What's up with all these Republicans around me?

[adamuu]

I make an effort to avoid Republicans. I don't like the feeling of anxiety (in fact I have a bit of a problem with it), and I avoid arguments. I will get in an argument if I feel it will be productive, but I decided long ago that I'm just wasting my breath. Talking with Republicans brings about a combination of anxiety and frustration that I'd rather avoid. I feel at this point that no reasonable person can be a Republican, and what's the point in having a discussion with an unreasonable person? So I try to stick to like-minded people, or at least reasonable, informed people.

I am a little shy. I don't usually initiate friendships and I have trouble getting past the awkward moments. Even very casual, school-only friendships take months for me to build into.

I live in a dark blue state, I'm attending a state university with ~10k students ... how many Republican students could there be? I assume very few. Yet somehow I wind up sitting next to them in classes, and making friends with them. Why does this happen?

Some examples:

I had this one woman pegged as a progressive. We were in a few classes together. One day walking together between classes I told her a little about my activism. She said "I'm sorta Republican." I said, only half-joking, "I'm not sure we can be friends anymore." And we never talked about politics again. I don't avoid her, per se, but it certainly put the brakes on our otherwise promising friendship.

Another friend I know from a few classes. So we sit next to each other most of the time. I would have never guessed he was one of them. He's making his way through those last few classes he needs for his degree, working part time to make ends meet. I'm thinking "progressive", right? But I know better than to inquire about these things, by now. Yesterday he asked if I saw Palin's "speech", and he commented that he thought she was a good speaker. WTF.

Another school friend, I knew from the beginning that he was one of them since he had an animated argument about it out in the open, where everyone could hear. It ended with the progressive on the other side of the argument accusing the conservative of keeping his head in a box, and slamming a door. So I tried to avoid the conservative from that point on. The thing is, he is smart and good at what he does. He's a bit of a show off, on the other hand, he usually has the right answer. He is predictably self-centered, and this means all I have to do is demonstrate how something helps him (bonus points if it hurts others) and he'll do it. Sometimes this can save me some work. I think I can keep him at arm's length, carefully avoiding the dangerous topics. But it does bring the following question to the forefront.

How do I wind up with all these Republican people around me?

To be fair, many of my other efforts in surrounding myself with reasonable people have been successful. My partner and I are anti-Republican, and bashing the right-wing never gets old with us, after 3 years of living together. We have 1 friend who is totally on our side. We hang out with him often, and vent our frustrations freely. He often has something insightful to add. So I'm not exactly surrounded by Republicans. But there are enough of them for me to wonder, what are they all doing near me?

[searchingforlight]

1. It is like comparing two doctors.

One is capable. He can follow the book, he can identify common ailments and if you have something that fits into his general knowledge he could be considered a good doctor.

The other is a diagnostician. He looks for the root cause and is smart enough to sort through the obvious to find it.

Your Republicans may be smart but they can't think, they regurgitate.

[VWolf]

2. Nice analogy. I like it.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

3. I have discovered in life, and I'm old,

that you really do best in friendships with people who share your political beliefs and sensibilities. I've tried, but there are always other issues with rightwingers - Daddy issues, Mommy issues, lots and lots of sexual issues - that prelude any kind of lasting and rewarding relationships.

It's all right, though. You know who you are, and that's all that matters. You're always going to encounter people who think differently from you, and you just learn to go around them. Since they're usually standing still (in every way), that gets to be pretty easy.

[Indiana_Dem]

4. I know, I have the same problem....

I live in a red state, so it's not surprising. I think pretty much all of my friends I've gathered through the years have ended up Republican. I just think that people traditionally vote what their family has over the generations. Indiana and the north have a history of carrying the "Republican" label. Before civil rights, Democrats were more strongly associated with the South. As the party progressed and the Republicans regressed, some people started changing their labels and some didn't. I think that is why so many people's characters don't fit their political labels.

Many of my Republican friends are very liberal in their living and thinking yet they associate themselves as being Republican. Republicans used to be the more progressive party. So now it's all mixed up!!

Someone else can probably explain it better. My grandmother (and her family) was a Republican until her marriage to a Democrat and also more strongly associated herself as Dem during the civil rights era. Ever since that time, our whole family has been hardcore Democrat. Some people don't change their party affiliation like that. They remain what they are through generations and really don't think about it. We all tend to latch on and identify to the ideas of the party we belong to. For example, I'm for most of the Democratic platform, however, I am a strong 2nd-amendment supporter and do not like some of the regulations the Democratic party support such as IDing animals and people, national IDs for people, and things like that. I agree with some regulation but not for everything.

My closest friend right now is Republican as is her whole family. We can't even go there. We have a divide between us about that so we decided not to talk politics to each other anymore, and I've found that we distance ourselves from each other during presidential election seasons. It just works better that way. It's very surprising, too, because she and her husband are very pro-environment and socially liberal. It's just that both of she and her husband's parents are/were very staunchly "Republican". They will never change their label but I know better of how they think. They make fun of fundamentalists--the husband really wanted Romney. They are more of the rich-liberal Republican type. I know for a fact they will hold their nose with the McCain/Palin ticket.

I just have to look at it that I probably wouldn't change my Democratic affiliation either. So I just don't try and change those hardcore Repubs who are my friends.

[izquierdista]

5. The other dimension

It's not so much that they are Republicans, but that they have an authoritarian personality. People who want to be told what to do (and most Republicans fall into that category), for whom the rules of logic and reason don't apply. You may want to check out the work of Altemeyer on the subject (http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/) and see if that can clear things up for you.

It may be that you have some authoritarian personality traits yourself (such as avoiding arguments and instead deferring to authority) and that is what you have in common with "all these Republican people around me". Where you see it as a desire for harmony, these people peg you as one of them because it appears that you defer to authority as they would. Maybe if you look at the world through Altemeyer's lens, it will all fall into place.

[adamuu]

14. I appreciate your honest feedback, and

I read the introduction and chapter 1 so far. It is an interesting read, but I haven't yet gotten to the part about avoiding arguments and instead deferring to authority being authoritarian personality traits. Can you give me a shortened version?

[Aristus]

6. A guy I go to school with is a right-wing freakazoid. I had to drop out of our carpool.

It got to be too much to take. He was a Medical Services officer in the Gulf, so his support of the war is sort-of understandable. But his head is just too screwed up on too many issues. He took a course on Organic Chemistry as one of his prereqs for school. He told me his O-Chem teacher proved to him that global warming is not happening. He had this formula that proved that it's a hoax. So he constantly argues with me about climate change. I wanted to point out to him that there are over 640 peer-reviewed articles by climatologist that assert climate change is a reality, and it is being caused by the burning of fossil fuels. I wanted to point out that second-hand information by a chemist, not a climatologist, who has published no peer reviewed research that I know of and who probably has an axe to grind, doesn't trump a 640 climatologists.

But I didn't...

He's even an arrogant idiot on non-political things. He told me the Iraqis didn't like our troops because U.S. Army helmets are shaped like the old German "coal-scuttle" helmets that the Nazis used. Yeah, the shape of our helmets; that's why the Iraqis don't like us... :eyes: He also asserted that the U.S. Army started using the German-style helmet after World War I, and gave it up when the Nazis started World War II. I told him that our army used the British "tin-hat" helmet between the world wars and insisted that he prove his assertion with photographic evidence. He never did.

I got sick of his right-wing bloviating, so I dropped out of our carpool.

[adamuu]

12. the global warming deniers are the worst of all

They make my blood boil
(which in turn doesn't help the global crisis much ;) )

[TuxedoKat]

7. When I was much younger...

I didn't think I could be friends who were Republican. I remember trying to talk politics with my college roomate (when Carter ran against Reagan), who was Republican because her parents were. I didn't know how to talk about politics with people back then and I resolved I had better not try and talk politics with her or we wouldn't be friends. About 15 years later one day out of the blue she said she was now a Democrat because she realized that she agreed with the Dems on all the major issues and that she just couldn't vote Republican anymore -- I was shocked because she had been the same way in college, pro women's/civil rights, pro-environment, etc. So I just wanted to encourage you to not discourage friendships because of politics because some people do change.

Some people though are so invested in being a Republican for whatever reason, that logic, commonsense or the cold hard truth will probably never change them. I have another friend who is probably that way. She still has a W'04 bumper sticker on her car! She has never tried to talk to me about politics and I wouldn't with her either unless she brought it up. Another friend's husband was over this weekend and he and my husband started talking politics. He's in the Nat. Guard and did a tour in Iraq, so we had some interesting discussions. Years ago I would not have felt comfortable talking with someone on the opposite side about politics. It didn't bother me because I knew so much more than I used to from listening to progressive radio and reading political blogs that I was able to hold my own with him and respectfully score some points. I also wasn't as bothered watching the Republican Convention either -- it used to make me upset and anxious to watch it, not this time. Anyway, I would keep doing your activist work and check into some other Democratic groups to find more like-minded friends. Perhaps you could have a debate watching party or get some Obama buttons to put on your backpack so if some like-minded people might see them and approach you first. Good luck and thanks for the activist work you are doing -- I really believe you Millenials are going to make an historic difference in this election!!!

[adamuu]

10. I really appreciate this advice.

Thank you. I think I will get a button for my backpack, among other things you suggest.

The reason I don't have one already is that I don't want the conservatives to think that means I feel like debating about it. I got into one debate recently because I was holding an issue of New Republic, of all things. But I think I can make it clear to any blowhards that wearing an Obama button is not an invitation to have a freaking debate about it. I can support my candidate without being prepared for every possible line of attack that a button might invite.

[L0oniX]

8. Try using a repellent.

[old mark]

9. I found that arguing with a Republican - or a right-religious -

is very like arguing with a drunk: it may be entertaining for a short time, but eventually becomes irritating and accomplishes nothing.
Won't change anyone's mind, and I am as likely to vote republican as a die hard republican is to vote democratic.

I have not been around many that I know of recently, not like in the '90's when they were all running around beating their chests and screaming about how conservative they all were (The men, too.)
They can be very irritating in groups - they seem to feed off each other and try to out-stupid each other - and I plan on attending no large social gatherings till after the election.
None even after the election if we lose.

mark

[Rocknrule]

11. I saw a dorm room the other weekend

with one entire wall covered with an American flag, a large GOP poster over half the window, and under it a "NObama" bumper sticker. Decked out like a true Hitler Youth member. I'm sure glad that kid isn't my roommate.

[OHDEM]

13. We'll be your progressive friends!!

I've actually gotten more involved as an activist to get some progressive friends! I love being able to talk to other people who actually care about their community & their country.

[adamuu]

15. hugs

:grouphug:

[adamuu]

16. I think maybe Republican are like cats

they're not interested in you unless you are allergic.