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I am legitimately worried that my girlfriend will break up with me if/when she finds out that I voted for Trump. She has always been an incredibly sweet and kind person, but her social media since the election has become unhinged. Like, some are more hateful than the worst comments I have seen on Reddit. We basically don't talk politics at all with each other, and I have no intention of changing that, but I am a bad liar with a terrible poker face, so if she becomes suspicious there’s not much I can do (I also have ethical qualms with lying, but these are essentially moot given the concerns above.)
EDIT: She found out. She was VERY upset. I'm like 75% sure its over.
Was a conversation held? Reasons given? A good old fashioned discussion? Sorry it just seems bizarre to me that personal intimacy to the point where you'd call each other girl/boy friend can be destroyed by this. Facebook unfriending, sure. Dropping of acquaintanceship across the internet, yes, I've seen it. But breaking up with someone you're supposed to be somewhat intimate with? Over a vote? Maybe this reveals enough fundamental disagreements that you are just not compatible, but I would have imagined such things would have come to light earlier.
We did have a discussion. She was willing to hear me out. I am also surprised it didn’t come to light earlier. I think her logic was: “Obviously no respectable person would ever vote for Trump. My boyfriend is a respectable person. Therefore, my boyfriend obviously wouldn’t vote for Trump.”
The conversation was very 2015 Tumblr. The one thing I didn’t have a response to was when she brought up the fact that she has friends who are “undocumented”. I could probably salvage this by going full Hanania and pledging my opposition to deportations and my support for abortion, which is a quite tempting option at the moment tbh.
I'm not going to try and co-pilot your conversations, obviously, and I trust you know what you're doing. I would suggest if she decides to bail on you for this there may be a lack of emotional maturity worth thinking about--and which may itself be a consolation to you. This is regardless of whether you or she is the one "in the right" politically.
I would like to think, however, that she resists the urge to just walk away and rid herself of the cognitive dissonance that seems to be at play, and that this is a kind of wake-up call for her.
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