Is Trivializing the Root of All Interpersonal Woes?

I was doing some reading the other day when I came across the term “trivializing.”

It gets thrown about in popular media, and often is something you learn to somewhat ignore, just because of how often people lament others “trivializing” some XYZ “really big deal” to them, that seems trite or overblown to others.

And yet...

Examine the classic debate between two opposites. Say someone who is pro-renewable energy because he wants to save the planet, and someone else who is pro-fossil fuels because he doesn’t want to be forced to pay top dollar for new, less effective technologies when cheaper alternatives are available.

The first guy accuses the second guy of killing the planet. The second guy feels like the first guy is trivializing his need to not burn a hole in his wallet, and becomes offended, and tells him off. The first guy then feels like the second guy is trivializing his desire to save the planet as an ignoble cause, and fiercely retorts.

This is a case of crossed wires communication-wise of the sort we discussed in “Dale Carnegie’s Most Life-Changing Piece of Advice”, but it goes broader than this, because trivializing comes in many shapes and forms, and it’s hard to detect and harder to combat in nearly all of them.