An Eazy Recipe to help avoid that traditional Thanksgiving Heartburn

One of the worse/best parts of traditional Thanksgiving dinners is the traditional pre-dinner and post-dinner debates. Most of us have been there once or twice. Most of us have probably said things, that later we wished we hadn't.

Insulting the relatives is not a memory that usually makes most family scrap books. Here's an easy way to avoid that traditional Holiday Heartburn ...

If You Must Talk Politics at Thanksgiving, Here's How
10 unsatisfying rules for disagreeing with friends and family over the holidays

by Conor Friedersdorf, theatlantic.com -- Nov 26 2013

On Thanksgiving, it's usually best if you don't talk politics. The subject tends to aggravate people, and it's very unlikely that anyone's mind will be changed. So don't do it.

But if you must talk politics, how should it be done?
[...]

1)    Be open to the possibility that you're wrong. Seriously.

2)    Approach the conversation with the purpose of better understanding one another's views, not proving to your relative that you are right and they are wrong.

3)    Before you focus on any point of disagreement, ask questions of your interlocutor to figure out why they think the way they do about the subject at hand.

4)    Emphasize points of agreement, if there are any.

5)    Give them room to agree with your arguments without having to concede that their arguments are stupid, or feeling as if they've lost the exchange and you've won.

6)    Rather than harping on a particular flaw in their preferred policy, ask questions that force them to confront it. "I agree, killing all the sharks would make it safer for surfers. But what about the creatures that sharks eat? How would you make sure their populations don't explode? Seriously, how would you handle that?"

7)    Don't bother trying to score debating points, especially when you both know that's all they are.

8)    Remember that they know stuff that you don't, just as you know stuff that they don't.

9)    Remember that lots of intelligent, good-hearted people share their position, and lots of dense jerks share your position, because that's true of almost every position.

10)    Listen more than you talk.