So, I've been spending recent weeks trying to get my brother to grasp that he's been handling most of the emotional weight of a bunch of his friendships.

It came up when he related someone doing that obnoxious "IF YOU'RE NOT POSTING ABOUT THIS YOU DON'T CARE" shit on FB.

Specifically, he took the position that a bunch of people he's known and considered friends and a bunch of relatives are currently Trump supporters and between them and his Trump supporting coworkers he doesn't share a lot of anti-Trump stuff on FB to avoid pissing them off.

Now, it's entirely fair to point out that the idea that you have to be posting things on FB or Twitter to prove you care is bullshit, and the person was just being performative.

But I had to address the whole "not offending Trump supporters" part.

When pressed on it, he could not provide examples of those same people showing the same care.

These people he shapes his posting habits around to avoid offending them and losing them as friends (or in the case of coworkers, making work uncomfortable) don't limit how they post.

So it's just kind of perfect that this bullshit about "ideological diversity" is coming up again.

Because this is the sort of shit that we end up with.

Left/liberal leaning types have to self-edit to maintain any sort of relationship with right-wingers.

For all that for a lot of us we just really don't bother TRYING to maintain those relationships, and that's why conservatives are getting huffy about us simply being able to walk away from them, anyone looking to actually maintain those relationships must self-censor.

It ends up being an almost entirely one-sided relationship because all of the actual effort is on the part of the left-leaning person.

Step out of line on anything they will "cancel" you without hesitation.

And they'll never even consider reshaping what THEY say around you.

The closest I've experienced has been just a "Okay, fine, we just won't talk about this."

Just avoiding conflict in the moment.

No actual effort put into respecting your differing opinions, while fully expecting you to do that for them.

In my brother's case, someone he's known for 20 years just outright blocked him for pro-BLM stuff.

...Remind me again who it is who's supposed to be guilty of intolerance of differing opinions?

I've expressed sympathy for the block but I've been trying to get through that in trying to keep friendly with these people he's only putting himself through more stress for people who will NEVER reciprocate in the same way.

Once these people showed a willingness to support Trump, and especially if they still support him now, they've put themselves into one of two camps:

People who delude themselves into thinking he's not awful.

And people who watch him be awful and LIKE IT.

The former isn't worth trying to reach out to, and the latter is THE FUCKING ENEMY.

I don't care if they're my neighbors, coworkers, relatives...

It's not partisanship, it's them actively embracing genocide.

I get that he's not going to be able to do much about avoiding talking about that shit at work.

But work's not going to be where he OR his Trump-supporting coworkers should be bringing it up.

And on social media? Don't follow coworkers on social media if you don't need to.

Watching him hurt by having someone he'd considered a longtime friend, in spite of that person being a rather awful right-wing shitheel...100% fuck you to whoever wants to insist we're supposed to be the ones reaching out to these people.

If I'm reaching out it's with a 2x4.

If they want to reach out it had better be with some sort of apology for being an awful fucking human being.