Lappe: Frame on community, not family

The new online issue of Utne magazine includes a reprint of a story by Frances More Lappe on how progressives need to reframe issues in terms of stronger community instead of family, as argued by political linguist George Lakoff (Don't Think of an Elephant.) Lappe, author of Diet for a Small Planet, argues that in wartime, reframing issues by answering right-wing rhetoric in terms of softer family metaphors will cause progressives to keep losing.

"A 'strong communities' frame might require progressives to stop, for example, talking about the 'environment,' which non-progressives can hear as a 'soft' distraction in war time, and frame ecological challenges as threats 'to safe air and water and food.'"