Paperback, 144 pages, published September 2022. Is our democracy corroding? In this original, eloquent essay, Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens explore the ethics and politics of public debate - and the threat it now faces. Yet Aly and Stephens note a growing tendency to disdain and dismiss opponents, to treat them with contempt. This toxic partisanship has been imported from the United States, where it has been a temptation for both left and right. Aly and Stephens discuss some telling examples, analyse the role of the media, and look back to heroes of democracy who found a better way forward. Arguing that democracy cannot survive contempt, they draw on philosophy, literature and history to make an urgent case about the present. In our time, the answer increasingly seems to be- Nothing. Absolutely nothing.