At some point, not-caring about politics becomes a privileged, insular position. Many people don’t have the option, and it’s not real attractive in those that do.
Is it that much of leap to view my “friend” as someone aligning himself with the KKK if he is voting for a candidate who is demonstrably supported by the KKK and whose supporters share similar views to white supremacists?
He may never put on a white hood, or burn a cross, or openly discriminate against a racial minority, but he’s enabling and emboldening those who do.
And there are plenty of conservatives that could probably say the same sorta thing about Hillary/Hillary “supporters” and certain positions that they as conservatives find vile as doggy poop.
Yes, it’s all possible. I feel I know them well enough outside of explicit political talk and how they act in their personal and community lives to be comfortable in assuming otherwise. That’s why they’re my friends. I do believe 100% that they are good people.
I hope your point isn’t to suggest there is some sort of moral equivalence between an email server decision and outright appeal to bigotry and ignorance.
I defend the right and judgement of any/all conservatives to not cast their vote for HRC in this election. I question their values if they consider casting a vote for Trump.
There are different types of people. One type takes this junk far too seriously. Trump is a boor. The Clintons are corrupt. With the populace we have there is going to be a people who get their information from propagandists or comedians and make a vote based on that. Calling them pedophiles isn’t going to change any minds.
I like Iron Mike’s approach. https://youtu.be/aG8xMrRPFdc See, these people can agree to disagree and than go on with their day.
That’s like condemning Clinton supporters because of the riots in urban areas that vote overwhelmingly democrat. Several of which were jumping people and even tried to drag a reporter into a fire. What does that behavior represent? Should all Clinton supporters be painted with that same broad brush?
If the topic came up in conversation and you heard your friends say a variation of “not my street, not my neighbors, they probably did something to deserve it”, would this be enough for you to cut them off? Or would you continue to hang out with them because it’s just politics and it doesn’t matter?
Exactly. People who don’t care–who think all political parties and all presidential candidates are all the same, so why bother–are the same ones who wake up one morning, wondering when they became oppressed and who let it happen.
Unfortunately, very few of us have been tested in this way. I don’t know what my friends would do if fascist shit came to town. I don’t even know what I would do. I just know what I hope I’d do.
I hope I wouldn’t just sit there and say “Hey, it’s just politics.”
It’s easy to ‘not find politics all that important’ when it’s just other people who’s lives are being destroyed by the politics your ‘friends’ support. I have a trans woman friend who had multiple situations in which she feared for her life at the hands of ‘good guy’ conservatives for doing terribly controversial stuff like stopping at a gas station to pee. I know a lot of gay couples who couldn’t get benefits or access to their partner in the hospital because they weren’t married, and who would get denied basic services if Trump’s ‘OK to discriminate’ laws get passed. I’ve got a black friend who has to worry about getting shot for a traffic stop that I’d consider a minor annoyance.
I think all of these things are pretty important, things like ‘not dying’ are a little different than ‘should we rezone the old Elm Street neighborhood for commercial use?’.
Would he be there for you if you were telling him about how you were leaving your wife for you new husband because you realized you were gay? I kind of doubt it. How supportive would he be if you converted to Islam?
He absolutely positively would have no problem with that. He’s not a social conservative. He is absolutely not trans or homophobic in any way. He’s more in the anarchist fuck the system mold of Trump supporter.