Would you be friends with someone who had different political views?

MrWonka said:

Have you considered the possibility that the reason why the country is so divided politically is because we're so afraid to lose friends and family over it? The only time anyone ever discusses the subjects is when they don't have to look their opponents in the eye. We avoid confrontation with the people we love and convince ourselves that our political enemy is someone other than out own parents.

It's like Trump him self proclaimed. If you want a good deal you have to be willing to walk away. If your friends and family know they can support a corrupt, racist, misogynist, xenophobic, homophobic, dishonest, ego-maniacal criminal for president and still not lose any of their loved ones why exactly would they ever bother to examine their life choices.

At some point it becomes enabling. Like helping an alcohol avoid the repercussions of their drinking. My parents are voting to destroy the planet so my children and I will suffer for that. Helping them stick their heads in the sand and avoid the reality of how angry I am at them for that doesn't do me any good.

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Don't think that if you dis-own them, friends and family members will all of a sudden examine their life choices. Even if they did, they'd still come to the same conclusions.

It is what it is.

HIP56948 said:

Don't know about being friends with all the people on your poll but I've tried to follow my Fathers words: "It's too damn hard figuring out who to be nice to or not be nice to, so I'm just nice to everyone"

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That's a good rule to live by

Is this thread about befriending people with different views or the people in the poll that have the power to actually act on them? I can get along with just about any regular person, but if they assumed office and started acting on some of things I found repulsive then I would stop being friends with them.

I don't think I'd go out of my way to befriend an enthusiastic supporter of any of the above, but I have friends across the political spectrum.

MrWonka said:

Have you considered the possibility that the reason why the country is so divided politically is because we're so afraid to lose friends and family over it? The only time anyone ever discusses the subjects is when they don't have to look their opponents in the eye. We avoid confrontation with the people we love and convince ourselves that our political enemy is someone other than out own parents.

It's like Trump him self proclaimed. If you want a good deal you have to be willing to walk away. If your friends and family know they can support a corrupt, racist, misogynist, xenophobic, homophobic, dishonest, ego-maniacal criminal for president and still not lose any of their loved ones why exactly would they ever bother to examine their life choices.

At some point it becomes enabling. Like helping an alcohol avoid the repercussions of their drinking. My parents are voting to destroy the planet so my children and I will suffer for that. Helping them stick their heads in the sand and avoid the reality of how angry I am at them for that doesn't do me any good.

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Exactly. Also, this poll is set up a bit dishonestly, IMO (especially since it directly referenced my thread). The question isn't whether you can tolerate political differences in friends/family, its whether you have any line whatsoever in choosing who to engage with in social discourse. I gave two examples: war atrocities and racist tiki-torch chants. The OP didn't want anything to do with these examples.

MrPeanut said:

Is this thread about befriending people with different views or the people in the poll that have the power to actually act on them? I can get along with just about any regular person, but if they assumed office and started acting on some of things I found repulsive then I would stop being friends with them.

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Bad examples for sure. Sorry.

Lovebug said:

Bad examples for sure. Sorry.

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It isn't a big deal. I just wanted to know if you were asking if I would befriend Bush or if I would befriend someone who supported Bush. No to the former and yes to the latter.

Lovebug said:

We were talking about it in the Ellen thread. Politicians, co workers, neighbors, how selective are you?

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I have many dear freinds who i disagree with politically. They are all good people we just disagree on which approach best serves society. Its a legitimate disagreement but its nothing people should lose a freindship over.

Doind so is s silly as a jewish person who only will be freinds with practicing jews.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

Hatuey said:

Ask an Iraqi/Syrian/Vietnamese/Cambodian adult whose entire family was bombed straight to Chiron's raft if they could be friends with Bush, or JFK, or Nixon, Obama or anyone who would order these bombings.

Ellen can be friends with him because they're both sitting in a literal atmosphere of luxury and his choices did not have any material effect on her life. I could probably have a beer with those guys too, but I wouldn't kid myself about how their decisions have affected people on the other side of the world all in the name of maintaining American hegemony. I certainly wouldn't think of them as 'friends'.

Feel good talk show rhetoric should probably not be used to determine whether or not you can be friends with someone.



Sent from the Matrioshka in the WH Christmas tree.

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I've lived and worked abroad most of the time since 1996, in East Asia and in Southeast Asia (I've amazed myself by this). There are numerous things I'd say about getting along with people who are radically different from you and who are opposite our own society, its values, its culture and civilization.

The first paragraph of your post does however focus powerfully on one aspect of what foreigners in their own land say about the USA. It is that despite the US government bombing hell onto a lot of foreign countries and people, and blowing up so many foreign people in their own lands, the government of the US is -- on balance -- very good to a fault to its own people. This is at least the view from abroad, where most governments shat on their people as the everyday normal, regular and routine.

Now with Trump however foreigners I interact with at work and socially say Trump is both divisive and cruel to his own people, ie, Americans in our own land. It's nearly unanimous among populations abroad that I interact with that Trump is as bad and as awful as any foreign nastyass ruler who abuses and shats daily on his own people in their own land. In the case of Trump of course it's Americans in the USA who are being maltreated by him.

Another way to say it is that since the Trump presidency Americans in our own land have become treated as foreigners who are subject to the same kind of abuse and maltreatment so many peoples have always suffered in the many ****hole countries of the world due to their own tyrant rulers and weak rule of law and their non existent institutions of laws. The bottom line in this is obvious, ie, that America has lost its luster to the cruelty of Putin-Trump and their native born American Rowers.

i am a staunch small government moderate conservative....and my wife is a moderate democrat

we disagree on more than we agree on as far as politics goes....

but we are happily married, and are and have been best friends for a LONG time

we can discuss most of the things we differ on, but in reality we know we arent going to change each others minds

we have friends who are both liberals, and conservatives....and who are donors to both parties

some dinner discussions have gotten quite lively....but intelligent people can disagree on a matter and still remain friends

religion is the one area where we all try to stay away from....it is a personal choice and personal opinions....and we have found it doesnt go well with lively debate

d0gbreath said:

If you don't discuss religion and politics you can be friends with everyone.

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Part of the problem facing our country is we as a whole have lost the ability to discuss either of these topics in a civil manner.

If you only have friends from one political side you are a true bigot.

Lovebug said:

We were talking about it in the Ellen thread. Politicians, co workers, neighbors, how selective are you?

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I would at least entertain friendship with all if only to see what makes them tick.... Only to drift away from one or two (Trump specifically)

straykatz said:

Part of the problem facing our country is we as a whole have lost the ability to discuss either of these topics in a civil manner.

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Looking back, I'm not sure when it was that we had that ability.

d0gbreath said:

Looking back, I'm not sure when it was that we had that ability.

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Civility and manners in general are dying arts.

Lovebug said:

We were talking about it in the Ellen thread. Politicians, co workers, neighbors, how selective are you?

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That kind of depends on the definition of "friends" but I'd damned sure go to a ballgame or go fishing with Bush, Bill Clinton, Trump, Pelosi or the Pope. I'd gladly meet Obama, Hillary or AOC socially. Beyond that, I don't know that I'd volunteer my truck and my back to help any of them move.

Three of them it would be an honor to meet.

Three of them deserve respect for their service.

One I would avoid literally like the plague.

Would you be friends with someone who had different political views?

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Of course I can!
And I think it is normal human behaviour.

americanwoman said:

Also, to add, it's fun to have people around you to discuss opposing views. That's why we're here on this forum, no?

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I don't know if that applies to everyone here...

lurchadams said:

Your poll didn't allow for more than one choice.. I'd befriend Obama first, then AOC, then Pelosi. Bush is a war criminal and trump is narcissistic sociopath. So no, on either of those folks.

Having said that, I wouldn't give anyone a hard time if they wanted to hang out with trump or bush. It's wrong for anyone to try to control who someone else hangs out with.

P.S.: I have a mad crush on Tulsi Gabbard, and I'd love to be friends. The only thing I don't like about her is that she's so stuck up.. she never calls or texts me

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You wouldn't want to be friends with Bush due to him being a war criminal, and yet you would befriend Obama and Pelosi?

Lovebug said:

We were talking about it in the Ellen thread. Politicians, co workers, neighbors, how selective are you?

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I'm a right moderate and my wife is a left moderate. She hates Trump, I don't love Trump but I will defend him from the left's insanity. She doesn't keep up with the issues and gets brainwashed with biased media coverage more than she realizes. She thinks she can sort it all out but only to a degree. She forms her opinions but will ask me about a particular thing in the news that she doesn't know anything about. That's what kind of shows me that she is brainwashed more than she realizes when she obviously doesn't know the details of important subjects and yet has an opinion on them anyway. Thank God though that she sees flaws in a few liberal ideas and policies and doesn't buy into them hook, line, and sinker. The farther left the ides are the more she sees they are nuts.