Sense and Sensitivity: Reaching Across the Political Divide

[cereta]

DEAR HARRIETTE: I have distanced myself from a friend who supported a different political party than me during the last election. She and I had gotten into some pretty brutal debates on social media, and I finally had had enough of it, so I blocked her on all social media and basically stopped talking to her. Although my side won, I have been questioning whether I should have distanced myself from her because of her political views. Is it too late to reach out to her and apologize? The last time we spoke was in October, and I miss her. -- Political Divides, Winston-Salem, North Carolina

DEAR POLITICAL DIVIDES: The great thing about living in a democracy is that our culture is designed for people to be able to fight hard for their beliefs and then regroup after an election. There is nothing easy about standing up for your party or candidate and facing off with people who do not share your views. Yes, sometimes friendships get fractured in the fray. During this past presidential election, people dug in along party lines. The levels of animosity, disdain, anger and dissension were extremely high. It can be hard to recover after such a swirl of emotion.

But you can do it. Or at least you can try. Reach out to your friend and ask if you can get together. Apologize for being so intense during the election season. Tell her that you miss her and hope you can restore your friendship.

Comments

[cereta]

Posting this because (a) I suspect many of us have been there at some point/are there right now, and (b) most recent letters on this general topic have come from the other side of the U.S. election.

I dunno. In this specific situation, I would say, reach out if you want to, but be prepared for the possibility that your friend is still angry, not just about past conversations, but about current events. I've been through a lot of U.S. presidential elections, and while my view is necessarily biased by my ideology, I have never seen an election that was less, "well, it's over now; time to go back to everyday life" than this one has been. Maybe your friend is ready to resume a friendship where you just don't talk about anything remotely political. But be prepared for the possibility that she may not be.

(Long paragraph about the general principle redacted because I can't get the words to say what I want them to say.)

[jadelennox]

I consider myself lucky, mostly, that I am not there, but according to the so-called liberal media, I think that means I am actually living in a liberal bubble and everything is my fault.

Anyway, she should totally reach out if she misses her friend, and it's worth saying that under all circumstances. But, it is not only the winner reaching out to the loser saying "now that's all water under the bridge, we can be friends again," it is quite seriously situation where the friend is probably desperately afraid of at least one of:

• the loss of their personal or family health insurance
• the decimation of their union or minimum wage
• the right to safely use a bathroom
• their home state's right to ignore their marriage
• the heartbreakingly cruel deportation of themselves, their family members, their neighbors, or their fellow citizens
• being killed in a hate crime, or having their place of worship bombed or burned down
• having themselves or their family members banned from the country
• or infinitely other things, including the existential threat to the republic

In other words, the LW's friend--someone who was already passionate about politics before the election-- is probably not in the mood to kiss and make up, unless they think they can convince their friend to change.

ETA: Hmm. I don't think this is a violation of the rules, but maybe it is. Let know you want me to delete this comment.

[cereta]

Nope, it's fine. You said a lot of what I deleted, anyway ;).

[wordweaverlynn]

The election felt like a referendum of whether people like me have a right to exist. Many of my family voted No. That does tend to chill a relationship.

[jadelennox]

colorwheel once helped me out when I was struggling with my inchoate disagreement with the notion that mature people overcome political disagreement in romantic relationships. (the same principal applies for all relationships.)

She pointed out that current political disgreements are not about roads or the gold standard or (mostly) tariffs. They are about who has the right to live in the country. Who has due process. Who can be married. Who can pee. Whether you can get life saving medical care. Who can vote. Whether it's our responsibility to make the tiniest goddamn effort to have a life-sustaining planet a century from now. Whether black lives matter. Whether cops can shoot you with impunity.

Or, from another point of view, whether the government will protect the unborn. Whether they can force you to buy things from private companies if you don't want to. Whether they can steal your money. Whether they can force you to do business with bad people.

Mature people who can have a civil exchange of views and try to converse with others and share different points of view are welcome and necessary. But the concept that these basic, fundamental questions of who is granted humanity are something that can overcome by mature, sensible people is patronizing and ridiculous. (Not that Harriette is saying that! But others do.)

[ellen_fremedon]

This. There are many political subjects on which reasonable people of good will can disagree, but the current state of ideological polarization means they've pretty much all become inter-party disputes.

[minoanmiss]

[deletes 1500 words or so]
This.