to like someone less because their political views revolt me

[yellowflowers]

A friend has got more and more right wing. It's depressing because when we met years ago as students we bonded over being lefties and in favour of helping those less fortunate and we both enjoyed debating issues. I still like debating things and don't need all my friends to think the same as me - far from it - but the more I hear of this person's views the less I think they are someone I want to spend time with because her views on poor people and on state education etc offend me. Is it wrong to see less of someone just for this reason?

GentlyFalling of course I know that many many people possess wonderful qualities of self-discipline and decency and good parenting, and are highly educated and all that stuff, and do not earn very much money at all. And those people have high aspirations for their children and will get very upset and frustrated when they can't get their children into the 'good' schools, because all the 'good' schools are over-subscribed and they are out of catchment.

I don't believe I even implied that ALL self-motivated, socially responsible people automatically became affluent as a result of those qualities, (though undoubtedly many do) and neither did I suggest that poorer people possessed none of those qualities, and that is why they are poor.

But you wanted to twist my words to make it appear that way. Don't worry - I'm used to it - it seems to be a well-worn path among left-wingers.

It is no coincidence that (as a general rule, with I am sure, a few noteworthy exceptions) 'good' schools are found in 'good' areas. We all know that. I could go all day about why this is, and how blaming the middle classes for their supposed stranglehold on 'good' schools is barking up the wrong tree totally and does nothing to improve the chances of disadvantaged kids - but I'm sure you've heard it all before.

This was not a thread about schools so I don't want to hijack it - but if you want to tell me how MC parents fail WC children by living in the nice end of town, and sending their children to their catchment school, then please do. I'm all ears.

Fellationelson well you have just said how MC parents fail WC children- by living in the nice end of town and sending their children to their catchment school! Not that it's their fault, but that's how- the other schools are always struggling to play catch up when there's not enough of a mix.

But certainly in the city where I live, if everybody sent their children to their catchment school, the schools would be a lot more even. Even the worst schools are set in areas where there is a mix of housing. It was extremely dispiriting to walk from my home to the school where I worked and see one child after another walking in the opposite direction to get to the 'better' school, despite the fact that the school where I worked was much closer.

Back to the OP, I find it hard to take friends who send their dcs to private schools and have one friend who possibly voted Tory but I don't want to probe too far!!

Actually I must apologise - I've just re-read my post and I agree that:

'self-motivated self-discliplined (blah blah) people tend to earn good money'

was a poorly worded comment, and doesn't exactly represent what I meant to say.

What I meant was that, in general, most people who are affluent/MC tend to be self-motivated, self-disciplined, socially responsible etc etc.

It's a subtle distinction but an but an important one.

It doesn't really alter my overall point though.

Surely you can be friends with someone who has different viewpoints, so long as you can agree to disagree, or not try to 'convert' each other, unless to reach a compromising middle position.

Good point mumcentreplus:
"I think it depends.. like all relationships I'm sure even in friendships there are deal breakers.. sometimes views people have, openly expressed on a regular basis in your company can be quite draining..
and after a while a friendship can be compromised.. to call someone a true friend is important to me, not something I would say lightly.. so what they believe is ultimately important.."

felationelson that's all I was asking - whether it was a serious comment. I wasn't accusing you of being a nasty Tory or anything similar, and I wasn't trying to twist your words, I was trying to understand what you were saying.

I also wasn't commenting on the schools issue. I was literally asking about that specific section of your post, which I now understand, and wasn't even saying anything about the whole schools thing, the supposed MC v WC thing that's arisen here or anything else!

Also, for the record, just because I'm left-wing doesn't mean I'm immeadiately going to twist your words to make it look like you're having a pop

YANBU there are people I know/used to be friends with who I just can't stand now.

I am somewhere in the middle politically, sometimes lefty sometimes right-wing (depending on the subject). Most of the people I am friends with are the same with a slight bias towards the left.

If someone was a rabid right winger, racist, homophobe and said/acted upon that I wouldn't want to know them. Anymore than I can be arsed with proper lefties who can't grasp any idea of personal responsibility whatsoever.

Greensleeves and I would not get on, we wouldn't be friends (just going by what is posted on here). That is fine, it doesn't make either of us bad people, it just makes us different. I don't feel the need to be friends with everyone I know.

I think you are right Morloth, we would not do well stuck in a lift together, that's for sure

your views are bone-bleachingly abhorrent to me

however it must be one of the odd things about internet forums - I find you quite likeable and enjoy your posts

DH's extended family live in a region where in the local elections the BNP came narrowly 2nd after Labour. I suspect, but have never enquired, that some of them disenchanted with Labour voted BNP, given comments made about immigrants taking/ undercutting on jobs. It makes me , dh says they're just thick. Don't often get together as we are world's apart.

But what are the other schools playing catch-up with exactly? League tables? How does that make the school better or worse? I'm sure you'd be the first to say that there are many fantastically nurturing schools where passionate talented teachers add tons of value to disavantaged or challenging children and yet they still end up looking below average to crap on league tables, even if they've had a glowing Ofsted.

If I suggested that MC children were inherently more clever that WC children there would be an outcry. Yet there is the assumption that (as you just said) schools that are perceived as undesirable could 'catch up' if only more MC children went there. How exactly? If the league tables suddenly improved then clearly they'd be reflecting the new MC contingent. It may make for a better public image, but it won't it suddenly turn all the education refusniks into model pupils. Or is some of the magic dust supposed to rub off? The trouble is, it can rub off both ways. For every borderline student who raises his/her game there will be another who sinks to the lowest common denominator. I can see how this might be worth the gamble to parents stuck with the 'bad' school, but I'm not sure how we are supposed to sell it to the others!

There is also an assumption that MC children are advantaged by going to the 'better' schools. Better how? Do they have much better teachers? Tons more funding? What? What mysterious thing goes on at these 'good' schools in MC areas that other schools are lacking?

I don't like the idea of being stuck in a lift with anyone, it is one of my great fears. I can handle the lift stopping, I can even handle the thought of it plummeting, but the thought of hours and hours and hours trapped with other people. Bleurgh.

You only like me cause I don't pretend to be anything that I am not. It isn't like, it is grudging respect. I feel the same way about you.

I think the moment I realised that I could not like someone and that that doesn't automatically make them bad/wrong whatever is when I properly grew up and understood the world a bit better.

Sorry that last post was to thewook. It took me so long to spit that lot out that the thread has moved on!

GF glad we understand one another now.

I would take issue with the idea that to be a homophobe or a racist you need to 'rabidly' right-wing. I have known many people spout racist or anti-gay twaddle and they have been dyed in the wool WC socialists - just not the educated liberal kind.

In areas where the BNP have started to do well, the traditional electorate has always been labour.

I have a very lefty friend who is 'reluctantly' racist. She is South African and my goodness she tries to undo her upbringing over this.

But it is knee jerk and she kicks herself for it. I remember being in a cab with her when some black teenagers walked by, I barely noticed them until she grabbed her purse off the opposite seat and held it tight. It was a reflex action.

She knows she is wrong about this and that skin colour has no bearing on what sort of person you are. But she has been taught differently her whole life and that sort of programming is a bugger to undo.

That's right. So many of us are programmed from such an early age that certain people will conform to certain sterotypes, or that our lives and opportunities have been blighted because of Margaret Thatcher, or becasue of immigrants taking our jobs, or our lives have been blessed with social mobility from humble beginnings because of Margaret Thatcher, or whatever, it takes a very unusual person to be able to shake off all of influence and start afresh with what they think.

I wonder how many people vote totally differently to their parents, and most of the people they went to school with?

well I should have disowned my mother years ago then when I first voted as she decided to vote Tory and vote in the horror that was Maggie, but of course, I didn't. Given that the parties are almost the same these days, does it really matter - how do you know what your friends are voting anyway - you don't hold their hand in the booth. How left do you have to be to be considered friend material? Do you plot people on a scale to see if they are left enough considering how Labour and the Tories seem to be merging?

FN you are right in a way, it is too easy to say that more of a mix would necessarily be of benefit to anyone, though I think it's generally better to have more of a mix just on a social level. It's the inequality that is the problem- and that's formed in the years before school even begins. More mixed schools will often just have sink streams, rather defeating the point of having a mix in the first place.

You are utterly wrong on the virtues of the middle classes though- what a load of twaddle!! As if goodness and decency are the preserve of the better off- hardly!

Back to the OP, I noticed the other day that a friend likes a facebook page called something like 'Enjoy being on the dole while I go out to work to pay for you' I thought this was really off, didn't expect it from this person, and was a bit given that said friend doesn't even work!!!!!