For context, we’re both past the 30-year mark, with myself in my mids and him pushing 40. We’ve known each other from Uni, have been best friends since, and the entire thing pretty much turned into a siblinghood, with his family sort of “adopting” me (I’m perpetually invited to all of their family events and gatherings, his parents love having me around, etc.) We’ve been there for eachother through some of our worst times, and we got along really well.
That is, until the Pandemic hit. This has been going on for a while now, but it started getting more pronounced during the Pandemic, when he went from sharing edgy memes to expressing belief in the principles behind those memes (think “I identify as an attack helicopter,” “immigrants are exclusively to blame for the downfall of countries,” 4chan type jokes about minorities, etc.).
On my end, I tried to discuss these things with him at first, trying to get a sense of why he was doubling down on these things, and the closest I could come to understand it is that it’s a relatively irrational fear, fuelled by his tendency to not really explore the veracity of the news he reads - as an example related to his transphobia, it’s like he refuses to accept that sex and gender are not inextricably linked to one another, not on a logical basis, but on a “I feel this is incorrect” basis.
Things got pretty tense back in 2022, when I felt the need to call a time off on our friendship for almost an entire year. I just couldn’t play it cool when he randomly blurted out something profoundly inconsiderate and devoid of empathy. Conversations turned from heated debates to outright arguments, I could tell that the gap was widening with every subsequent one, and his beliefs seemed to solidify.
We reconciled in 2023 after his wife reached out to me expressing regret that we would lose the friendship over “politics,” tried to get back to acting normally around one another, yet the same issues popped up again. This time, with even less empathy. The most recent example was when we both learnt that Trump got elected president again. I expressed a sense of empathy and regret for all of the people who would no longer be allowed to get abortions, the risk he posed to HRT beneficiaries, the danger he posed to all minorities, etc. The only thing he could come up with is “I feel nothing, they deserve it. Did it to themselves.” I called him out on his utter lack of empathy, we had a brief, but poignant argument, and now we’ve barely been talking for two weeks. He periodically drops a message like nothing happened, but I am beyond hesitant to reply. Everything is cold and superficial.
Now, I tried to understand him and his situation… He’s a relatively fresh father (his daughter is 2 years old), he is aware of the fact that the world isn’t doing too well, but seems to be in denial about it which I sort of understand as being a method of self-protection, but I just cannot abide by his views anymore. No amount of panic or self-defence justifies this in my opinion.
I just don’t know what to do. I mean, I do know, or at least my subconscious does, but… I don’t know, guess the age and depth of our friendship makes me hesitant to drop it, although this is just the sunk cost fallacy at play… The fact that I feel I’m past my socialite days and knowing that I probably won’t make any more friends any time soon doesn’t much help, either.
Guess I’m just looking for confirmation around what I already know is the only option…
It’s gross to hear he’s a Dad with a little girl and still holds these views. Not trynna badmouth your friend but that’s the first thing I thought of. I’d simply want to end anyone who tried to take my daughter’s right to be anyone she wants to be.
I 100% share your sentiment, I’d give my life just to know that my kid would have the freedom of self-determination…
Its crazy to watch every single disgusting 4chan trope and meme hit mainstream and actually be accepted.
I know exactly what you mean… I used to be very naïve and wanted to believe that people are essentially good, but may lose track of that through being misguided and confused. But after seeing how much things have degenerated around those moronic tropes, it’s like the gods themselves slapped me out of my joyous dreams…
Ok so you’ve had a lot of people talk about how your friend isn’t the same person anymore and you’re probably going to have to end it, so I’ll address the other underlying fear here.
You can and will make new friends and won’t be lonely.
The best advice I can give for making friends is going to things where it’s a large social event that has a shared interest. Conventions for whatever nerd stuff you’re into are great for this. Historical reenactment groups, anime, comics, whatever. When you’re at a place like this, you already have an in with people because you’re into the same thing as everyone else there and can talk to them about it.
Getting interested in other people always makes you more friends than trying to get them interested in you.
I’ve made more and longer friends in my 30s than I did in any other phase of my life. You seem like an empathetic and caring person, and kindness can get you a lot of friends out there. You’ve got this!
Thank you for the encouragement and for the sound advice!
I was actually planning on spreading out as of next year (2024 broke me, I am letting myself float somewhere outside of time and space until the year’s officially over), focusing mostly on as much volunteer work as I can find. Maybe I’ll get lucky and find a job in a related field, or something, that would definitely make my day.
As for conventions and social events, that’s a bit… tricky for me. So far, I’ve pretty much been the embodiment of the “adopted introvert” meme (for lots of reasons, most beyond my introversion), so it’ll be baby steps for a while. But you are right, I have to do some exposure therapy.
Those are very kind words and I can only hope that I deserve them!
People change. You can’t make them change. You can try to talk some sense into them but if that fails, it might be time to move on.
I had a friendship for 20 years that blew up over childish stuff. It took me a while to realize it was the best because she a self centered, abusive person. And I also realized that she wasn’t the same person I knew when we were growing up. I realized I didn’t miss the adult, I missed the childhood friend I had and that person disappeared when she changed as an adult. Sometimes it’s best to just let go.
Jesus, losing a 20-year friendship really sounds like losing family, I’m so very sorry…
I’ve been heavily codependent for most of my life, but I’ve worked for years to fix it. Believe me when I say I care too much for my hard earned nugget of mental health to give up on it for someone who spreads hatred, even if that person is my friend.
It sounds like he isn’t open to change and you don’t enjoy his company anymore. I think it’s time for a “you’ve changed man, and I don’t like this person you’ve become, if you ever get over this hatefulness you know my number, but until then don’t contact me.”
I hate to tell you it may be worth it to give up on him, it sucks for you, it’ll suck for him, and if I thought you’d change his mind it would benefit me for you to do so. But he seems committed, and when you apply force you often face an opposing force. Anything that might change him will be in his soul and it will involve him feeling consequences for his beliefs like the loss of friends.
And beyond that, sticking around will just prolong your heartbreak. Sometimes relationships end, and sometimes it’s ugly. We culturally accept that for romance, but it’s true for platonic, professional, and even familial relationships. There is only one person in the whole world you’re stuck living with for the rest of your life, and it’s you. I’ve found few regrets when I remember that fact before making hard decisions. Whatever choice you make here, make it one that someone you want to be would make.
You’ve hit the nail on the head, I did notice that my opinions seemed to push him even further into his…
I just wish he’d drop this fearful hate… I’ve come to know him as a decent guy over the years, and this shift took me completely by surprise. Hell, maybe the seed’s always been there, I don’t know anymore…
I do hate to send traffic back to reddit, but there’s a support group back there called r/foxbrain that we don’t have the equivalent of. They can help you out more if you need, this is specifically what they’re for.
Credit to u/ThatDanGuy over there for the following. This is more about people that specifically love Trump, but the conversational techniques can be applied more universally:
Let me give my two strategies:
- “I Don’t Trust the Guy.”
My current favorite approach is to be as simple and vague as possible. “I don’t trust the guy.” Repeat every time someone says anything about him or any other nutcase. Like a broken record. It gives them no where to go. If they do go into meltdown just cross your arms and repeat it.
Do NOT argue. Do not reason with them. Do not give them anything but those few words. It gives them no place to go. And it does put them in a bind. They and their dear leader will have to bear the responsibility of anything and everything that goes wrong. You bear no burden of proof or responsibly. Their guy won, so you need not defend any of your positions.
This avoids the problem of having to spend time arguing. And if you were to make a prediction, it won’t be proven until it comes true. What if something happens that mitigates your prediction? For example, if Trump only deports a few people, but makes a really big show of it. His voters will be convinced he did what he said he would (he didn’t in our scenario, but they won’t believe that) and then they will gloat over their false reality. So don’t give them anything they can win. Give them nothing.
2.: The Socratic Method.
This can be used defensively during a single encounter. It can be used to shut them up. However, it is intended more of an every time you have to talk to this person approach. Still, it may give you some tools you can use during one off encounters.
First, Rules of Engagement: Evidence and Facts don’t matter, reasoning is useless. You no longer live in a shared reality with this person. You can try to build one by asking strategic questions about their reality. You also use those questions to poke holes in it. You never make claims or give counter arguments. You need to keep the burden of proof on them. They should be doing all the talking, you should be doing none.
You can use ChatGPT or an LLM of your choice to help you come up with Socratic questions. When asking ChatGPT, give it some context and tell it you want Socratic questions you can use to help persuade a person.
The stolen election is an easy one for this. There is no evidence, and they will have no evidence to site but wild claims from Giuliani, Powell and the Pillow guy. Trump and his lawyer lost EVERY court case, and when judges asked for evidence, Giuliani and Powell would admit in court that there was NO evidence.
So, here is my interaction with ChatGPT on the stolen election topic, you can take it deeper than this if you like.
https://chatgpt.com/share/377c8a82-e6e0-4697-a9ae-a0162aa36061
A trick you can use is to ask them how certain they are of their belief in this topic is before you start down the Socratic method. On a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you that the election was stolen and there was irrefutable evidence that showed that? And ask the question again after you’ve stumped them. Making them admit you planted doubt quantifies it for themselves. And if they still give you a 10 afterwards it tells you how unreachable they may be.
Things to keep in mind:
You are not going to change their minds. Not in any quick measurable time frame. In fact, it may never happen. The best you can hope for is to plant seeds of doubt that might germinate and grow over time. Instead, your realistic goal is to get them to shut up about this shit when you are around. People don’t like feeling inarticulate or embarrassed about something they believe in. So they’ll stop spouting it.
The Gish Gallop. They may try to swamp you with nonsense, and rattle off a bunch of unrelated “facts” or narratives that they claim proves their point. You have to shut this down. “How does this (choose the first one that doesn’t) relate to the elections?” Or you can just say “I don’t get it, how does that relate?” You may have to simply tell them it doesn’t relate and you want to get back to the original question that triggered the Gallop.
“Do your own research” is something you will hear when they get stumped. Again, this is them admitting they don’t know. So you can respond with “If you’re smarter than me on this topic and you don’t know, how can I reach the same conclusion you have? I need you to walk me through it because I can’t find anything that supports your conclusion.”
Yelling/screaming/meltdown: “I see you are upset, I think we should drop this for now, let everyone calm down.” This whole technique really only works if they can keep their cool. If they go into meltdown just disengage. Causing a meltdown can be satisfying, and might keep them from talking about this shit around you in the future, but is otherwise counterproductive.
This technique requires repeated use and practice. You may struggle the first time you try it because you aren’t sure what to ask and how they will respond. It’s OK, you can disengage with a “OK, you’ve given me something to think about. I’m sure I’ll have more questions in the future.”
Good luck, and Happy Critical Thinking!
Bonus: This book was actually written by a conservative many years ago, but the technique and details here work both ways and are way more in depth than what I have above. It only really lacks my recommendation to use ChatGPT or similar LLM.
How to Have Impossible Conversations: A Very Practical Guide
edit because I got the DanGuy’s name wrong.
Oh, wow, thank you so much! I’ll do a deep dive into this, but I stopped holding out hope for any form of change about a year ago…
I won’t make this my primary focus, though, I’ve wasted enough of my mental health on people I believed I could “fix.”
I don’t have any answers, but I just had to send this one to a longtime friend last night:
Righto. Call me what you will, won’t change my mind
All because a casual mention of women’s baseball sent him on an anti-trans rant. It’s frustrating because we see eye to eye on a lot of things, but being willfully ignorant while immersing yourself in Xitter isn’t going to win any friends. In fact it’s already lost him at least one.
This is… heartbreakingly fitting… God damn it, I hate this situation so fucking much…
I was in a somewhat similar situation after the pandemic too. I used to be part of a local fighting game community in my region before COVID, even volunteering as staff for years. There were some great people in that group and I still have a couple really good friends from there.
But when the pandemic hit and all the “enlightened centrists” and people with the shittiest takes you’ve ever heard started crawling out of the woodwork like roaches, I felt more and more ill at ease being around them. People I’d known for years started spewing out the same gross attack helicopter jokes and edgy 4chan memes you mentioned.
A couple years back after one antisemitic joke too far (just to clarify, actually antisemitic, not anti-Israel), I decided I had enough and left the group discord and the game cold turkey. Instantly I felt my mental health improve. I searched around on Meetup and after a few months found another regional gaming group that was much more open and friendly, and I haven’t looked back since.
I’m also past the age of easily going out and making friends (early 30s), so I just want to say that it’s never too late to cut out people from your life who aren’t worth wasting your increasingly precious time with. I’m sure you’ve been through all the arguments trying to convince your friend to act reasonable to no avail, and if they continue to stick their fingers in their ears and live in a fantasy world, then let them. As much as it sucks to watch, it’s not worth your time, patience, or sanity to deprogram people once they’ve become radicalized.
Thank you, yeah… I barely have the energy to take care of myself, let alone deal with this bullcrap, I swear…
As for restarting my social life… that one’s really going to be a challenge… I can feel myself closing off, and living in a country where the grand majority of the population is made up of god-bothering regressives really doesn’t bring out the social animal in me…
As someone with scant social connections across the span or their life, I want to honor the difficulty of considering ending a friendship even when that friend’s world view is increasingly diverging from one’s own. I’m in a similar boat where my longest friendship, by far, is to someone whose become increasingly alt-right. We’ve been in the we-don’t-talk-about-certain-topics phase for a few years now. People, a la Reddit, might say Dump Them; but it’s not that easy or simple
You’re 100% right, it never is, even when it’s painfully obvious that it is the only solution left.
I’ve tried to avoid clashes, but they’re increasingly inevitable, both because he seems to be settling into his closed off state, and because I’m opening myself up to the world and its problems more and more. And it’s slowly becoming emotionally draining to have to dance around this particular flavour of disagreement because I cannot help but be intensely aware of the fact that these are the ideas which will make or break everything…
My best friend of 10 years slowly changed, then met a woman and completely cut off contact with me and the whole group of friends.
It hurt a lot, but really, it was fine. It’s ok if friendships don’t last forever. People change, sometimes for the worse, often you can’t do anything against it. You know what’s right, and you know that he isn’t anymore.
The world isn’t suddenly different if a friendship ends. The reason the friendship used to be great still hold true. It won’t be with that person anymore, but there are others for which these reasons will hold true again. It will require work to get to know other people again and start trusting them, building a deep relationship again, but it’s possible.
Thank you, yeah. It’s like losing family, especially after such a long time spent getting to know them. He genuinely is like a brother to me.
To be perfectly honest, it’s not the anticipation of solitude which gets me the most (I’ve been lonely my entire life and it’s just a dull ache at this point). It’s… It’s losing that history, y’know? And I know, the past isn’t real, but, at the same time, it’s real enough…
Classic case. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P55t6eryY3g
Unfortunately, if he cannot be reached and is not susceptible to any reason, then I’m afraid there’s not much you can do, other than making a decision for yourself and what’s best for you. Ultimately you cannot help people who don’t want the help. And as it stands, it seems like he turned into a terrible person, or somehow ended up showing his true colors. Either way, the conclusion to make would be the same. I was in a similar situation with my mother, ultimately had to cut her out of my life for my own sanity and mental well being. Being alone sucks, but is not that bad and definitely better than being surrounded by toxic people, and there’s always a chance to meet new people if you make an effort for it.
It’s so weird… I mean, we both used to go on /b/ back in Uni, but I always went there as a sort of… horror tourist, if that makes sense - to simultaneously laugh at the absurd closed-mindedness and hate and to study what people can become when under the protection of anonymity. I never actually thought he took anything seriously, and it’s been such a long time since then.
He’s not horrible, he’s… I don’t know how to put this, like an aggressive defensiveness of sorts. And, I mean, I get it, he had a kid just as the world was shown to be sinking and people started going nuts, they’re having financial issues like most of us. Add to that the “standard” fatigue which comes with having to care for a very smart kid, and I get why he’d close himself off to the world and to his empathy. But instead of looking at the actual problems, it’s like he’d rather blame the easiest targets for it. Which is why I frequently got contradicting ideas from him, and which is why I’m so confused about our friendship… It frequently feels like I’m talking to my granddad, who was one of the staunchest, most aggressive Conservatives I’ve ever met…
Truth is, I don’t even know what is and what isn’t getting through to him. For instance, one day we can concur that Late Stage Capitalism is the cause of, let’s say, 85% of contemporary problems, the next it’s “people are suffering because they don’t man up and deal with it” (not the “let’s rise up and change things” kind, the “swallow it down then BAU” kind)…
Edit after watching: exactly as I was thinking that maybe I should stick by him and try to pull him away from the danger, the video punched me right in the gut with pure truth… I fucking hate living in this country, it feels like it’s taking everything truly important away from me…
Yeah, it’s like there is 2 ways you can go when trying to continue being able to be happy. You either choose to focus only on what you can change and try not to think about stuff that you can’t have any effect on anyway, or if you can’t limit the scope of your empathy, then you just have to shut it off entirely. Limiting the scope is more work, and you are still constantly susceptible to sad things, but you retain your humanity. And are capable of some amount of happiness. Shutting it down completely is easier, but then you slowly morph into a monster.
Wanna know something ironic? It was his wife who gave me the push to actually embrace my empathy.
My mental health was like String Theory for a while: “we’re pretty sure something is there, but we’ll get back to you in a decade or three.” It got so bad, that I started spiraling down the I Don’t Care route just to detach from my feelings. His wife told me “why do you say you don’t care when you obviously do?” That stuck with me and it brought me back from nihilism, motivating me to pour all of the energy I could into caring, into facing and understanding the discomfort, hell, even starting to study politics!
And now, when I’m fully dedicated to my caring about everything I find valuable, they both tell me I care too much…
The issue with letting go is the feeling “I can fix him” or maybe nostolgia. A person can only change if they want to and if he is proud of himself right now there won’t be any change.
Keep in mind ppl call me a total cold a hole regularly, but if you want to stay, maybe think about what is/will be in this friendship that is worth fighting for and How much worst did life get without him for a year?
I’m in same boat with brother and father. I cut my father off since that’s a lost cause with 0 benefit. even if he sees the light, he’s dead weight. I’m on the fence with my brother since i see him all the time and he does feel pain when I counter his opinion.
I feel you bud. Having issues with sibling and parent myself in similar shoes. I keep trying with them, reaching out and letting them know I’m willing to talk but these days all I get back is memes and things like “get red pilled”. I finally wrote them both a message saying that unless they are willing to have a conversation, I am done reaching out.
Apparently I’m now the childish one for the ultimatum.
I asked my brother why doesn’t he care about the rights of his sisters and cousins and he said I was gaslighting him. I felt so much disappointment.
How did a guy go from Chess champion to this. I used to look at the trophy with pride since i taught him how to play and now It makes me feel sad to look at. I spent a year working on his gift and now I dk if I want give it. I was soo excited months ago.
Jesus Christ, this sounds uncannily familiar… It’s like they’re all cut from the same cloth, I swear…
I’m genuinely sorry you’re going through this, had to cut my family off, too (racists and casual eugenics enjoyers, in addition to just being overall shitty and abusive people). I stopped expecting people to change a long time ago, which is why I know what I have to do. It’s just… so fucking hard to lose yet another familial relationship.
I hope things will work out with your brother, though, it sounds like he’s relatively open, although still reticent to take the plunge, so to speak.
Thanks. I’m not sure where to go since my anger and disgust is in my own way right now. He was locked in his room for Thanksgiving thanks to her GF getting angry over something minor. I don’t get a chance to talk to him since we have different shifts now. I’m well in bed when he comes home. Besides, I’m not sure how to approach it without losing my cool. I’ve never been accused of being a composed person.
I have been told I’m too composed and, believe me, I have no idea, either… It’s beyond difficult to deal with this, it’s downright devastating…
I truly hope you’ll manage to find some peace, whichever way that may be…
The “only” part is a big problem, although I am sure you can get a lot of advice here about meeting new people, but I will confirm your option that cutting him off is the right thing to do. I was in a worse situation than you with my best friend and I cut him off and I am now glad I did:
I met him when I was in middle school here in Indiana- I came from a tiny private elementary school where the sixth grade glass had 11 kids and the ones I was friends with went to the other middle school in town. I was a weird kid and I was bullied a lot, so I kept my mouth shut for a lot of seventh grade and made no friends. He was one of the first friends I made in eighth grade and we hit it off immediately and never ran out of things to talk about because we had so many of the same interests. We also could make each other laugh really easily. It was a great friendship. We hung out together most days and even in college, since we both went to the university in the town where we lived, we hung out all the time.
He ended up being the best man at my wedding. When he was in a long term relationship in the U.S., it was before gay marriage was legal. When it ended, he moved down to Mexico for a while and found a new boyfriend who he snuck into the country illegally. We let them stay with us in when we were living in L.A. for over two weeks while they got things arranged. The boyfriend basically spoke no English and it was a super awkward time, but we put up with it.
Some time after that, when my daughter was a newborn, he called me up one day and said he was going to do a pop-up restaurant event in the town where we grew up and where he was now living again and asked me for a $400 loan. He’s a really brilliant guy and excelled when he went into a career in restaurants and managing them, so this was plausible. I told him he knew we didn’t have any money right now because we had a baby, but maybe call my mom and ask her. Which he did and she gave it to him.
Now I knew he had what was essentially a life-long drug and alcohol problem. It had never ruled his life, but it had definitely held him back more than once. But I really didn’t know what a lie of a life he was showing to me. Of course, the $400 was probably for drugs. There was definitely no pop-up restaurant. My mom and I asked him to pay her back multiple times and he kept making excuses. Then one day he ran into her in a grocery store and he hugged her and started chatting with her as if the $400 thing never happened. It was really clear it was never going to be paid back.
So it hurt. A lot. But I cut him out of my life. I knew I had to. Who knows what other lies he had told or would tell to try to manipulate people so close to him? That was a bit more than fourteen years ago and I talked to him only once since then- he asked to make amends, I told him to pay back my mom, he never did. As far as I am concerned, I will not be talking to him again.
And then more recently I realized that I could look up his criminal history in Indiana. His criminal record was over two pages long. I knew he was in jail for a couple of days because of a DUI when he was in his 20s, basically the entire time since he had returned to Indiana in his late 30s to his late 40s, the age we are now, he had been arrested multiple times on drug and fraud charges. At the time I looked him up, he was in prison for possession of meth cooking equipment (he’s out now). Bear in mind, he’s not some dumb hick. He composed classical music in high school and got into the Indiana University School of Music, a really prestigious music school, for music composition, which is not an easy thing to do. He ended up in jail because he was cooking meth. I started contacting all of our mutual friends and found out all of them had cut him out of their lives at various points in the last fifteen to twenty years as well.
So yeah, it’s hard. It hurts. But do it. Definitely do it.
Thank you so much for sharing this, and I’m so very sorry you had to go through it. It sounds absolutely horrible…
But you’re right… This isn’t just a difference of opinion, this is a pretty big difference in values, and I don’t think he’ll mellow out any time soon…
Edit: related to him being my only friend, it’s a relatively recent occurrence. I live in a country where progressive… anything isn’t really all that much of a thing for most people, and the Pandemic has been disgustingly effective at bringing out people’s true colours. Which is why I had to cut it off with a lot of people I knew. Just couldn’t handle their gratuitous toxicity anymore…
I’ve heard a saying that sometimes it’s better to pay someone to not see them again. $400 is a bit high though!
Plus, he would have come back for more.
In your example, after you rectified your relationship, you said you talked about the election. If you hadn’t brought up the election, do you think they would have?
If you think they could maintain a politics-free discussion with you, it seems like you could still be friends with them. But you can’t bring up politics either.
For example, I have many people I work with, who I don’t agree with all of their ideologies, and that’s okay. We can still be friendly, heck we can still be friends. We just don’t talk about politics. At all. And it’s great
If, on the other hand, they’re going to keep talking about politics leading to arguments. Then yeah it’s time to quit the friendship.
Honest question, since I’m having this trouble with my dad.
How do you genuinely have a light hearted chat with someone who thinks your friends should be deported or have their rights taken away, and who would expect his own grand daughters to carry a rapist’s baby to term?
I can’t seem to divorce the two.
The same way you chat with someone with advanced dementia. You avoid topics that might distress them, accept that their capabilities are limited and that you might have your feelings hurt. Try not to hold it against them. If you love them enough to do this with the knowledge that they will not change (except to get worse), take comfort in the fact that you are probably slowing their decline. Cherish the moments where you’re still able to connect. Endure for their sake, basically.
Not saying you should continue the relationship, but if you choose to this is one way to think about it.
Just like you would work with someone who you don’t agree with. Focus on a shared activity that isn’t politics.
People are more then their political agendas.
No, this person is denying other people’s right to exist.
I think cutting them out completely is the right move.
Not that many people in the world who you can depend on, who will show up at 3am if you need them no matter what… i caution against throwing away those very strong bonds over politics.
It’s human rights not politics.
Eventually, yes. I can tell he’s “tuned into” the state of things, ironically, even though he’d rather close his eyes to it (not judging or blaming him, not that hard to understand why), and politics, whether he realises it or not, come into play pretty frequently.
Thing is, this isn’t just about politics, this is a clear divergence of core values. It also reflects throughout his general behaviour, though in lesser quantities, so to speak. Like the instant it started becoming obvious that the world isn’t ok, he balled up and… I dunno, started coping through these opinions, I guess…
It should be possible to maintain a friendship, especially one based around shared activities - with someone who has different core values.
That’s the thing, I’ve been trying to do just that for basically the last year and a bit. Even decided to pull the trigger on moving to the same city as them (I attended Uni here, but then moved to a different region), thinking that maybe if we met up face-to-face more than we used to it’d help alleviate things a bit. But this was just the latest disagreement to happen between us.
And don’t get me wrong, I don’t expect any sort of relationship to happen smoothly and effortlessly, we’re human and pretty much irrational at the worst of times (myself included). And with things going the way they’re going in general, I can tell I’ve not been at my best for a good while, either. I don’t know if I can deal with any future occurrences, as I can feel that I’m not getting any more cheerful or optimistic as time passes.
I’ll give it some more time, was planning on doing so anyway, and I’ll consider things from your perspective as well. I have too much respect for him to rush this…
You moved cities to be closer to your best, and pretty much only, friend. That’s intense. I think there is a more urgent need to increase the total number of friends you have.
For your special circumstance, I think its BETTER to have a friend you have serious political issues with, then having NO friends at all. Humans are social creatures.
Whatever you have to do to expand your friend pool, I would encourage you to do so.
Ah, sorry, must’ve expressed it wrong.
No, that was a decision I’d been mulling over for several years and several reasons. Our friendship was one of the big reasons, yes, but I mainly needed to get out of my old context, needed a change.
As far as expanding my friend pool, it’s… in the works. But I really can’t deal with extreme differences in views, not in the here and now. My mental health’s been heavily dented for several years now (fixed some problems, then the world exploded), I genuinely can’t deal with casually interacting with people with whom I fundamentally disagree…
I’d rather be alone than surrounded by people I know I can’t trust.
It’s only political in so far as one side of the political spectrum is intent on actively creating new misery and extending suffering and the other side (which is the center) wants to maintain the status quo, which is a passive slow bleed suffering smothered in anxiety but you’re dumbed from the blood loss.
It’s about choosing to grow negativity. That’s the divide, not politics. The fact that it represents itself in politics is just another layer of disappointment, but it’s not the main issue here.
In the US the voting blocks are about 50/50; If it’s impossible to be friends with people from the other voting block, it will be hard to persuade them to the other voting block.
Is there any merit to his positions? Have you budged at all yourself?
I honestly fail to find any merit in what he’s shared so far. All I see is gratuitous hatred and a refusal to actually investigate and understand. He seems very comfortable in his beliefs and, I dare say, quite aggressive toward anything which threatens said comfort…
As far as if I’ve budged or not, I’m getting closer and closer to being a radical Leftist (I hold nothing but disdain for Authoritarianism, to be clear) based on my own principles and understanding. I’m downright galloping, but directly away from the beliefs he holds.
It’s sad to watch someone close go down that trail of fear and anger. I’m hoping you can find some common ground, an olive branch that might help bridge the gap and start bringing him back to the light.
What worked for me was what I call the Pluto Play.
The idea is to acknowledge to him that yes, unril very recently, in common parlance, gender and sex meant the same thing. However, language gets more refined, and consensus has allowed us to give two distinct meanings to the words. However, consensus hasn’t been universal (yet).
Pluto, for the longest time, was considered a planet. However, language had gotten more refined, and consensus has allowed us to reclassify Pluto. While a lot of us ironically joke that it’s still a planet, consensus is slowly becoming universal.
By linking the two concepts in his mind, it gives him something to think about in his own way, and if he can concede even one universal truth to the cause of egalitarianism, he’ll always be open to changing again.
Good luck to ye!
(Edit:Spelled “some” as ,“aome”…fixed)
Thank you! That’s not a bad idea, although I honestly don’t hold much hope for it ending up being successful in any way. This really does feel like a stalemate…
