Just curious about cross-ideological habits.
Can we count all the trolls in P&R as friends?
I have friends on all sides of the spectrum, and enjoy hearing their thoughts and opinions.
Heh. Up to you.
No one’s ever on my side :(
Of course, since those friends I usually hang out with don’t care that much, and I’m rather comfortable with talking to myself with people around, that isn’t really a problem.
I’m not negative of the US enough for work, my position on social issues such as feminism are usually a bit too extreme… I have different people on my side in every issue, or so it seems now and then.
I have friends all over the political spectrum, but I am always hesitant to join political discussion with them. This is more-so with socio-political issues. Some discussion like those about gay marriage, I simply refuse to participate in because, as I have a lot of gay friends, I’m emotionally vested and will often wind up throwing an insult and storming off in frustration.
Nevermind that most of them have little desire to actually learn about issues and go out and vote (as opposed to just voting who their parents would vote for).
On this topic I read an article maybe a year ago that said that two leading Swedish politicians in the Stockholm city council had married. The woman is an honest to god almost-communist leftist and the man is a die-hard conservative free market believer.
They first met eachother in the council meetings. Love transcends all political barriers I guess. Or atleast some :)
This poll is guilty of neglecting the SHIT BONERZ convention, or it’s modern alternative the FACK NO YOU JOKE ME convention.
I do have friends of all political backgrounds and I discuss politics with none of them. Everytime I wander into a political discussion I’m thankful we live in a republic and not a straight democracy. I’ve come to the conclusion that a lot of people get their politics from the same place they get their religion. A combination of rote learning, group identification, and glands with no critical thought clouding the issue.
My friends range from socialists…to libertarians! Kind of hard to find the authoritarian right in Seattle.
I have a couple high school pals I hang out with from time to time who are on the hard right.
Do I consort with the other side? I’ll say. Desslock and I shared a bed at Sundance!
I really value contact with people with whom I disagree. And barring some sort of weird Holocaust revisionism or white supremacy, I don’t think I would ever let someone’s political beliefs interfere with how I think of him or her as a person.
Having said that, it’s been hard to find anyone in my circle of friends who doesn’t agree with me RE: the Bush administration, which leaves me trawling a gaming forum for stimulating policital discussions/arguments.
-TomTwo very republican friends of mine loathe the president, but think John Kerry is hopelessly enmeshed in left-wing politics. It’s surreal to see them quoting clips from Fahrenheit 9/11 and then say they may vote for Bush anyway.
I have no wish to be surrounded by people who are like minded, but I guess it must be my life style choices that leads me to gravitate to similarly minded people. Conservative types just don’t do the things I do, like go to alternative music venues, backpack around Europe, and drink beer in smoky working class pubs. Some do, and I’ve had a few as close friends, but mostly I just end up bumping into left wingers, environmentalists, and anarchists. I guess it doesn’t help living in a university town either, which tend to be notoriously liberal.
Who needs yes-men for friends? It’s like Isaac on Sports Night once said: “If you’re dumb, surround yourself with smart people. And if you’re smart, surround yourself with smart people who disagree with you!”
And it was quite lovely at Sundance. In all seriousness, of course I have friends who don’t agree with me on every political issues. Tom and I may fight like cats and dogs over this stuff, but I still hang out with him a bunch of times a year and it doesn’t affect our friendship at all. The guy who was my best man at my wedding was extremely anti-Iraq War, and we have far more vicious email arguments than anything posted here, virtually every day based upon the latest news – and still go out for pints about 4 days a week and laugh about our disagreements when we hook up in person.
My only concern, sometimes, is that when I take issue with something someone said, that they won’t be as objective as I am and will take it personally. They certainly shouldn’t - especially at a message board like this where we don’t even really know each other.
Having said that, it’s been hard to find anyone in my circle of friends who doesn’t agree with me RE: the Bush administration,
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Heh, me as well, with that one notable exception, everyone I work with and hang out with feels the same way. Maybe I’ve just browbeaten them into submission.
Desslock: I’ve respected you for a long time (since the usenet days and before), and your political opinions would never change that. It is a little disheartening, sometimes, to see you freely throwing out the “your opinion is insane/you’re a nutball/why would anyone anywhere ever take anything you say seriously/etc” type assaults, though.
I think you’re all nutters!
But if its any consolation, I’d also buy you each a beer. Maybe only cheap beer …
Heh, fair enough - I do think you, and others, are overplaying my one comment to Rucker about how his comment was so crazy that I couldn’t take anything POLITICAL he said again seriously again – the reality is, it was such an otherworldly comment that it seriously damaged his credibility on those matters to me, and if I didn’t have respect and like Brian in the first place, I wouldn’t have cared enough to point it out. Some things come across better in person than they do in writing.
I do have Left and Right wing friends, but I don’t discuss politics with any of them.
Well, about Bush- I know far right people who seriously buy into Muslims being a great threat and have said stuff that was dangerously close to advocating genocide. Those people? Voting for Kerry. I don’t know where you find intelligent advocacy of Bush. It may not exist. I thought there was a good argument against gay marraige until I found out it that opponents seriously argued that if we let gays get married people will marry dogs.
How many Bush voters do we have on this forum? 2? Maybe? Desslock would but is Canadian.
Trying to find the authoritarian right on the internet is a difficult job. There are fascists on the internet, there are libertarians on the internet, and there are moderate Republicans on the internet. Not to be overly generalizing, but the authoritarian right doesn’t use the internet, it being a tool of the devil.