We Don’t Talk Anymore
As the 2020 election winds down (and upon publication of this all but the last few votes will have been counted) I’ve been trying to figure out what to write regarding it. I could just straight copy and paste policy ideas from candidates pages, but that’s lazy writing. I could try interviewing voters on Election Day, but Bradford County has 700 COVID cases so more strangers standing around talking to each other is dangerous practice. So instead I’ll just share with you a sad story regarding American politics and not talking to your best friends about it.
I don’t have to tell you American politics have gotten toxic in the last few decades. You see it when a protest about anything right or left is met with hostility. (What exactly are you saying when you drive by an anti police violence protest in your big truck and rev the engine a bunch?) You saw it when a car ran over people counter-protesting a white supremacist rally in Virginia in 2017. Less dramatically, you see it on your Facebook page daily. What was once a competitive back-and-forth between the dominant parties in the American political system has devolved into the worst possible examples of tribalism. Pew Research found that 58 percent of Republicans and 55 percent of Democrats viewed the opposite party “Very Unfavorably” and 45 and 41 percent respectively view the other party as “a threat to the nation’s well being”. That’s not a lot of the overall nation but that’s far too many for healthy political discourse.
I ended up in that toxic discourse in January of 2019. The Democrats had taken the House and promised to keep the President in check. I, a skeptic of the President’s, was for that but no one else was. A very close friend of mine posted an outrageous scenario regarding “consequences” of a potential House impeachment of the President. I commented with righteous indignation and condescension. After a few replies I was hit with “I lost my best friend” due to my political debates. It broke my heart. This person I’d been friends with since the first bus ride to kindergarten thought I’d been brainwashed. Our fight never got better and we haven’t spoken since.
Now I see people pulling up yard signs, defacing property, and screaming “traitor” at voters of the opposite persuasion from both sides. It wasn’t always this way. Bush didn’t call for Kerry’s arrest on the campaign trail. Obama didn’t attack Romney’s family. We’ve thrown ourselves into our respective camps and dug in our heels, resistant to any criticism from outside our tents. Conservatives refusing to believe in climate change because a Congressman needing that oil lobby campaign check said to. Liberals pushing policies aimed at helping urban constituencies at the expense of rural ones. I appreciate the passion for your beliefs, folks, but if your half of the political spectrum had all the right answers there wouldn’t be any problems left in the country.
This column ends with me reiterating that I absolutely despise our countries two-party system. George Washington saw it forming in 1796 and based a large part of his farewell address on railing against it. Two parties can’t accurately represent the full political spectrum of the United States. The Democrats are a party of rights activists, labor unions, and environmentalists all rolled into one. Republicans are a mix of pro-life voters, small government conservatives, and business advocates. Both sides are legitimate. Stop acting like one of them is trying to destroy America. They’re both just trying to steer the country in a direction that fits their own moral compass. Relax with the “Traitor to America” stuff and whatever you do don’t fight with your best friends over it. Because I did and now we don’t talk anymore.
