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Notes -
How do you handle it when people ask for your political opinions in real life?
I had a woman ask me suddenly, out of the blue, "who did you vote for in the last election?" We were having a nice conversation before that point (not like, a meet-cute instant love or antyhing, but at least it was a good conversation). I answered truthfully that I had just recently changed my address at that time, so I didn't vote, because I was dealing with a lot and it just wasn't worth the effort for me of updating my voter info on top of everything else. She instantly made an annoyed face and turned away, never to talk to me again. She was obviously a liberal- god help me if I had said I voted for Trump. But like, what are we supposed to do in these situations? Is it just impossible to talk to people with different political opinions now?
Some real life examples:
I had my kid's daycare provider ask me who I voted for in the 2024 election. She is clearly hispanic, has an accent, and my kids come home learning spanish words. I've normally not voted or voted libertarian, but I happened to vote Trump in that election. And I responded without thinking "Trump". Her response was honest relief and "oh good, me too".
The neighborhood dads discuss politics with each other, there are a variety of political persuasions. I'd guess that it is close to an even split among conservatives and liberals among the dads. You can razz these guys a little about their beliefs, but ostracizing anyone or acting high and mighty would be a massive social faux paus. To the point that it would probably massively backfire.
My cousin's wife is an artist/painter/political activist. My cousin has worked on political campaigns and is the local head of a teachers union, very left coded obviously. During my wedding in 2016 my best man joked about how he burned his ballot. My cousin's wife was horrified.
In the 20teens I worked at a tech company. Most people were liberal. Politics would come up in the breakroom. People knew I was a libertarian. I did get in a minor argument with one co-worker on facebook. He said something about libertarians being awful for not voting for Hillary, and letting Trump win. I said something about its the democrats fault for having such an awful candidate up for election. It was a few months later that I deactivated my facebook account.
I was on the dating scene and got a date with a girl off of OKCupid. Found out during the date that she worked at some women's oriented political organization in DC. I'd already sorta outed myself as libertarian. I figured the date and my chances were tanked. I stopped caring and talked more politics, when I was done and ready to go home I invited her back to my place. She surprised me by saying yes and we hooked up. I never heard from her again.
In general, I don't like hiding my politics. I have a bad poker face, and I'm too opinionated to shut up for long. My experience has been that the consequences of revealing your politics are not that bad. Its possible some people have talked shit about me at work behind my back and I lost some opportunities because of it, I think its unlikely though. Its also fully possible that friends or family have been annoyed with me before for expressing my opinions. If there is a reason for me to not express my politics in person its that the real world doesn't have to follow the rules on TheMotte. Politeness is not required. A lack of antagonism is not required. Low effort participation is encouraged. Enforcing consensus is the name of the game. etc.
My advice to you is that just about everyone hates the 'agnostics'. The ones with no opinions who try to stay out of it all. Politics is pure tribalism. Religious affiliation is tribalism. Sports team affiliation is tribalism. A yankees fan and red socks fan will really go at each other over baseball and their respective teams, but they both don't want to even talk with the person who doesn't care for baseball. So be honest and put your opinions out there. To politic is human.
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