To hate my DH's Tory politics?

[tearsforsneers]

DH is a staunch Tory, always has been. Privately educated and long career in the military.
My background is more working class - brought up in a single parent family, not on benefits but my mum worked bloody hard so we would have a good start.

I can't bear how he supports the Tories - I find what they've done to the country (and how the future looks under them) so bleak.
Similarly, he says he's embarrassed by my support of labour, who he says are a total shambles.

We've agreed not to discuss politics but that seems a shame after five years together. I love and adore him in every other respect though we've never so vehemently disagreed in our views.

AIBU to love him yet feel uncomfortable at his political standpoint?

I couldn't be married to someone who supported the party of anti-Semitism. But each to their own.

Lets be honest they are all a bloody shambles. After 40 years of voting I have absolutely no idea of who to vote for at the election.
Could you perhaps agree that they are all useless?

Well you picked him. He was a staunch Tory when you married him, what’s your complaint?

I find it hard to understand how anybody thinks Tory policies are actually working in the way someone suggested above i.e. generating a strong enough economy to pay for services for the most vulnerable. Surely it's the case that poverty is at very high levels, and the NHS and schools don't have enough money. It's clear the policies are not working at all as under the Tories after 9 years of managing the economy, they still don't seem to have enough money. Unless of course there is enough money to fund the NHS and alleviate poverty, but it was a deliberate choice to spend that money on other things (like billions to the DUP and however much all the messing around with Brexit has cost, general elections, etc etc etc). I read about a Conservative MP yesterday who has claimed 1 million pounds in expenses since 2010. 1 million pounds. In expenses. Paid for by tax payers.

I do see that some people are afraid the country will run out of money if Labour are in. Or that people will emigrate because they don't want to pay high taxes. But other countries mostly have higher taxes, and if they don't, there's nothing like the NHS or maternity leave or even annual leave like there is in the UK.

You can't have it every which way.

My mum was brought up as a true blue tory, born to a family of ‘Hyacinth Buckets’. My dad grew up as a ‘gas man’ - the son of a mechanic on Grimsby fish docks. After 52 years of happy marriage they are both politically rather homeless - my dad in particular. He is broadly socialist, but very Eurosceptic. He is livid over privatisation of water, but thinks the public ownership was inefficient and corrupt in its own way.

I was a staunch remainder. After the referendum I was truly gutted. However, we spent many hours in discussion about why people voted the way they did and how it didn’t make them ‘stupid’ or ‘xenophobic’.

I have said before, classifying people as good/bad based on labour/tory is rather pathetic. People have valid reasons for voting the way they do. Try genuinely listening rather than thinking of your ‘Yes, but.....’ answer instantaneously.

There are complete c*nts on both sides of the political spectrum and at all levels of wealth and education. Some of the worst ‘benefit’ bashing’ I have ever come across is from clients at the food bank - they are more than happy to talk about how other people shouldn’t be getting benefits.

You will be able to find common ground if you look for it.

But this thread demonstrates that many people are simply not willing to move away from narrow partisan positions when it comes to politics. Talk to your husband, not about party politics but about how he sees society working. I bet you will find a lot you agree on.

We all need to let go of the idea that there is only one right way to vote and start building bridges imo. Polarised politics gets us nowhere.

But you married a military man who was privately educated? What did you expect?

I read about a Conservative MP yesterday who has claimed 1 million pounds in expenses since 2010. 1 million pounds. In expenses. Paid for by tax payers.

Do you think conservative MPs are alone in that? FYI, the pie chart is average expenses per MP by party for 2018/2019. The list is from 2010.

Honestly, you hate the tories but happy to reap the benefits of being married to a privately educated army boy!

I really do think that people who can't see any good in any type of politcal view than their own are probably not very clever.

You’ve married somebody with values fundamentally different to your own

Not necessarily.

My husband and I have the same values, a shared faith, fairly unusual and strong views on many areas of life, but very different political views.

Same aims. Different views on how best to achieve them.

DP voted Leave, I voted Remain. We decided not to discuss Brexit at the time because we would never agree.

Generally I'm much more liberal than he is so I see some of his views as extreme and he thinks I'm too passive.

It doesn't make us incompatible.

But it does seem like your opinions are both very cliche. I grew up in a council house, very much working class. That doesn't mean that voting Labour 20 years on is necessarily the right thing for me now.

The way the country ran when you were both young is very different to now.

Or they're probably working for one of the political parties - probably labour because momentum understand social media- and are desperately trying to associate the other political parties with bad things (tories - hate the poor) (labour -antisemitism) (Lib dems - don't know what a woman is) or whatever.

It's a bit too blatant now and has just got annoying.

Well you can feel uncomfortable but it sounds he has his own views on your Labour beliefs. Do you think you have the moral high ground? It all sounds a bit clichéd.

oh bore off. Your quarrel is with most voters in this country then

Hardly. The Conservatives got about 42% of the vote in 2017 compared with Labour's 40%. In the previous two elections it was less than that even though they won more seats.

You Tories aren't great on facts, are you?

Tories are only interested in themselves. They are fundamentally selfish, and like that awipe the other night claiming £80k doesn't even put him in the top 50%, divorced from reality. They don't know/don't care that the policies they espouse, are actually hurting millions of people, they just don't give a sht because they think it is best for them. Selfish, entitled twats.

dadshere I agree that guy was an idiot. However, the rest of your post makes you sound just as ignorant. No wonder this country is in such a state.

Labour right now want to nationalise everything so we are under state control. How did that work out in Venezuela? It was once a rich country. Corbyn has said he admires their policies. This is fact. There is a video. McDonnell has said that he would imprison everyone who voted against Labour. This is fact. It’s on audio. How the fuck can people vote Labour and say it’s the Torys that are bad?

I couldn't be married to someone who supported the party of anti-Semitism. But each to their own

You mean Labour? The party doesn't support anti Semitism. There may be individuals who do but it's not something the party would ever support!
People vote Tory and there are a number of racist, homophobes and anti Muslim in that party. So that means the actual party support those?

I grew up in a 1% household--not mega rich (single low 6-figure salary) but definitely very well off. My parents are left-leaning centrists (very New Labour) and both sets of my grandparents were Thatcherites. I grew up hearing both these political views espoused with vehemence over the dinner table (one set of grandparents ate with us every day until my grandmother passed away in the nineties).

I'm now to the left of the Labour Party (I consider the latest manifesto to be centrist and sensible). I couldn't have married a person who supported a smaller state with its implications for the well-being of the most vulnerable. My husband and I are both 20% tax payers and we have more money than we need. We're not vulnerable, don't need food banks, have a mortgage so no insecure renting. We have everything we could ever need.

There are people on my street (I live in a mixed council estate, some private social housing) who I see at the discounted section for food every day at the local supermarket. A neighbour did a council house swap to avoid bedroom tax as her children had grown up, and then ended up worse off because the council tax was one band higher. She works as a carer (previously as a cleaner) on minimum wage, as does another neighbour. I am so much more fortunate in pay than they are, so why wouldn't I want to pay more tax so they can have a better quality of life?

I do judge people who are comfortable like we are, or who are even richer, who resent the redistribution of wealth. Neither my job nor my husband's job is 2-3x more important than a cleaner or carer. More specialist and not pointless by any means, but not that much more important. If my tax can help others, and doesn't mean I lack the essentials, why wouldn't I want to pay it?

I am therefore deeply suspicious of 'Conservatives', whether they are far right racist bigots or One Nation Tories. However, if someone (eg your husband) simply supports select Conservative policies which I may not agree with (possibly military related) but which are not harmful to the most vulnerable, I have no problems with them at all.

How did you end up in a relationship with him, OP? I've never (knowingly) so much as snogged a Tory, I certainly wouldn't have married one. I couldn't be in a relationship with anyone who thought it was ok to leave millions in poverty and let all our public services disintegrate. My politics are too important to me.

If DP developed Toryism, I'd have to dump him. Although I'd probably get him checked out by the doc first, just in case he was developing dementia or something.

The only political thing we've ever disagreed about was the 2nd Iraq war, and that was before we were together. He changed his mind about that a couple of years later.

But you won't have to pay more tax under Labour. Although I agree that you should.

I couldn't be in a relationship with anyone who thought it was ok to leave millions in poverty and let all our public services disintegrate. My politics are too important to me

Jesus 🥴

If your otherwise happy, then don't worry about it.

Your vote cancels out his & vice versa. So neither of you are going to have any impact on election results.

I don't think having different politics automatically means different values.

DH is a Conservative of the Rory Stewart variety. I am politically homeless and have voted Green, Lib Dem, Labour and even Tory in the past, even though I come from a strongly left wing background.

Both of us agree with some of the policies of each party and disagree with others. Its the relative importance that is different.

DH is most concerned about the economy. Corbyn giving 10 of shares to the workers knocks 10% off our pensions. People seem to forget that pensions are invested in shares in the stock market. It's not all millionaires rubbing their hands as they count their gold. Snatching away the shares in public services to renationalise would shrink our and all private sector employee's pensions even further.

I agree with that but for me the environment is more important. Stopping the badger cull, fox hunting and looking at different farming methods to stop using insecticides for example. So I'll be voting Green. Strong on the environment, less renationalisation.

So we vote differently but understand each other's POV.

And finally, in my opinion the nieve notion of left wing good right wing bad is ridiculous. Remember Stalin killed as many as Hitler.