Chris Evans, Mark Kassen, Joe Kiani

Actor Chris Evans, filmmaker Mark Kassen and technology entrepreneur Joe Kiani saw some years ago the lack of youth engagement in civic life and the challenges, especially for young people, in becoming educated on the issues without hyperbole.

This led Evans, Kassen, and Kiani to launch “A Starting Point” in 2017, a nonpartisan video-based online platform dedicated to creating a more informed electorate with a focus on high school and college students.

The website addresses major issues in easy-to-understand ways with video explainers from current and former members of Congress, governors, mayors, state legislators, and subject matter experts representing different points of view. 

During an appearance this year at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., Evans said one of the goals of A Starting Point is to “create more civic engagement” on issues that affect our lives and the well-being of the nation.

Creating a government that reflects the nation

Evans said A Starting Point seeks to “demystify” important topics by providing a digital home for people to hear directly from elected officials, but without hyperbole or having the conversations framed by commentators with their own political biases. Then individuals can make their own decisions, he said.

Under the heading “Starting Points,” the site offers interviews of politicians who provide two-minute answers on eight topic areas, including education, the environment, immigration and the economy. The section “Daily Points” offers quick video clips from Republican and Democratic lawmakers on current issues in the news, including topics such as bird flu and whether the U.S. should ban TikTok.

A third area, “Counterpoints,” hosts short debates between elected officials on a host of different subjects, while a section labeled “Explores” centers on conversations with lawmakers that seeks to clarify key issues.

A section called “Chat’ includes video discussions with current and former lawmakers and Cabinet members as well as experts dealing on subjects such as climate change, abortion and Middle East policy. There are also “Campus Conversations” section with a dialogue between members of Congress and college students.

Engaging young people

The three founders have pointed out that many potential voters, including young people, turn off the news and never discuss actual public policy because they are fed up with the bickering and partisanship that dominates the political landscape.

“I think you find that young people actually want clean information. I think they feel it’s either too daunting or too negative, so we try to create a place where they can start and break some complicated things down,” Kassen said in an interview with Axios.

Kiani has said that people go to their own echo chambers and never hear reasoned discourse on important issues.

 “We’re going to lay the framework for both parties to speak on the same issues and let people decide which way they think is the right way,” Kiani told Yahoo! Finance in 2020. “At the end of the day, the facts should be the facts.”

The trio hopes the site is helping to defuse some of the frustration and skepticism among young people with straightforward information that is intended to educate, not advocate, and hopefully spur discussion and more civic participation.

“Given everything that’s going on in the world, more engagement in politics is always a good thing,” Evans told People Magazine.” It will only help the government work better for us and better represent who we really are.”