Hiya from the Council on Contemporary Families conference in my hometown Chicago. It’s 70 degrees and sunny, and only a gathering like this one could keep me inside.

This morning Virginia Rutter, Stephanie Coontz, and I offered a media workshop, where I heard some of the best ever rationale for why “popping it up” (meaning, learning to write/communicate your complex and researched ideas for a broader audience) is not “dumbing it down”:

Barbara Risman: “If your idea is truly smart, it can be conveyed without jargon. It’s laziness to think otherwise.”

Josh Coleman: “Reducing a complex idea to a soundbyte is a form of wisdom in itself.”

Stephanie Coontz: “It’s not a compromise to your intellectual integrity. If you can’t reduce your complex idea to one or two sentences, it may be because there’s a hole in your argument. It’s not merely a matter of laziness but intellectual self-deception.”

Virginia Rutter: “If you can’t boil it down, maybe media isn’t the medium for you. Maybe it’s meant for a smaller discussion.”

!!!

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