Today was the most shocking day thus far, due in part because we were building an electric fence. Instead of being surrounded by the rest of my group, I spent a few hours assisting Dave Sweeney – a local farmer – in putting up electrical wire around his cow pasture. Mr. Sweeney was a 6’4 “big ole Republican farmer,” an image most of America can easily visualize. That visualization you created is the problem in today’s society, that we can easily visualize this man without ever engaging in a conversation with him.

Looming large in presence but surprisingly soft in voice, Dave began asking why the American public and media can simply associate the words farmer and Republican with negative connotations attached. I have been given the opportunity to draw my own conclusions, rather than base them off of another person’s stance, and obtain a better insight to the average farmer than before. Unfortunately society appears to invest more on opinions instead of developing their own thoughts.

Misinformed citizens now believe that Republican farmers are either affluent citizens or dumb hicks that work for them, neither of which understand the society that we live in today. Because of this assumption, people are unable to understand what agribusiness entails. While it is true that agribusiness does include wealthy profit-driven corporations, there are still signs of family farmers that populated the spacious fields of Iowa.

Family farmers have been unfairly associated with the potentially “evil” corporations of America, and this cycle is not easily fixable. While Mr. Sweeney has his own views on “hot topics” such as gay marriage and immigration reform, he shows the ability to respect and understand the opposing side’s view. He and I agreed that the person you least agree with is also the person that you learn the most from. For these “negative connotations” to vanish, people must be open to the opposing side’s view. Unfortunately, people spend most of their days engaging in conversations with people with whom they already agree. These political conversations transform into  “eco chambers” that confirms a person’s opinion as the “right” one. Unwilling to let their opinions be challenged, people can not realize the potential flaws in their opinions. Mr. Sweeney is unlike the majority of our society, and presented a conversation where dispute was welcomed instead of rejected. Even though there was a fence between us, both literally and figuratively, we both walked away that day understanding a side of the story that we had never heard before.