Kurds v. ISIS. Hamas v. Israel. Ferguson residents v. police. Obama v. House Republicans. The news seems filled with standoffs. In the absence of success in getting their way, most of these parties have used violence. The extremists, who occupy the edges of most communities but are also the loudest, scream at their leaders not to compromise. Last month I forced myself to watch the partisan news stations FoxNews and MSNBC. In addition to there aversion to facts and accurate information, what seemed to characterize these shows was their derision of compromise. Even the word was uttered with the disdain a Red Sox fan might use when saying the word "Yankees." Like it is OBVIOUSLY bad and undesirable.

But the absence of compromise only leads to a couple of possible outcomes:

1. The stand off continues and the possibility for violence increases.

OR

2. The weaker party (physically, economically, militarily) agrees to the stronger party's demands - which usually appears to the stronger party as victory. But we all know that forced capitulation feels like manipulation, breeds resentment and is only a short term pause in the stand off.

Compromise is the only way to sustainable futures. Compromise is not capitulation. It is agreement to alternatives that can meet the interests of all concerned but not necessarily all of the interests of the concerned.