I learned an important lesson early in my adult life. Did you know that you can oppose something without endorsing the opposite thing?

What I mean is, just because a person might be in opposition with Second Amendment purists, that doesn’t mean the person is anti-Second Amendment.

That was enlightening for me to learn because I was still in that mindset of what I call playground logic.

Playground logic is basically: X isn’t true, so Y must be. It’s an attempt to resolve problems by putting everything into black and white categories. But as we age, we learn that life is often more complicated and the problems are more nuanced, and there are more frequently different shades of gray.

A few years before my father died, he was curious to know what made me go from being a proud right-wing conservative to a more open progressive type. We had a discussion that led to a talk about socialized medicine. And we both learned an important lesson. Though we both walked on opposite sides of the political spectrum, we still agreed much more than we disagreed.

I pointed out to him that, living in a market-driven economy, the way things work best is when everyone has the purchasing power to participate in the market. I pointed out that treating health care as a commodity separates quality of life even more drastically into the categories of the haves versus the have-nots.

I pointed out that needing medical care without insurance is not only cost-prohibitive, but it also could easily lead to advanced medical problems by leaving a condition untreated, and could lead to removing a person from the workforce and reducing their participation in the market. Basically, it’s bad for the economy.

My dad didn’t outright dispute my point. He agreed in principle. But then he said, “I shouldn’t have to pay for someone else’s health care.”

I pointed out to him that he already did. I simply pointed out that all insurance is, is a middle man. When you pay your monthly premium, that money essentially goes into a pot. The insurance company uses that money to pay claims. But — and this is vitally important — when an insurance company can deny payment of a claim, that’s money that doesn’t get spent on the insured.

How do you think it is that insurance executives make millions of dollars in salary? You’re paying them, while also paying for other policy members’ claims.

The average family of four has to pay approximately $12,000 in a calendar year to maximize their insurance benefits (after deductibles, premiums and co-pays). But a proposed Medicare-for-all plan would be an increased tax burden of approximately $1,200 per year, per taxpayer. The single-payer system eliminates the profit motive from the occasion.

Upon examining the information and seeing that there is actually a dollars-and-sense reason to support single-payer health care, my father agreed with me and changed his view.

And we both learned that the primary reason we were seemingly at odds on so many things is because that’s what we were told. Both sides are so vocal and yell so loudly and angrily that we are distracted.

Why would someone want us divided on most issues by keeping us distracted by only a few issues? Ask yourself who would stand to gain from that. Those who want us at odds with each other aren’t going to reduce their volume, so we need to learn to just step away from all of the political theater and quietly focus on the issues that truly matter.

Maybe then we will see some real progress for both sides.