The Cost of Our Words
The Cost of Our Words.
A simple call,
fix the rhetoric issues in our country.
Who Am I?
My name is Colin Hortman. On June 14th, 2025, my parents were assassinated . In the months since, I've been grieving, advocating for policy change, and asking the same question on repeat:
what do we do so this never happens to another family?
Part of the answer starts with something deceptively simple. It starts with our words.
Retrain Your Ear
The language of our public life has drifted far from the way most of us were raised to talk to one another. Opponents have become enemies. Disagreement has become condemnation. And for people already on the edge, that language builds something dangerous: permission.
The same mechanism works in reverse. Language can de-escalate. It can re-humanize. It can remind us that the person across from us — the one we disagree with — is still a person.
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These organizations are doing that work. Engage with them. The ask is small. The effect, practiced daily, is not.
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dignity.us — The Dignity Index
An eight-point scale that measures whether language recognizes the humanity of others or strips it away. Their daily phrase exercise takes one minute. It retrains how you hear political language — and eventually, how you use it. Start here.
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braverangels.org - Braver Angels
Workshops and public forums where people with deeply opposing views sit down, face to face, and practice listening. Not to win. To understand. Open to anyone.
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disagreebetter.us - Disagree Better
An initiative focused on teaching people to engage across differences without contempt. Because you can hold your values firmly and still treat people with dignity. The two are not in conflict.
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eradicatehate.org - Eradicate Hate Global Summit
Research and prevention work focused on the pathways to radicalization — and how communities can interrupt them before they turn into violence.
What I am Doing
I'm speaking. That's the whole point — because I believe there is power in words, and I've seen what happens when we use that power carelessly.
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My message is simple: lower the temperature. Not by avoiding hard conversations, but by having them differently. The stories I share will make you laugh. They'll make you cry. And I hope they'll give you permission to lean into the things most of us have been quietly avoiding — grief, division, the gap between the people we are and the people we want to be.
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I built a speech around that message, and I'll be sharing it in more places soon.
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I also recently told a story called Rhubarb and Whiskey at a storytelling event in Rochester. It's the first piece I've shared publicly, and it's the one that started all of this. I'll be posting it here soon — I think you should hear it.
My aim, in everything I do, is to help people find what they have in common, to see each other as human, and to model conversations with dignity. That's good for your family, your workplace, your community — and yes, for this country too.
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It's going to take all of us. I'm glad you're here.