A Friendship Gone
A guest story from Nick Carraway —
“Everyone that knows me knows I had a falling out with Tom Buchanon. He was one of my friends in school, but as luck should have it, I really didn’t know him as well as I thought I did. Sometimes I never know a guy as much as you think you do. The same thing happened again this week.
A friend I went to high school with and drove to school every day has become radicalized. He was apparently spouting off about this whole election is a coup on the Facebook. Facebook doesn’t take kindly to folks that are potentially inciting violence based on false information. They took the post down. He has decided to quit Facebook.
He sent me a “breakup letter” after one of my posts on my personal blog site. He had asked me to share my posts with him just a few weeks earlier. I always knew he was conservative, but he was one of the reasonable ones. At least, that’s what I thought. One of us has gone clear around the bin. At the moment, I suspect it’s him, but who knows.
A large part of my ethics requires me to admit that I can be wrong. No one has a monopoly on the truth. However, we split based on the fact that he internalized my criticism of the Trump truckers that ran the Biden bus off the road and the various right-wing groups sewing discontent at protests by fomenting violence and then letting Antifa and Black Lives Matter take the blame.
What was so disjarring was the fact that he took it as a personal attack. It’s one thing to buy into the narrative that the protests have been violent because of the protesters. I get that on some level. I still don’t get the personal affront of calling out people that planned the kidnapping of a sitting governor. Why is he internalizing this? Why does he feel the need to defend this on such a level?
I’m not mad. I’m sad. I’m overwhelmed with grief. While we haven’t seen each other in years we had stayed connected online off and on throughout the past 15 years. It’s a rhetorical question that will eat away at me for quite a while. What in the hell happened to him? I left him my contact info and put the ball in his court. It will be up to him.
I tell this story because I suspect many of you have a similar story to tell. It’s one of the curses of social media. As John Oliver said in passing, “gee, it’s too bad about Larry. I guess he sucks now.” We stay connected only to find someone we thought we knew so well Is gone. Mourning someone that is truly gone is hard enough. Mourning the loss of a friendship stings that much more.”
Can’t tell for sure if this is what you’re looking for, but..
In 2008, I discovered not only were many in my family and my friends circle not Dems/liberal but they harbored racism. As 2008 faded into 2012, I took notice of the anti-ACA hardened surface of many of these fading friends and distant family. By 2016 I had grown short-tempered and far more militant dealing with these people. As I’ve posted many times I made the decision to retire traveling to the office Wednesday morning. TOO many Tea Partiers worked there and while the were insufferable before the election, I could see myself not dealing well with them in victory. Retirement eventually happened. While the family was together in December 2016 I took my little bride and our kids aside with our phones and we deleted contacts that were definitely Trumpanzees or that had shown me their support of Trump in the past few months. Here in 2020 my little bride and I have further winnowed contacts. A church acquaintance of over 40 years unfriended me after a particularly hateful Fb post I made. His wife “yelled” at my wife on Fb after an exchange that ended with my little bride posting that these Trumpanzee’s values were too distant from hers to continue as friends.
A Trumpanzee neighbor yelled at us this morning as we chatted with another neighbor who was pulling up the Dem signs in his yard. “Going to Court”, “it ain’t over”, and “pedophile” played prominently in his rant.
I’m pleased and happy with the election of Biden Harris, but the year of ‘rona pandemic and the 4 years since the election of Drumpf have taken years out of what I had hoped would be a pleasant, joyous retirement. And. It’s difficult to get my head around the idea that 20+% of the population of 330 million is racist, sexist, fascist evil-doers.
1Same thing has happened to me with my high school girlfriend. WE had chatted over the years but now I’m scum of the earth
2A friendship of fifty years has vanished like a light snow. Damn that Orange Menace to hell.
3Trumpf succeeded in destroying relations with my brother and sister the past few months. While I knew they were both conservative, we were able to get together (when I visited from Oregon to Idaho), talk on the phone, say I love you when we said goodbye. We were like that for years up until just a few weeks ago. This past week, my brother told my niece (his daughter) that if Biden wins, he’s cutting off all friends and family that voted for Biden (he knows my family did). He hasn’t talked to his daughter, son-in-law or even his young grandson for the past week. He’s even stopped watching Fox News (I guess that’s good). This country has a lot of healing to do.
4Before Trump was elected I had a number of close friends who I regarded as simply old-time conservative republicans. His election transformed them into belligerent, aggressive right-wing zealots who got perverse joy in arguing and bombarding me with emails containing the most outrageous lies. Although I can hold my own in a debate they lived in a fact-free world and there was no reasoning with them. These are people I had known for decades and it was a shock to realize how wrong I had been about their character. They are no longer friends and I do not communicate with them which makes my life easier.
5Meh. If they can’t take a joke, soap ’em. For all other conservatives there’s this meme: it’s a pic of Hilz visiting Donnie behind bars saying “I bought you some e-mails to read.”
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/54bd9546c0e60cb6c1e89791d0cf3a003bd73f0011ff616d1bc725c726b41403.jpg
6Sympathy. Same thing here, starting before the 2008 election, when someone I thought of as reasonable and middle-of-the-road (and I knew *had been* a Democrat recently) told me she was going to vote Republican because “Obama is a liar.” She was appalled I was supporting him. We hadn’t been super close but I’d encouraged her as a beginning writer, driven her to meetings, etc. That was it for her and her husband.
In 2015, as I’ve mentioned, a man who’d befriended me and several of my friends on SFF.net, who had seemed perfectly reasonable before, had driven 100 miles to come to one of my readings in Austin, introduced his wife to me and other fans, whom I had come to think of as a friend, turned hard right under the influence of his priest & bishop, and by the 2016 election was so off-the-cliff that he sent me a threatening email with a picture of an assault rifle and a target in triumph at the result. I blocked him; a friend who has tried to keep a line out to him is about to give up. There are others I’ve lost in this. We lost my husband’s younger brother as a person we could deal with years ago; he went Southern Baptist to the max, in a congregation that was into suppressing women as well as being vehemently ultra-right-wing. (He told us HE was the patriot, and we–both veterans–weren’t; we were traitors to American ideals. Blah the blah-blah blah. Kid had been a left wing protester in college when we were in the military, but turned right as soon as he got a job.) The older brother couldn’t vote Democrat anymore because “abortion = murdering babies = the most evil evil ever.” (Kidnapping children and trafficking them into private prisons that charge taxpayers $750/day to mistreat them isn’t evil because “those people” are aliens…)
So yeah, family, friends, people you thought you knew…and damn, it hurts. T- and G- and the whole F- family, and several more. Writers in my field I can’t talk to; we look past each other at conventions (when I still went to conventions.) People down the street I don’t know that well, except I used to order stuff from their kid when the football team was raising money. People my husband worked with, people I saw every day…and some of ’em may’ve been that bad 30 years ago, but not all of ’em, I don’t think.
7So I have a not so startling proposition: Trumpism is a true cult. Listen to the “Sensibly Speaking Podcast #221: The Cult of Trump ft. Steve Hassan” which can be found here [https://sensiblyspeaking.com/2019/11/23/sensibly-speaking-podcast-221-the-cult-of-trump-ft-steve-hassan/].
I have started Hassan’s book “The Cult of Trump: A Leading Cult Expert Explains How the President Uses Mind Control”, and it’s pretty grim…
8I’m very sorry that so many people have had lives negatively impacted by the worst president ever. If I may make a suggestion: Get off social media, especially FB. I haven’t logged in to my account in over three years. It was tough at first but now I don’t miss it AT ALL. A lot of my family has also sworn off FB and we now communicate through phone calls and texts. We send photos, jokes, videos, etc. and the toxic people on FB can’t find us. I know people value their FB accounts but I think you’ll be much better off without its readily available poison.
9Let the Trumpies hold their breaths till the country turns blue!
10The fallout from this truly IS sad.
My brother and one sister no longer speak to me. My Democratic sister tells me the other one is an anti-masker, as well as being a xenophobic racist. Though my brother is more of a big business Republican, we all had to stop talking politics in 2008 – then all communication ended over a year ago. I’m lucky to have a very restricted facebook list, but even that’s been truncated since His Orangeness ascended the golden twitter throne. I won’t be attending any more extended family reunions.
Fortunately, my entire circle of local friends are in the same political camp as I.
p.s. Elizabeth#7…You’re tops on my husband’s list of favorite authors and have been added to my pandemic book stack. Glad to see you in the WMDBS.
11As many of you know, my wife Jane is the bomb in so many ways. She outdid herself today in the compare and contrast category of fear and hope. Back to 2008, remember McCain/Palin. Fast forward to 2020 Biden/Harris.
So, c’mon Democrats, celebrate! Yes, we are better off than we were four years ago. But a sad for the Vice Poodle who missed being the first woman VP.
Celebrate tonight, sleep it off tomorrow, and get busy Monday. Focus. Georgia. We can neuter Moscow Mitch.
https://fairfight.com/about…
12https://electjon.com/
https://warnockforgeorgia.com/
Reading these opinions today and from whenever past where the commonality is the change in people going from good or reasonable to mad dog brain washed.
13IMO, there is nothing new here under the sun from whenever regarding the basics of human nature. Here we note the descent into selfishness, fear, greed brought on by each person who makes a choice. trump didn’t make them to choose their choices; he didn’t put a gun to their heads stating “me or death”. And even if he did, it is still the individual’s free will choice as to go along or not. Look thruout history where people decided to resist evil knowing that they would likely pay with their lives.
WC Fields is reputed to have stated “You can’t cheat an honest man.” This from a poor, hard scrabble kid who was a carnie barkers and a card shark and feared putting his money into banks because of the Depression.
The point: the more we can look at something independent of our own wants, desire, ego and the other sorted self-centering human weaknesses, the less susceptible we become to being taken for that proverbial ride.
From what I have read, the choices we make eventually become hard wired to where the individual has no longer free will choice short of Devine intervention; eg, trump, mcconnel, et al. Also applies to those doing good for others.
van heldorf @12—The whole quote from W.C. Field’s character “Larson E. Whipsnade” was: “You can’t cheat an honest man; never give a sucker an even break, or smarten up a chump.”
14I’m so sorry for your loss.
I haven’t had that happen exactly. I’ve lost friends before, of course. Four very close friends just drifted away and I have never known why. It’s painful 20 – 40 years later.
Well, one did explain —- in a way. One of the reasons he said he was leaving was because I had entered therapy. Wait, what? His reasoning made absolutely no sense to me but I guess it did to him.
I guess I’m fortunate in a way — I’ve never had a friend who, when I scratched the surface, I discovered a bigot.
Perhaps the loss of my friends would hurt somewhat less if I had — because then, at least, I would know why we were no longer friends. And it would have been my choice.
15I just had one more thought.
I’d like to recommend a book for anyone who has gone through an experience similar to Susan’s.
It’s called, _Upcoming Changes_ by Joya Pope.
Ok, yes, it’s a spiritual book [in case that turns you off.] I hope it won’t though.
It talks about the time of massive change we’re going through right now — with more inclusiveness among people beginning, for instance.
And it explains that such changes are frightening to a lot of people —- some of whom prefer violence to change because they feel safer with violence than they do with the idea of including people in their circle who aren’t just like them.
The book might help you gain some perspective. Hate is not spurred by evil — it’s spurred by fear.
Btw — the book is out of print. Amazon still carries it but it’s expensive there.
16Abe Books offers it for much less:
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&cm_sp=SearchF-_-home-_-Results&an=joya+pope&tn=upcoming+changes&kn=&isbn=
We lost friends, a couple, over GW and the Iraq war. First time that had happened to me.
Now it is my quilt group.
Not sure if I can go back. They are Trump supporters & Elise Stefanik
I have stayed away.
We try not to talk about politics but it is hard.
Celebrated with neighbors earlier, it was glorious. Outside, in shorts and a beautiful sunset!! Last week we had 3 inches of snow
17What a wonderful feeling to know that the US president is not a lunatic.
My family and I just all had a toast to Joe and Kamala after watching their acceptance speeches. We all had a tear in our eyes and goosebumps. Felt so good. Going to enjoy tonight after all the misery of the last 4 years. We all deserve it.
18I’m so fortunate I haven’t lost any friends or family over politics. I do have a libertarian brother but we don’t go there, period. We spent 5 years caring for our parents and he did an amazing job with all the forms and correspondence needed to keep them home so that has been the focus of all our conversations. Our own kids and their spouses are all liberal- and most, like us, aren’t on FB. Maybe with a smaller circle of “friends” there’s less trouble.
But I did drive by a house in our solid blue town that replaced their Trump flag with a “Biden loved minors” sign and it was all I could do to not stop the car and rip it up.
19I’m so sorry for all of you who have “lost” family and friends over the hate coming from the right. I have a sister who is much more racist/warped conservative than she realizes, but I do believe she is (mostly) trying not to be overt about it. And I have a brother who just doesn’t talk politics, and his son pretty much enforces that rule when the rest of the family is together. (The sister has 2 pretty far-right grown kids.) I’m grateful that we are at least still trying to get along.
On the other hand, I have sort of accidentally fallen into a group of friends from high school who are as adamantly liberal as I am, although I never would have guessed it before. I didn’t really “run with their group” in school, but they have accepted me graciously into their circle. (One is in Tennessee and fumes about most of his state as much as I fume about Texas.) So I’m seeing the world through a different lens from yours, and for that I’m grateful.
But I still won’t rest unless we get the Senate. McConnell was evil before 2016, and I don’t see that changing. And if not him–Cruz? Cornyn? We won’t move forward with any of them.
20My family doesn’t generally talk about politics. My parents were Republican, of their four kids I’m the only Democrat. One of my siblings considers herself independent (though is registered GOP), the other two more conservative, though I think their spouses are more so. We’re still close though. I argued with my late mom about political stuff, and even though she called me her “smart daughter”, she wouldn’t believe me. She grew up in a small MW town and admitted to me later in her life that she was probably a racist (even after living in cities for her adult life). Funny thing is her brother who lived in that little town his whole life hated GW Bush. I’ve been happy to find like-minded liberal family members-my late uncle, as stated, also some cousins. My niece whose parents are conservative is liberal. I just found out my mom’s cousin and her husband – both in their 80s – are Democrats. I had no idea. Like I said, we don’t usually talk about politics in the family. Most of the people I associate with in my day to day life are of a like mind, many I meet by chance because we share the same interests (maybe that’s why?). I stay on Facebook so I can communicate with friends in towns where I used to live, and with family. Many are liberal but others don’t mention politics, not because they disagree, they just don’t care to comment. One person I had to unfriend because all she posted about was the Rapture. Ugh. We had been friends, but I just couldn’t take that garbage anymore. Another person just said she was taking a leave from FB because she thinks FB is *only* for sharing family photos and there was too much “hate” related to the election (she’s conservative). I don’t know what she’s talking about, maybe just stuff dissing Trump. We aren’t close, so. ::shrug:: I also remain on FB because I belong to interest groups, our local community group (for information), and my volunteer group (for information, photos). My FB posts are a mix of family news, photos, funny memes, and some politics; more of that lately. People can ignore what they don’t want to read. ::shrug:: I’m sorry for those of you who have lost friends and family to the lies and hate stirred up by Trump and FOX. It’s awful and extremely sad.
21I’m sorry for all the pain y’all have endured/are enduring.
22There seems to be an awful lot of racist panic among US white people, as they see their majority, and perhaps accompanying status, shrinking. Is it possible to leave a door open for such people, once/if they realize they have something to offer other than a white skin? And/or male genitalia?
As one who grew up in what I call the conservative part of the conservative part of the conservative part of Houston (in the conservative era of the 1950’s, I find a serious bifurcation among my former schoolmates–it was a small but exclusive private school, and many of us have known each other from a time when our ages were still in single digits. Anyway, at one point, a couple of our classmates, who had otherwise always been extraordinarily nice people, in the way that Texans can be, started sending out all that scurrilous BS attacking Obama, and it started an email war of epic proportions that pretty much broke up the email chain.
23Of course, now that we’re dying off one by one, those of the worst offenders that are left seem to have been chastened enough not to be so public about their racism.
A point of pride, though, is that the daughter of one of my classmates is now a Democratic Congresswoman.
It’s like you were hit by the realization that some people have become zombies, incapable of thought and human compassion. We have some lost folks in our circle too – most everyone has, it seems.
24The bigger problem is that these people WANT desperately to go down that road. The nightmare is likely, not over. Despair, desperation and ignorance has brought us to this point and it will continue washing over the country. Stay safe folks.
Its a matter of identification. Look at all of Trump’s faults. Those faults are well spread out among any population. When someone in such a high office expresses those faults out in the open, it validates all the others with the same faults. then they do the “herd” thing. they would continue to do the “herd” thing even if said leader personally amputated their limbs. Sad. Yes. Damn sad.
I am also betting that ten to one none of them recognized “I will lift you up on eagles wings” as a song so many sing in church. And know what it means.
My thanks is with a sigh that these 4 years are over and I view the upcoming 4 years with thanks.
25Maggie, I agree with you about its being a matter of identification but also of wishing they could emulate him: stiff creditors, bang Playboy bunnies etc.
As for losing family, my experience has been amusingly different from other loiterers in the beauty salon.
One of my cousins is farther right than anybody you know. (Not entirely her fault; she grew up in a Bircher household.) But even back in the ’50s family gatherings were argumentative.
Now some of my friends are mad at my cousin and rushing to defend me from her and trying to get me to unfriend her. We both try to explain that the Eagars have always been that way. One of my best friends is so mad at her for being mad at me that my friend is now mad at me for not throwing my cousin out.
26fought hard to keep my wing nut friends,(they know not what they do). What we need to do now is dig deep for the dirt on Mc turtle. We know him & his wife have been cheating & stealing for years & years. get rid of him & we have a chance of restoring our country.
27maggie, keep in mind that “know what it means” may also depend on “the herd.” A whole lot of people who never suffered anything but first-world, white-folks problems are pretty sure that they are the suffering persecuted, even though they never have gone hungry a day in their lives, never had to be afraid to go anywhere they wanted to, never had to fight to get to vote…Those folks are pretty sure that song means they’ll be lifted out of their “white-folks suffering” and have the world on a pretty little string; they don’t realize that, comparatively, they already do.
28Not much more to add by now. My story is an old friend from my ‘Bible college’ days. I’ve moved on, he hasn’t. He’d been getting bad over the years but then once his wife died he’s way gone. Last time I even spoke with him was almost two years ago; he told me then I was following a ‘Demonic path’. If he’d just call and try to avoid Trump I’d be very grateful, he won’t. Everything is Trump with him now.
29To date I have only had to “ghost” one person, who I knew for years. She is a well educated person (a teacher) and has gone through difficulty (single pregnancy and a handicapped child) but she started rationalizing and defending the evangelical mindset and I just gave up. I do think about her and wish her well, though.
30Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and personal stories. I knew I was not alone and I knew how and why people become radicalized. It’s one thing to know something empirically. It’s another to experience it. A similar thing happened with someone I used to volunteer with. I ran into him at one of my daughter’s games. He literally did not recognize me.
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