This has been a concern of mine for awhile now, and it’s finally happening. My only close friends are people I have grown up my whole life with. We’re all suburbanite cishet crackermen who were well-off enough to never have to struggle with potentially starving or becoming homeless; predictably, this has fostered some garbage politics, mainly trumpanzees and blue MAGA. With Cheeto Hitler removing whatever shreds of a mask of humanity the Great Satan had left, I now have my blue MAGA friends calling out my trumpanzee friends for their support of Drumpf. The trumpanzees have been silent since the inauguration, and today the group chat has been split.
It was already a terrible form of liberalism for me to have let things slide for the sake of peace and friendship with people who, if I wasn’t already close to, would throw in the cuck pit. There is still a major issue in that the most vocal of the friends I’m still in touch with are blue MAGA to the point that, if I’m to grow a spine and actually stop letting things slide, I’m worried that I’ll be smeared as fascist myself and lose the close friends I have because pushing back against great man theory takes that make Orange Satan out to be a uniquely evil force instead of recognizing the evil of the system that produced him will invariably come across as defending Trump. I’m bad at making myself go outside, let alone making friends, that I’ll have very few IRL people in my actual life.
Edit: The issue seems to have been deeper than politics, and the sides reconciled. However, the baseline seems to be “no outright evil political beliefs”, and Marxism Leninism is considered evil by most burgers.
It was already a terrible form of liberalism for me to have let things slide for the sake of peace and friendship with people who, if I wasn’t already close to, would throw in the cuck pit. There is still a major issue in that the most vocal of the friends I’m still in touch with are blue MAGA to the point that, if I’m to grow a spine and actually stop letting things slide, I’m worried that I’ll be smeared as fascist myself and lose the close friends I have because pushing back against great man theory takes that make Orange Satan out to be a uniquely evil force instead of recognizing the evil of the system that produced him will invariably come across as defending Trump. I’m bad at making myself go outside, let alone making friends, that I’ll have very few IRL people in my actual life.
Comrade, I know exactly what you’re talking about. I’m the exact same way. I’m only recently getting enough confidence to be more open about my beliefs to the very few people still around me. And to be honest it’s not easy to deal with other people when we are like that.
That being said, in a couple of months it will be two years since I completely ditched my last friend group. The reason I ditched them is because they were actual fascists. Me being a centrist lib at the time didn’t fully realize it, and being autistic it took me way to much time to realize that their irony was actually their real opinions, just disguised for plausible deniability. Since they were my only friends I would let things slide, wouldn’t say anything and would just take it silently. Until I couldn’t anymore, I was becoming more left by the day and was starting to see through them, to the point I couldn’t remain there.
The downside is that I’m very lonely now, but I rather be lonely than at the side of literal monsters that want concentration camps and want women to not be able to vote, both things they seriously told me the last time I spoke with them.
Each situation is unique and you’ll have to decide if it’s worth to continue doing what you’re doing or not.
I’ve lost a few friends over politics, and I don’t regret it. In terms of making new friends, my suggestion would be to try joining a hobby club of some sort. It’s a lot easier to make friends if you already have some shared interest you can connect over. It does involve going outside, but if it’s something you enjoy then it’ll help you get out of the house which is a bonus of itself.
Edit: The issue seems to have been deeper than politics, and the sides reconciled. However, the baseline seems to be “no outright evil political beliefs”, and Marxism Leninism is considered evil by most burgers.
I’m curious, have you ever discussed your beliefs with any of them? Could even be one on one with whoever you think is most reasonable if you’re afraid of them ganging up on you about it. Some of them might be more open to hearing you out than you assume. Doesn’t mean they’ll 180 their views, but if there’s one thing liberals tend to be good at, it’s putting on a dinner party face when they drastically disagree. So as long as you aren’t coming out of the gate singing the Soviet National Anthem and saying “Stalin and Mao did nothing wrong, landlords get rekt,” it may not be as bad a reaction as you’d think. You could start with softer anti-imperialist views, like discussing US history of coups or how many military bases it has across the world or it having the highest incarceration rate in the world or its history of deception with MKUltra or the John Stockwell interview. Putting into perspective first what kind of source country is informing them on other countries. Could see if they are willing to take facts like that in stride or if they’re going to go full denial, in which case, you may not get much of anywhere.
Also it will probably go better if you’re able to approach it gradually on your own terms, rather than going off after letting your frustration build.
I’m curious, have you ever discussed your beliefs with any of them?
Beyond the occasional Marxist dogwhistle, no.
To the rest of your comment, that does sound like a good way to go about it. I bring up easier to broach anti-imperialist topics when something relevant comes up. Some stuff would be a bit more random to broach, like Operation Gladio or something. You’re definitely right that I should do this gradually, because if I get too frustrated I might end up hastily burning bridges I’d rather keep intact.
In my view, if your politics make your friends angry and it’s anything besides “Hitler had good ideas” then you’re probably better off.
Just be logical and reasonable, and try to understand where they are coming from without being condescending. With my lib friends, I try and ask a lot of questions and adopt the materialist view of what is actually true and exists. Just keep optics in mind and understand you are having a struggle session with your friends, keep in mind to use stuff like “I” statements. If they are your real friends, they will listen to what you have to say, if they leave, that’s on them. There’s 8 billion people.
I don’t want to get into details as to not dox myself. But I’m having this happen right now.
Ultimately, the conservatives in the chat were either wreckers (deliberately disrupted the chat if any left issue was on topic) or were pedantic debate lords about everything, especially trans issues. Also, every one of them is a rabid anticommunist. I have tried over the years to explain my perspective, to offer information, to be patient, and now I’m more educated but I’ve run out of patients.
The libs in the room (one of them being queer) Came to their defence after I lampooned them recently after almost a year of no contact. I stopped being a wimp about it, and I called a spade a spade this time around. I guess the two transphobes in the chat room didn’t appreciate it because they both left at some point. Not the first time. I was told to be civil, which is fucked in the context. At the height of the anti-trans stuff several years ago in Texas, we had a huge debate back and forth and one of the conservatives told me in no uncertain terms that DCF should be used against parents with trans kids. Apparently, I’m the one who’s supposed to be civil, though.
Everyone’s situation is different I guess. I have a good relationship with work friends who are more progressive. I have some promising parent friends who live in town. But that’s only recent.
I was told to “not be a stranger” by someone who never reaches out to me directly, after the smoke cleared. Its a two way street.
My suggestion is to move away and make new, cooler friends
Stupid friends aren’t friends worth having. Start a fight with them all.
Hit the blue maga nerds for being every bit as stupid as the maga chuds. Demonizing trump and his followers is just as ignorant as the trumpists demonizing marginalized people.
Maga hate immigrants and lgbtq people because while their living standards were falling the dems were wasting tons of time and effort pandering to marginalized people. Blue maga might be stupider because they think that pandering was real progress and that Maga chuds are the ones to blame for the fall in living standards. Both sides are just blaming fellow victims. Both sides are fucking idiots who refuse to look up and see their real enemy are the fat fuck capitalists who are purposely confusing the issues so that nobody comes at them.
Yes LGBTQ rights, abortion, immigration, etc. are important issues but until the political system is fixed so that the billionaires aren’t the only ones with any power those issues will just be flicked back and forth as distractions meant to keep people from addressing the real issue of wealth inequality. You will never get equality between sexes, races religions, and sexualities while the super rich are in control because if everyone was equal except the rich we’d all come together to eat the rich.
Stupid friends aren’t friends worth having. Start a fight with them all.
I’d probably do that if they weren’t my only friends and I’m shit at making friends.
I lost pretty much my entire friend group recently because I called out how one of them is a fake activist while working for a defense contractor. They did not like that one bit!
They were my friends through all of high school and college, and while it stung a little bit at first I genuinely feel so much better about it. You’ll make new friends, I found myself sitting in a shell not going out because I had all my social interaction satisfied by the group chat.
Your choice but it won’t be the end of the world, I promise.
Unfortunately, the only way to keep friendships under these conditions healthy, is for EVERYONE to understand the rules:
a) Let the disagreements slide
b) Figure out what each person’s red lines are and try not to cross them
c) Cut off politics as a subject unless everyone present is willing to follow the rules
As far as you, I’d suggest keeping in mind that adults tend to be extremely defensive when it comes to political views and ideologies. You can’t convince anyone with theory. So political discussions in that regard are useless anyway. Making people see that their boss and their landlord are vampires is the way to start converting people to the left.
For this situation, I’d suggest expressing your concerns in the chat. Something like “Guys, leave politics out of the chat. Some of us are very uncomfortable with the kind of talk that’s been going on here these past few days. We’ve been friends for X years and it’s not worth ending these friendships because of the elections”.
I definitely don’t agree. If you can’t handle a struggle session with friends, what’s the point?
Friendships are like relationships. Very rarely they are ideal, and you need to make concessions if you value them.
Sure. But imo to completely avoid ‘politics’ (impossible) is not a good idea. I cannot speak for you or OP, but with my friend groups, that would never fly with me. All my close friends know that I’ve been a very politically engaged person since I was 14 and I make no secret of this. If they are your ‘real’ friends, I would hope there would be a level of understanding between each other. If your friendship is just based on hobbies, the friendship may not be as strong as one thinks.
I get what you are saying, but still, situations differ, and I wouldn’t in good conscious recommend to a total stranger to enact a confrontation with other total strangers (to me). In my circle of friends, I have 3 or 4 friends who we’ve always disagreed politically, but we can hold a discussion because we understand each other’s boundaries, and we are not trying to convince each other. I have 2-3 other friends who are alligned with me, and I have 2-3 other friends who are apolitical, and don’t like engaging in politics that much. They are the “default position is liberal” kind of people. So we just leave them be when they are in the group. All this was mutually agreed upon.
If your friendship is just based on hobbies, the friendship may not be as strong as one thinks.
Sure, but likewise, it doesn’t mean a friendship should be based on political alignments or that one should be jumping at the opportunity to create rifts just because they think their friendship with others is “strong/weak”. Obviously OP is uncomfortable with confronting their group, and I am assuming they know their situation much better than me, so I tried to give them the solution that is the most harmless and still can potentially fix their problem.
yeah I agree with you. OP seems to be close to a breaking point where people are losing respect for each other, i guess my point is if friends can’t be respectful among each other, it’s best not to be friends.
My social situation is almost eerily similar to OP’s, with a critical difference being that with one or two exceptions, my friends are either apolitical or center-right. Because we were friends since childhood, we have a whole range of shared interests and hobbies that have nothing to do with politics. Whenever there was political hostility between us, it was usually instigated by a couple shit-stirrers on the periphery of our friend group.
After a big row regarding Columbus Day / Indigenous Peoples Day a few years ago, the bulk of the friend group decided “no political discussion” and when it comes up by the shit-stirrers, just ignore it.
And honestly, this “no politics” rule has worked out pretty well. Admittedly this is easier to do when you have a majority who are apolitical or aren’t really all that interested in discussing politics. Long way of saying, I really like your suggestions to OP, certainly better and healthier than the suggestions about “burn it all down and leave”.
The people who are willing to split up a community over their electoral politics are not likely to be won over, you should probably not expect to be able to save all of them. That said don’t blame yourself, they are the ones who can’t take the grill pill and just be normal around their friends.
Your MAGA friends bizarrely sound like the more conciliatory part of the group, it sounds from your description that they understand things are tense and are trying to avoid stirring the pot.
You don’t think there’s a portion of the group that would be amenable to instituting rules for hanging out/chatting to just not bring up politics? I feel like the “no religion no politics” canard is common for a reason, a lot of people understand it’s volatile and are willing to avoid the topics to preserve their relationships.
Because to be clear, you’re not failing the revolution by not having an argument with them about neoliberalism, nor would you be spearheading it by owning them with facts and logic. But a group of friends who care about each other and are willing to work together to defend their common interests can be valuable, especially if things keep getting worse.
Not of course that you should tolerate everything. Maybe this is too wishy washy to be helpful as advice but you have all the context to make the judgment call I think.
The people who are willing to split up a community over their electoral politics are not likely to be won over, you should probably not expect to be able to save all of them.
There’s a Trotskyism joke to be made about splitting the group chat.
Your MAGA friends bizarrely sound like the more conciliatory part of the group, it sounds from your description that they understand things are tense and are trying to avoid stirring the pot.
They’re more passive suburban trumpanzees. There not going to go off about some QAnon sounding shit, and they’re offline enough to not have caught the chan brainworms. Even without this though, I think their relative chillness is due to them having less of a perceived threat since politics is ultimately just a game to them, as they are petite booj/highly paid professionals (one is a failson insurance kulak, one an HR/recruiter traitor of the working class).
The blue MAGAs are seeing capital take its mask off on live TV. They give just enough shits to be concerned about this, but their attacks of Trump all still rely on American exceptionalism and other reactionary angles. You’ll see them calling Trump a commie traitor to the US; that there will be “USSAR (United Soviet States of America Republic)” level censorship; that refusing to condemn Trump is “unmanly” (a stance that itself affirms patriarchy); that pointing out that what Trump is doing is unconstitutional over and over again is le epic own (as if constitutionality has ever stopped the American Regime from harming someone it really wants harmed). If I hear one more joke about muh increasing egg prices, I am going to become the joker.
You don’t think there’s a portion of the group that would be amenable to instituting rules for hanging out/chatting to just not bring up politics? I feel like the “no religion no politics” canard is common for a reason, a lot of people understand it’s volatile and are willing to avoid the topics to preserve their relationships.
Most of the time in person we don’t discuss politics. The blowing up happened largely because some of them are trumpanzees even when we don’t see them.
Because to be clear, you’re not failing the revolution by not having an argument with them about neoliberalism, nor would you be spearheading it by owning them with facts and logic. But a group of friends who care about each other and are willing to work together to defend their common interests can be valuable, especially if things keep getting worse.
I often tell myself that Combat Liberalism is only meant for people in party cadres. Still, I don’t think I’m using my privileges to further the cause of liberation as much as I should, and I believe a big obstacle getting in my way for this is that my social circle is basically entirely suburban petite booj/labor aristocrackers. The large privileges and spaced out personal fiefdom homes of me and my suburbanite acquaintances do a lot to discourage community building.
I am going through this as well. To be brief, the first step is to cut them out. MAGA is a cult. You cannot change their minds. I have tried. Don’t offend them. Just go dark. You are busy. Work has increased. Times are tough.
The second step is to reach out to people you trust whom are against him and everything he stands for and build a new network with them. Start with one person if you have to. Go from there.
Good luck.
I used to have a 3 man group for D&D and pathfinder. Very close friends. One of them I was able to make left enough to be tolerable. He’s basically stupidpol type but tolerable and considering he used to be much worse there hope for him. The other one is just an incel fascist now and I haven’t talked to him in a few years. Sometimes there nothing you can do.
If I was in your shoes I wouldn’t go out quietly. I’d start calling out bullshit on both sides. Something here or there. Pull up sources and shit. Really throw it out there. The longer you manage to be in there without getting the boot the more I’d do it. If you are lucky maybe someones eyes are opened, if not, well, it sounds like the friendships already about done.
In short,
