Old friends and family all going very right wing

[magicmallow]

I'm a LP and don't have that many friends because socialising is difficult when you can't go out often.

I've always considered myself quite liberal / left wing, I don't agree with everything about the left but on the whole am a very "live and let live" kind of person as far as most things go, anti racist etc.

Several old, and very dear friends seem to be being brainwashed by conservative right wing theory and I find it very destabilising.

Because my social circle is fairly limited it is making me question my beliefs and understanding of the world, particularly as these people are traditionally close to me and make up the majority of my social circle.

For example, parents now pro brexit, dad is pro trump, old friends turning towards anti-feminism, all lives matter, trotting out loads of weird right wing catch phrases (cultural marxism etc), going anti muslim, although they wouldn't term themselves right wing (calling themselves "centrist").

I'm struggling with it a lot.

I try to debate but it seems pointless as they have made up their minds, so I don't try to change their minds.

I do love and care for them but I worry that I will get swept up in their narrative. I try to make new friends but for some reason am not making progress in that department for a number of reasons (lockdown is not helping).

The whole thing is driving me slightly insane to be honest. The polarisation of the world is mad right now. I don't want to turn into a

Any tips? Similar experiences? It's scaring me how intolerant society is becoming. I don't agree with everything "left wing" it all seems very confusing at the moment (esp re. some of the GC issues) but I certainly don't agree with the "all lives matter" sentiment etc. I can't quite believe how a lot of the conservative right wing agenda has permeated the brains of people I love and care about. I am quite sad.

I realise there may be holes in my thoughts above, I apologise for that, I'm not great at expressing my thoughts and I am not particularly au fait with arguments for or against either side, but I am scared and sad about people I love being taken in by what they deem as "normal" viewpoints that I believe are in fact rather extreme.

PPS I realise that being pro brexit does not make you right wing, but in my family's case they are trotting out the right wing arguments in support of it.

They have their own reasons for their beliefs and you have to accept that. We are all individuals with different life experiences and attitudes.

We are all entitled to our own opinions

I know what you mean; recently I’ve become more aware of my husbands family having more right wing views than either they previously did or that I realised; my DH too although I always knew his views. I feel like people are becoming more out for themselves while I think we should judge a society bu how they treat the most vulnerable.
I try not to get too much into debates that I know won’t end well but sometimes I can’t help but try to show them what is happening in the country. I work in social care and I see on a daily basis what is happening to the most vulnerable which a lot of people don’t see or know about/belief the conservative rhetoric that it’s their own fault.

I'm not sure this is an age thing. Look at many aspects of our society. EVERYTHING is polarised. Suddenly people cannot politely disagree or accept that others think differently. It's all cancellation culture and having to wear badges to express your 'tribe' and denigrating anyone who disagrees with you.
Just look at how J K Rowling has been appallingly treated by people who presumably haven't even read what she has written. There's no nuance anymore, no debate, no tolerance, and as a result very little understanding.
I don't think you need to try and change people's minds here. They're your family not people you're trying to persuade to vote for you.

I think the growing intolerance of the left is causing a reaction in ordinary people. You say you’re very live and let live (and I’m sure you are) but the ideological left is basically telling everyone to bend the knee or be denounced.

If it’s a choice between that or the tories, sorry, I pick the tories.

It’s a fairly new thing that left wing people want to NC with anyone not subscribing to their beliefs system.

I was always very left wing and interested in human rights and environmental law, active with Amnesty International and Greenpeace. Lots of my friends were conservative and we had lots of heated debates. But we were still friends.

My dad is left wing (old school Labour), my mum is conservative (and anti immigration), and that’s always been fine.

I think it is sad if people feel they can’t be friends with those with opposing political views

In a weird way it has pushed me towards the right, as people like Owen Jones and the aggressive trans lobby have pushed me away from the left wing liberal side I used to be on

Oh god, yes. It’s like walking on eggshells with one person as they become angry at the slightest criticism of Trump, Republicans, and the right - almost feels like they feel it as a personal attack! They will also draw undeserved connections between what you say and whatever they’ve read online, and then address you as though you represent “the Left” and ascribe all sorts of opinions to you that you’ve never voiced. It’s like you’re just a stand-in for these projections, alongside feeling like they’re just switching off when you speak or spending that time thinking of what they’ll say next.
They were always very pleasant, calm and mild mannered before. I don’t think they realise how abnormal it is to be flaring up in the middle of a calm conversation. I do want to be understanding because they are clearly not happy in some area but equally I think we really urgently need to see more calm, considerate discussions between those holding opposing political views in the press and represented online. I think this kind of thing arises partly from simply not having access to examples of how pleasant disagreement can be had.

@Dissimilitude yes, exactly that

1 Sentance - Social Media Bubbles - whichever side you are on there's opinions/memes and strawmen arguments being fed into your newsfeed/youtube/insta account all the time - subliminally influencing you - look out for it and start noticing it

What Dissimilitude said.

I'm a diehard lefty and none of the current political parties speak to me. It's no surprise people are searching for other ideologies to follow.

Yes, of course everyone can have an opinion but part of relationships is finding common ground and if you find your views so strongly not aligning with friends and family it can and will strain things.

With my parents, my dad in particular comes out with some things I absolutely do not agree with. I have now learned to just steer the conversation back to something less controversial and heated, as it just ends up in an argument. I still love the bones of him, and would never stop seeing him but I just can’t agree with some of the things he says. And I know he feels the same way about me.

With friends, I think it depends on how political and loud these people are. If it’s all they’re talking about in person then I’d start withdrawing from them as no-one likes preacher right or left leaning, it’s boring and especially when they just put down your opinions too. If it’s something they’re sharing online but don’t really discuss in person then perhaps just mute them on social media and carry on the friendship. Which again I’ve done with a friend. If they do talk about it they should be allowing you to voice your opinion and not insult or shut your down, a healthy debate can be great as long as everyone gets an input.

As PPs have said everyone is allowed to have an opinion, that includes you, but if some of their views are so abhorrent to you I wouldn’t have any qualms about distancing myself.

I’m not sure speaking of the left as this shadowy leviathan is all that helpful. Surely the best way of encouraging people to think of themselves as politically homeless and further stagnating the left wing. There may be a concentrated core of people who all think the same and whose political opinions are entirely predictable, but do they constitute the majority? What about the porous border of more thoughtful, undecided, unpredictable or “swing” lefties who could be a real force for good if only people would acknowledge that the left is pretty heterogenous?

I don’t talk politics with friends at all and never have. It can just become a hotbed of contention and although I’m sometimes surprised by people’s views, I accept them as just one aspect of them. That being said, if they crossed a line for me (being racist for example) I’d cool the friendship. I agree with a previous poster who said that no political party represents their views at the moment. I don’t know quite what I am, politically speaking. 🤔

There does appear to have been a radical shift in recent years with the extreme left seemingly becoming just the left and to a lesser extent the extreme right views being subsumed into the right.
I have always considered myself left of centre but since the left has effectively shut down any nuance or discussion around views I have found myself unable to really align with their views and become more centre which doesn’t have any political party to represent it. Many of my friends are similar.

For example I agree with most of the aims of BLM (agree institutional racism is present and needs to be addressed urgently) however some of their goals are extreme which I don’t agree with (abolition of the police). However you either agree with all of it or none according to the left and so what do you do?

As with most MN I would support transgender people having a safe space and protections but do not agree women’s safe spaces and protections should be subsumed by this. Same problem.

I feel like I’ve noticed this drift on MN in the last three/four years or so I’ve been using it and like you OP I find it pretty disturbing. I really don’t think being pro-trump is ‘normal’ reaction to ‘left wing intolerance’. I’m probably as moderately left of centre as you can get and I find the current political discourse very troubling. I’m an age where this is my first adult experience of an out and out right wing Tory govt and I’ve started to really understand the ‘you need to tories to come into power once a generation so everyone can see how bad they are’ mindset of some of my older family members. I never thought a Tory govt would really be as bad as they said it was, now I can see what they mean!

In terms of your situation I would have to say something which I know Is very difficult. However I have found that if you actually ask people Something like - what do you think cultural Marxism is? It gives them an opportunity to think about what they are saying and occasionally it does make them realise start therr he e juts spouting a quip.

How very sensible of them, considering the alternative.

MN is predominantly left wing and I have never experienced in the real world from left wing friends and family, the level of hatred and vicious name calling for the Tories that I've read on here.

Several old, and very dear friends seem to be being brainwashed by conservative right wing theory

This made me laugh. If believing this makes you feel better go right ahead and believe it but people are no more brainwashed by the Tories than by Labour, in fact I would say less so.

We're all entitled to our own opinions OP which left wingers seem to have some difficulty understanding.

There's a big generational divide in politics at the moment. The percentages of older people who voted Boris/Tory/Brexit is very high (up to three quarters majority) while the younger generations it flips the other way.

I think the growing intolerance of the left is causing a reaction in ordinary people. You say you’re very live and let live (and I’m sure you are) but the ideological left is basically telling everyone to bend the knee or be denounced.

Part of the problem is many of the causes of what is deemed nowadays 'the woke left' is at odds with the traditional working class Labour movement, who believe in things like patriotism. So traditional Labour voters voted Boris and Brexit in their droves.

@allCrankley - when I say "conservative' I mean with a small c, not related to the tories.

@allCrankley and no it does not make me feel better about myself whatsoever. I just feel sad that some views against muslims, people of colour, etc are espoused by people I love, views which I consider often extremist.

The left seem to have become very extreme and so do the right recently. Not sure why but it seems to be a sign of the confused and frankly odd times we are living in.

We currently have very right wing leaders yet those who shout loudest seem to be very left wing. There's unfortunately racism all over, yet black lives matter etc is a very polarized way of dealing with it- like it or not many white people feel ostracized by it. Documentaries like the one I see on Netflix flashing up called 'Black is King' by Beyoncé really don't help either. If it's not fine for individuals from a particular ethnic group to say it about their race, it shouldn't be fine for another. It just polarizes groups further.

Like it or not if people feel silenced or like they can't say things (e.g immigration etc) they start to typically become more hardline. I think this is why you are seeing extremes of both.

Despite this- the quickest way to stop this is to stop discussing politics. How I think and feel about these things in real life is between myself and a ballot box.

But echoing a previous poster- any racism near me and they'd be getting told. I don't want to hear that crap at all and would cool my relationship with them hugely or just end it. That being said racism doesn't go hand in hand with being right wing or not supporting things like BLM (although of course it's more likely).

But yeah anything political around me I find it's just best not to engage with. Treat it like it's a boring topic of conversation and don't engage until they get the message.

I've been finding the left unbearable. I do agree that we are all getting in each other's nerves.
I only talk about politics with my like minded friends.
Ask family and friends to keep politics aside.

I think it’s a push back against the far left extremism. You might consider some of my views ‘right wing’ but I consider myself a liberal.