The Spiral of Silence and The Emperor's New Clothes

"Stand up and speak up for truth -- especially when it is not popular."

- Russel M. Nelson

In the story of the Emperor's New Clothes, two swindlers promise to provide the Emperor with a magnificent set of special, new clothes. Special because they would be invisible to those who are stupid or incompetent.

The Emperor’s officials see no clothes being produced on the swindlers’ looms, but none of them say anything to avoid being seen as incompetent. When the Emperor walked through the city in his new “clothes,” everyone could see that he was naked, but no one wanted to be the one to say it for fear of being a fool or being shamed by others.

But then, a child came along who, in his naiveté, was willing to defy consensus and speak out, “The Emperor has no clothes!” The thing is, it’s not that the child said it. It’s not even that other people heard him say it. It’s that everybody knows that everybody else heard him say it!

The child created a shift in circumstance in which the common, shared knowledge that the Emperor has no clothes was now out in the open. This turned the tables to where it now APPEARS foolish to disagree with the fact that the Emperor has no clothes.

German political scientist Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann coined a term that describes this phenomenon: the “Spiral of Silence.”

This often occurs when holding a certain view gains a negative stigma, and fear of being seen as having that view causes people to stay silent. And thus, the masses believe they are alone, or at least in a small minority of people with the stigmatized view, when in fact, they are part of the overwhelming majority.

In effect, the majority "hoards" its opinions. Hence, the public discourse on some issues can become more polarized than is the actual distribution of public opinion.

As a nation, but especially in our church, we suffer from a Spiral of Silence regarding topics related to critical social justice.

Though censorship is often spoken of as the leading threat to open discourse, the more subtle threat is the voluntary limitation of one’s own speech creating a spiral of silence.

It is not the iron fist of repression but the velvet glove of “niceness”, that is the real problem. We fear that we may not appear “nice” if we stand for truth or if we push back against an ideology that goes against the Doctrine of Christ. We may fear that we may cause “contention” when in reality, we are standing for truth, which will inevitably be accompanied by some “conflict.”

To be clear, when such confrontation or pushback does occur, we should make sure that it is done as civilly and lovingly as possible. But we must also firmly stand and declare the truth.

Most importantly, we must plainly teach and set a clear example for the youth of what the church actually stands for. Otherwise, we end up with more youth who feel like this girl who wrote to President Oaks during his last fireside.

“I feel like I sometimes get inconsistent and confusing messages from the Church. In my day-to-day life, I see members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on social media act as if they aren’t part of this gospel. … I feel like I am the only young woman in my ward who sees the things I see wrong with the world. … I truly don’t understand why so many youth in our church don’t see any problem with people changing their gender every other day, dating people who are the same sex or identify as no gender.

“At ward or stake youth activities, I am asked my pronouns, or at school, I am asked to dance with a girl who thinks she is a boy. I know we are supposed to love everyone and show them respect, and I always do. I [just] feel that there is a line being crossed…. I wish we heard more talk from Church leaders about this problem.” I often get comments from two types of listeners who tell me that I either shouldn’t be talking about this subject because the Brethren aren’t talking about it or who are mad because the Brethren aren’t talking about it enough.

It is not solely their responsibility to talk about these subjects. The Lord has told us that “it is not meat that ye should be commanded in all things … The same is a slothful and not a wise servant.”

The Brethren can’t speak to everything, everywhere, in full detail all the time. That is where we come in, and we must “lift where we stand.”

Who will insist that we speak plainly and tell the truth about delicate and difficult matters that we would all prefer to cover up or ignore?

Who will declare "the Emperor" to be naked?

How can the church sustain an elevated discourse on sensitive topics when the current social climate pressures the majority into silence, all while pushing fundamental reform within the church?

It cannot.

But, with the simple choice to stand for truth, and with a little courage, we too can choose to be like the child who spoke truth to the Emperor, give others courage, and break the Spiral of Silence.

 Best,

Greg Matsen