 Yeah, it really is important to have a minimum level of trust and I'll say relationship. One thing I do is I really try to encourage the students to get to know each other. Usually the time just spent in class, definitely that's one way to get to know each other. But I use name plates. These are practical suggestions. Name plates and I constantly refer to students to each other. Oh, so and so said this. In some ways I do this consciously but in other ways it comes naturally and then I like to say, oh well so and so is position. I'll say the Jamie position is this but the Todd position is this and is there somewhere in between and I do try to in a way to highlight what students say and for fun I sort of identify them with certain position. I'll sort of poke holes and poke fun at certain positions and I'll ask students to clarify if they don't like how I describe something. So getting them just to open up, you know, you have to start somewhere. It's great when you have students who have had you before for other classes, you know, they have a kind of relationship going in and I remember vividly, I think we were talking about abortion and spontaneously some students mentioned their religious background and I can't remember if we ever spoke about religion explicitly but I definitely I picked up on it when someone said, well my religious background is this and I thought, oh wow, okay. And then after that the same day a few other people also talked about their religious background. This is where I came from. This is what I think and we're talking about abortion not religion but I think they, you know, whoever was the first to open this up did that so that other people would understand where they were coming from and, you know, it really is important to understand who people are, not just what they think but why they think what they do because as I say, everyone has a reason for thinking what they do. Even if it doesn't make sense to us, there is a reason for what they do just as we have reasons for what we do and we may not be able to convince them that they should think that too. Well, most of us, it's very difficult to convince someone to think differently from what they did before. So having a relationship really, it is important and I was thinking, a colleague of mine in the communication department talked about gradual disclosure. The idea is that, you know, the more you get to know people, the more you feel comfortable sharing more about yourself and that reinforces that kind of relationship I remember a student, it was again in my legal philosophy class which was a seminar and the student said this, only true friends can truly disagree. When she said that, I remember, wow, yes, I think you're right because only people who have a relationship can say things that they know the other person will disagree with and yet they won't be afraid of saying it because they know or they believe that the relationship is strong enough to sustain that. It's with strangers that we often were not willing to share things but it's with people who, you know, that you know that you can trust yourself to say certain things which you know other people might criticize and attack. Definitely having that relationship is there and how do you foster it? I don't believe in safe spaces and I'm glad to say that I'm not the only faculty member who rejects safe spaces but there is a certain level of safety that's needed because the purpose of safe spaces is not to have safe spaces so we don't feel threatened, it's to have a safe space where people feel comfortable enough to venture further than they feel comfortable doing and so definitely having a relationship with other students, knowing where students are coming from, believing that students aren't crazy even if you happen to think they are, what I'll say is I don't understand where they're coming from but that's because I'm not in their shoes. You know, trying to create a safe enough space for students to talk about things that they really believe it's essential. I really do try to show students that there are no taboos in my class. I don't know if other faculty would hold to that. In my class there is no such thing as a stupid question or forbidden question. I try to ask provocative questions. I try to always praise students for what they say. I don't always, I definitely don't always say I agree with it but I will say thank you for sharing something if it seems very sensitive. I will say thanks, things like thanks for your honesty, thanks for contributing that, thanks for raising that point even if, you know, I mean I don't assume, in fact one of the ground rules that I have in class is I tell students don't assume that just because someone mentions something or makes an argument, raises an argument that they necessarily agree with it. I think that's essential because if we always assume that we only say things that we ourselves hold then I said then there are many, there are a lot of positions and arguments that will never be raised because we're afraid that other people may think that's what we think. And when we're talking about law and arguments and what possible arguments could be made, I mean lawyers need to make arguments that they don't necessarily agree with, right? Lawyers work for clients whom they may personally despise and other people may find that despicable, right? Why would you want to defend that person? And I think most lawyers would say because that's what the law requires. And I would imagine, yeah, most non-lawyers might not be able to understand that because why would you ever want to do something that you think is wrong? Well, because there are some higher reasons, some higher purpose to doing something that is wrong. You know, cutting someone with a knife, you know, in one sense that may be wrong but if you're a doctor, if you're a surgeon, that's precisely what you do. And so, you know, there may be reasons to do things, to say things which some people will think is wrong. But if you're doing it for a different reason, it may not be wrong. I tell students, people do different things for the same reason and people do the same thing for different reasons. And therefore it matters why people do things, you know. I use this crazy example. I said, you know, if I bake you a cake, a fruit cake and I give it to you and say, happy birthday, you know, that means one thing. But if in the back of my mind I'm thinking and I hope you choke on one of the pits in the fruit and you die, happy birthday, you know, are the two people doing the same thing? Well, yes, they're doing the same thing, right? From the outside, they're giving you a birthday cake, wishing you happy birthday. But from the inside, right, if you get inside their head, it doesn't seem like they're doing the same thing. So, again, the why is really important.