Why America Forgot How to Argue: And How We Can Remember

Sixty-five percent of Americans say they always or often feel exhausted when thinking about politics. Fifty-five percent feel angry. Just ten percent feel hopeful, and only four percent feel excited. When Pew Research Center asked people to sum up their feelings about politics in a single word or phrase, the most common responses were "divisive" and "corrupt." Eighty-six percent agreed that "Republicans and Democrats are more focused on fighting each other than on solving problems."

These are not the feelings of a democracy that has figured out how to argue productively. These are the feelings of a people who have forgotten what productive argument looks like.

In the previous installments, we traced how debate was central to American civic life from the founding through the Civil War, how it became institutionalized in schools and colleges but lost its connection to adult community life, and how the urban debate movement proved that debate skills could transform outcomes for anyone who learned them. Now we confront the present: a moment when millions watch debate as entertainment but almost no one practices it as a skill, when algorithms reward outrage over understanding, and when the infrastructure that might allow ordinary citizens to develop the capacity for civil argument simply does not exist.

The Spectacularization of Conflict

In 2024, a YouTube channel called Jubilee became the unexpected center of American political discourse. With over 10 million subscribers and videos that routinely accumulate tens of millions of views, Jubilee's "Surrounded" series pits individual commentators against groups of opponents: "Can 1 Woke Teen Survive 25 Trump Supporters?" "Can 25 Liberal College Students Outsmart 1 Conservative?" "1 Republican vs. 25 Kamala Harris Voters."

The videos are spectacle, not education. Professional debaters and political commentators face off against ordinary people who lack their training. Episodes are edited for maximum viral potential, with clips circulating on TikTok and Instagram designed to show one side "owning" or "destroying" the other. The format rewards quick soundbites over substantive engagement, confident assertion over careful reasoning.

Jubilee's founder, Jason Lee, has described his vision as creating content about "empathy" and "dialogue." But critics have noted that the format treats serious issues as content to be consumed rather than problems to be solved. As one commentator put it, Jubilee is "what the memeification of politics looks like in practice." Another called it "like Squid Game plus 'gotcha' plus viral moments."

The demand for this content is real. The Charlie Kirk episode accumulated 38 million views. The Ben Shapiro episode drew 5.1 million viewers in its first day, roughly the same as a typical episode of Saturday Night Live. When Pete Buttigieg appeared to debate undecided voters days before the 2024 election, the format reached the highest levels of American political life.

This is what debate has become for most Americans: something to watch, not something to do. A performance in which professionals humiliate amateurs. Entertainment optimized for engagement metrics rather than understanding.

The Architecture of Outrage

The transformation of debate into spectacle did not happen by accident. Social media platforms are engineered to maximize engagement, and research consistently shows that content expressing moral outrage spreads faster and farther than content that does not. Posts that bash political opponents outperform posts that seek common ground. Divisive content is more likely to go viral than nuanced content.

The mechanisms are well-documented. Recommender systems analyze user behavior to predict what content will keep people scrolling. Content that provokes strong emotional reactions generates more engagement. Algorithms learn to surface content that triggers those reactions. Users are exposed to increasingly narrow ranges of perspectives, creating filter bubbles where similar ideas are amplified and dissenting opinions are filtered out.

A systematic review of research from 2015 to 2025 found three consistent patterns: algorithmic systems structurally amplify ideological homogeneity, reinforcing selective exposure and limiting viewpoint diversity; youth demonstrate partial awareness and adaptive strategies to navigate algorithmic feeds, but their agency is constrained by opaque systems; and echo chambers not only foster ideological polarization but also serve as spaces for identity reinforcement.

The result is an information environment designed to make productive disagreement nearly impossible. Exposure to content that contradicts one's opinion often produces a boomerang effect, reinforcing existing beliefs rather than reducing differences. People are more likely to see content from those who agree with them, and when they do encounter opposing views, they encounter them in contexts optimized for conflict rather than understanding.

Recent research suggests that the problem may be even more fundamental than algorithm design. A 2025 simulation study found that even a simple social media platform with no sophisticated recommendation algorithm still devolved into polarized communities. The basic functions of social media, including posting, reposting, and following, may inherently produce polarization regardless of algorithmic intervention.

What We Lost

Compare our present condition to what Americans once had. In the 1850s, crowds of 15,000 would gather for three hours to watch Lincoln and Douglas debate the future of slavery. They stood, listened, engaged, and often changed their minds. The debates were published and read nationwide. They shaped the course of American history.

In the early republic, literary societies trained students not just in argumentation but in civic responsibility. Members practiced switch-sides debate, arguing positions they personally opposed. They learned that reasonable people could disagree, that understanding an opposing view did not mean endorsing it, and that the skills of argument were essential for democratic citizenship.

Benjamin Franklin's Junto, which met every Friday night starting in 1727, required members to pursue inquiry "in the sincere spirit of inquiry after truth, without fondness for dispute, or desire of victory." The group spawned the first lending library in America, fire companies, a hospital, and the American Philosophical Society. Debate was not entertainment; it was civic infrastructure.

What happened to these institutions? The literary societies dissolved in the 1880s, displaced by fraternities and athletics. Competitive debate retreated into schools, becoming increasingly specialized and disconnected from public life. Presidential debates became exercises in image management. Cable news evolved into what critics call "identity journalism," reinforcing in-group identity while demonizing opponents.

The institutions that once trained ordinary citizens in the skills of civil argument disappeared. Nothing replaced them. We built an extraordinary infrastructure to train young people in debate, but we never built anything for adults. Half a million students debate competitively each year. They graduate into a world where the only options are to watch professionals argue on YouTube or to retreat into silence.

The Pipeline Problem

The National Speech and Debate Association has enrolled nearly two million members since its founding in 1925. The organization currently serves over 140,000 active student participants across more than 4,000 schools. Urban Debate Leagues add another 10,000 students in 20 cities. College debate programs train thousands more.

The alumni of these programs read like a who's who of American professional life: Supreme Court justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Samuel Alito; media figures Oprah Winfrey, Stephen Colbert, and Jane Pauley; actors Brad Pitt, Paul Rudd, and Chadwick Boseman; comedians Jordan Peele and Hasan Minhaj; politicians from Ted Cruz to Elizabeth Warren.

These people will tell you that debate was formative. Justice Jackson called it "the one activity that best prepared me for future success in law and in life." The research confirms what alumni report: debate improves graduation rates, college readiness, reading comprehension, and civic engagement. Debaters are three times more likely to vote in elections and twice as likely to participate in social and political campaigns.

And then they graduate.

There are no adult debate leagues. There are no after-work programs where professionals can continue developing argumentation skills. There is no equivalent of the recreational basketball league, the amateur softball team, or the community theater group. The infrastructure that exists to train young people simply does not exist for adults.

Think about what this means. We have proof that debate works. We have proof that it transforms outcomes across racial and socioeconomic lines. We have proof that it creates better citizens. And we have built no mechanism whatsoever for adults to access these benefits.

The Stirrings of Something New

The need is so obvious that people have started trying to fill it. Braver Angels, founded after the 2016 election, is now the largest cross-partisan organization in America dedicated to depolarizing politics. The organization brings together "red" and "blue" participants for workshops and debates designed to foster mutual understanding. Since its founding, Braver Angels has sponsored over 5,600 events attracting nearly 70,000 participants, with 125 local alliances nationwide.

The format works. Studies of Braver Angels workshops have found that participants report improved ability to set a constructive tone in difficult conversations and to listen in ways that make the other side feel heard. The organization has attracted attention from scholars, politicians, and ordinary citizens who recognize that something is broken in American discourse and want to help fix it.

But Braver Angels is focused on depolarization, not debate. Its workshops aim to reduce hostility between political camps, not to train participants in the technical skills of argumentation. The need it addresses is real, but it is not the same as the need for ongoing debate practice and competition.

What would it look like to build the infrastructure that has been missing since the literary societies dissolved? What would it mean to create adult debate leagues in the same way we have adult recreational sports leagues? What if the half million students who debate each year could graduate into communities where they could continue to develop their skills, meet others who share their passion, and compete in structured formats that reward substance over spectacle?

The Model That Works

We know what works because we have been doing it for students for a century. The National Speech and Debate Association provides a national framework, local chapters, tournament structures, recognition systems, and community. Urban Debate Leagues prove the model can work in under-resourced communities with students who have no prior exposure to competitive debate.

An adult debate infrastructure would need similar elements: local clubs that meet regularly, city and regional tournaments, a national championship, recognition systems that reward improvement and excellence, and a community that values intellectual engagement over ideological conformity. The format would need to be accessible to newcomers while providing depth for experienced debaters. It would need to accommodate people with jobs, families, and limited time.

The model exists in other activities. Recreational sports leagues allow adults to compete at whatever level matches their skill and commitment. Community theater gives amateur actors stages to perform. Book clubs create spaces for intellectual discussion. What does not exist is a structure for ordinary adults to practice the skills of public argumentation in a supportive, competitive environment.

The demand is clearly there. Jubilee's success proves that millions of Americans want to watch people argue about important issues. The question is whether we can create something for them to do instead of watch.

Why This Matters Now

The crisis of American discourse is not abstract. It manifests in elections decided by voters who cannot distinguish arguments from assertions. It manifests in communities where neighbors refuse to speak to each other across political lines. It manifests in the exhaustion that 65% of Americans report when they think about politics.

The institutions that once trained citizens in the skills of democratic deliberation have disappeared. The technologies that have replaced them are optimized for engagement, not understanding. The result is a population that increasingly retreats into ideological silos, consuming content that confirms what they already believe while viewing opponents as enemies rather than fellow citizens.

Debate offers something different. Switch-sides formats force participants to understand positions they oppose. Competition rewards research, evidence, and logical consistency rather than volume or emotional manipulation. Community forms around shared interest in intellectual engagement rather than shared ideology. These are exactly the skills and habits that democratic citizenship requires.

The history we have traced shows that America once had institutions that cultivated these skills. The literary societies, the town halls, the Lincoln-Douglas debates were not accidents. They were built by people who understood that democracy requires citizens capable of civil argument. When those institutions disappeared, nothing replaced them.

We can build something new. We can create the infrastructure that has been missing for over a century. We can give the half million students who debate each year somewhere to go after graduation. We can offer adults who never had the opportunity to debate a chance to develop skills that will make them better citizens, better professionals, and better neighbors.

The Work Ahead

This series has traced debate from Benjamin Franklin's Junto to Jubilee's viral videos, from the literary societies that were "virtually little republics" to the urban debate leagues that transformed outcomes for students in Baltimore and Chicago. The story is one of expansion and contraction, of possibilities created and opportunities lost.

What remains is the gap. We know debate works. We have proof from decades of research and millions of alumni. We have models that succeed with students from every background. And we have built nothing for adults.

The infrastructure that democracy requires does not build itself. Someone has to create the clubs, organize the tournaments, establish the frameworks that allow people to practice. Someone has to do for adult debate what Bruno Jacob did for high school debate when he founded the National Forensic League in 1925, what Melissa Wade did for urban debate when she launched the Atlanta Urban Debate League in 1985.

Americans are exhausted by politics. They are angry and frustrated. They feel that the system is broken and that they have no power to fix it. But the history of debate in America suggests something different. It suggests that when citizens have opportunities to engage with each other in structured, substantive formats, they become better at the work of democracy. It suggests that the skills can be taught, the communities can be built, and the infrastructure can be created.

The literary societies are gone. The town halls have devolved into shouting matches. Presidential debates have become choreographed performances. But the hunger for something better remains. Ten million people subscribe to Jubilee's YouTube channel because they want to see people argue about things that matter. The question is whether we can give them something better than spectacle.

We can. The history shows how. The research proves it works. The only thing missing is the will to build it.

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Sources and Further Reading

On Political Polarization: "Americans' Dismal Views of the Nation's Politics," Pew Research Center, September 2023; "Americans' feelings about politics, polarization and the tone of political discourse," Pew Research Center, 2023.

On Jubilee Media: Wikipedia, "Jubilee Media" and "Surrounded (web series)"; "The rise of viral debate videos and their impact on our ability to disagree," PBS NewsHour, October 2025; "Jubilee Is Making America Debate Again," Variety, November 2024; "Mixed Signals: Can YouTube debates bring America back together?," Semafor, April 2025.

On Social Media Algorithms and Polarization: "Echo chambers, filter bubbles, and polarisation: a literature review," Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism; "How social media platforms can reduce polarization," Brookings Institution, June 2023; "Social Drivers and Algorithmic Mechanisms on Digital Media," PMC, 2024; "Trap of Social Media Algorithms," MDPI Societies, 2025.

On Braver Angels: Wikipedia, "Braver Angels"; braverangels.org; "Cultivating civility: Braver Angels aims at depolarization," Washington Examiner, April 2024.

On Historical Context: See sources from Parts 1-3 of this series, including Harding on literary societies, Guelzo on Lincoln-Douglas, and NSDA historical materials.