has the ability to have that ammo for when they're asked in pride on, flip-flopped, why? Negative. They could then reference that story. So I'm wondering if stories are the key to being able to be comfortable changing an opinion and what your kind of thoughts are on that. Yeah, I do. I think yes. think you said a few things that I agree with and important. You have to remain curious. You have to remain curious because none of us know everything. And even if things that we do know and take for factor for truth, there's things also change. Things are not static. So being curious and open minded. I think is a critical component to being a unifier because it means you're willing to take in information and you're willing to listen and you're willing to change. It's not a flip-flopper. You're getting educated. You're growing. You're learning. Those are back to definite. Those should be the qualities that we aspire to and that we recognize and we honor. Not the, my God, you changed your mind. You must be a flip-flopper or you're a trader. That's what? No. No, never. That's never a good thing. Whether that's in school, whether that's on an issue, whether that's in a discussion with your friends, you're always learning, right? So curiosity. And I think, but to your point, humans, we've always, throughout our history as a species, we're storytellers, right? That's how we've learned. Go back to the fairy tales, go back to the grins, right? All of those were, the Bible, all of those were stories to help you share and understand the world in terms of fairy tales to protect children, right? Stories that taught you what to be afraid of and how to be careful every book starting with the Bible telling you stories to help educate you and help you see and learn through examples of in By the way to behave ways to get along ways to accept people ways not to lessons and laws and rules, right? Stories is how we communicate that so Being a storyteller again Listening to them and sharing them be a good storyteller aspire to be a great storyteller, right? Your friends will love you more because they want to hear your stories, right? You'll break down walls. You'll have more intimate relationships because if you're able to share personal stories, people feel closer to you. Right. That's who you think of who you like. People you like tell you great stories and you learn from them. So I think you need to remember those things and start to behave with that. Leave with your heart that way. So people that have been listening to this conversation and want to get involved in engaged with us United, what type of engagement do you look for and where could they find you? Obviously we want millions to get engaged. So there's, always, you can always go to our website, us-united.org and learn a lot of information. And from there you can take the unity pledge and begin down that path. We have all of that on our social media. You go to our Instagram, to our Tik TOK, to our Facebook, to our LinkedIn, all those places you can find us united. You'll know you have it by the purple and white logo on my hat. And you can again, sign up for the unity pledge and start. posting and sharing once a week, hashtagging us United and making that happen. Those are the easiest ways to get involved. Then tell your friends. That's what that's a beauty. So to spread it, get more people engaged. I'm a symbol. I'm not a profit. I'm always raising money. Right. It's easy. We love donations. We sell these hats. We do lots of things. There's lots of ways to get involved in our movement. And because it starts with us, it's like I said, it's a reason the Constitution starts with we the people. That's us. Right. We are the ones who can make it happen. And so I think Those are all ways to get involved. Beyond that, volunteering and keep going. But I think Unity Pledge, actually helping change the algorithm by sharing and posting once a week, sharing all that with your friends and getting more people to do that. And if you want to be a donor or you want to be involved and volunteer, great, keep going. We love it. And we more and more content coming. There's a documentary movie from this road trip which will blow people's minds. And we will be done with that in next couple months. like some good news, start consuming the good stuff. And we have a lot of it in our social. as we wrap up, is there anything that we missed or anything that you want to leave us with before we end it? I think we covered a lot. As I said, think it really, the power is with all of us as individuals. This is not about presidents and governors and senators and billionaires. It is about Americans because there's all kinds of polling. 70 plus percent of us or in the middle somewhere, middle to the right, middle to the left. nobody wants us to be, that I talked to, of the thousands of people, no one wants us to be this divided or to feel and look this divided. But if you disengage, because it's gross and you're like, ⁓ what am going to do? The only thing that you're left to hear are those 15 % on each side who are invested in division and they get louder. And then you pay attention and it seems worse and you pay less attention. It's a downward spiral. is up to us in that 70%. change that and the simple things, change the algorithm, be engaged a little bit, participate, help people. Hey, that's going to change everything. Adam, thank you so much time for your time. We went over a little bit, but these are my favorite conversations to have. So really appreciate your time. Really excited to get your story out there to a new audience and to more people. yeah, asked the folks that are listening, take the pledge. It sounds like a very low level of effort weight to really have a big impact. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right, thank you so much. ⁓