How to cope with my parent’s political views?

[Blacktigerstripes]

I’m staying with my parents at the moment, in their early sixties.
How do you cope with differing political and cultural views?

I’m getting so angry the more conversations we have.

My DM doesn’t agree with gay marriage…she also has a totally differing political viewpoint to me and my DP.
I’m finding myself getting more and more angry.

Has anyone else had this issue?

That’s what the thread started as but the discussion has widened since

I mean some views are unacceptable. There are some pretty extreme views that cannot be voiced in society without some sort of consequence, and that’s not a bad thing when it comes to some extreme views.

Look, there are all kinds of views that we don't like, and there is a kind of shading that veers into unacceptable. Probably everyone feels that way.

But at this moment in time there seems to be a very narrow sense of what that includes for people who think of themselves as politically progressive. Take race for an example. In another thread, someone said they consider that anyone who rejects ideas like white privilege is a racist and a bigot - an unacceptable view. Despite the fact that it's a controversial ideology that many people who are from racial minorities dislike, and disbelieving it in no way implies a belief that some racial groups are inferior or undeserving of political equality.

Or in this thread several people believe that only a bigot would question same sex marriage.

Now for me, an idea that starts to get into the "wholly unacceptable" territory, morally, is euthanasia for infants. Yet this is something that the government in several countries in the west allows or is considering allowing. And I just don't hear anyone saying that views like this are just unacceptable" to the point we shouldn't allow people to talk about them.

And not being able to talk to parents about something that is a topic with a lot of layers, or even just get on without talking about it, doesn't bode well for society.

FYI to anyone … this is an excellent book that really illustrates what can happen when people think they can and should dictate what happens in private.

www.amazon.co.uk/Whisperers-Private-Life-Stalins-Russia/dp/0141013516/ref=sr_1_1?crid=E6ON5BH4Z1SZ&keywords=the+whisperers+orlando+figes&qid=1666567138&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIxLjk1IiwicXNhIjoiMS40NSIsInFzcCI6IjEuNjgifQ%3D%3D&sprefix=The+whisperers%2Caps%2C163&sr=8-1

How I cope with some relatives is by asking them to please not bring such topics up, and stating explicitly that If they do we will leave.

We had to leave 6 or 8 times before they got the message.

Every so often they backslide and we all get up and leave again.

And that’s how you should manage it.

Sounds like the OP, who hasn’t been back, expects the parents to either shut up or agree with them.

Here’s another excellent book… www.amazon.co.uk/Nothing-Envy-Lives-North-Korea/dp/184708141X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2UR7JEDRCJSJN&keywords=Nothing+to+Envy%3A+Ordinary+Lives+in+North+Korea&qid=1666567495&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIxLjk5IiwicXNhIjoiMS4wMCIsInFzcCI6IjAuMDAifQ%3D%3D&sprefix=nothing+to+envy+ordinary+lives+in+north+korea%2Caps%2C362&sr=8-1

Both books are real life accounts of what happens when ‘others’ think they should have a say in private moments and thoughts. Honestly, if you can read either and not defend privacy and freedom of thought and speech (regardless if you agree with the content) then you are problem.

That's an excellent book, which shows how bad things can get when there's only one righteous perspective.

History has shown us many times.

Live and let live doesn't apply if someone's homophobic and racist though does it?

Seriously if someone was a misogynist, racist, homophobe you'd just say "live and let live"?

Just because someone is family doesn't mean you need to keep in touch with them if they have vile "opinions". It's cowardly to not stand up for what is right just because a little confrontation makes people uncomfortable or because we are happy to enable people being horrid.

Actually, it's not racist to want to preserve your culture/race as a minority.

"But if it was the other way around..." - it's not the other way around, before you whip out that old chestnut.

Well actually if your opinion is that you deserve marriage but a gay person doesn't, it's not very possible to be friends is it. These aren't just views, you think these people.dont deserve the same human rights as you do.

If I said my opinion is (insert something violent and horrible about you or your family) should we be pals and you shouldn't get angry because it's just my opinion and I'm allowed to have this view?

What kind of sick world would we live in? If your DP said he thinks peadophiles are normal and should be allowed to teach would you stay with him because "you should be able to get along"?

Come on what is wrong with you.

Grown adults have their own views and that's their right. Don't like them - don't talk about them or move out - really quite simple no?

@Miajk I am from an oppressed minority sub-culture. I would prefer my children to 'marry out'. Is this an acceptable thought to hold, and perhaps to express in my own home?

Yes - You don't have to agree but you can agree to respect each other. I don't think it's possible to change someone's views. For instance I have people in the family whose views are quite xenophobic yet half of my family members are foreign. You have to find a way to co-exist if you must live with them

What does "deserve marriage" mean?

Many people who have differing views on marriage get along just fine.

Can you explain that? Genuinely - I don't get the rationale different standards.

If, in 200 years time, the English or Irish or whoever are the minority would it be ok then?

Yes, I would say “live and let live” as long as that racist / misogynistic / homophobic person is not breaking the law. people are allowed to have opinions in a free society, even if you or I may not agree with them. Policing people’s thoughts is a step too far for me personally.

you are using highly emotive and sanctimonious language. Nowhere did I say people need to keep in touch with those with “vile opinions”. In fact I feel quite the opposite - if I feel so strongly about someone’s views, I would steer clear of the topic entirely or avoid them. On the contrary, OP is the one STAYING WITH these awful people with vile opinions, and getting angry at them in their own home about their own views.

if her parents’ views are so unacceptable to her, why not leave / reduce contact?

I don’t really understand your thought process, @Miajk. Are you saying that if you’re part of a minority community, it’s OK to exclude others from your community?

I completely agree that racist views are abhorrent and very difficult to tolerate if family members hold them. I don’t quite know how you handle it, tbh. One of my friends in a mixed race marriage has experienced this with her grandma, although she’s improved over time. One of DH’s cousins, however, who worked in Japan ended up breaking off her engagement to a Japanese man, because his parents were horrified that he wanted to marry a white woman. She felt that she’d never be accepted into their family.

It’s hilariously ironic that the right call the left intolerant when some of the most nasty and intolerant people I’ve ever come across are right wingers - Boris Johnson, Donald Trump, Priti Patel, Nigel Farage to name just a few 🤣

I don’t disagree with every right wing viewpoint at all, just those that are racist, sexist, homophobic, or those that are designed to punish the vulnerable or less fortunate.

There are plenty of undesirable views on the left including racism etc but to suggest that the right are never intolerant and the left are the worst is a load of absolute crap.

Bigoted views are less a difference of opinion and more a question of someone’s morals.

I am an American woman in a location where my right to an abortion was recently put to a vote. I know that multiple family members voted to remove the right to abortion. This hits me hard because an unintended pregnancy could be very detrimental to my health. DH and I had a good private ranting session and got our frustrations out of our systems. I have enough life experience to know their opinions are entrenched and unswayable. Battling the same issues over and over again is pointless.

Gosh OP you’ve clearly hit a very raw nerve with some people here! I dread to think what views some of the “in my own home” brigade express behind closed doors!

Exactly this!!

It’s ironic reading the accusations that left wingers are intolerant because they don’t think others should be free to be horribly intolerant in their views and actions.

Take gay marriage for instance, makes a huge difference to gay people, but really has no effect on anyone else besides obviously demonstrating society being more fair. If someone is anti gay marriage that’s the ultimate intolerance as whilst it doesn’t affect them it affects others hugely, but that’s ok supposedly because it’s their view. Same with my racist fucking father in law, his free speech is probably being allowed to be openly racist vocally, again why should he be free to essentially bully others on their race when it doesn’t take anything to not be a racist cretin?

So called intolerant left wingers would rather live and let live unless you’ve got an individual who’d happily let their views adversely affect another group of people.

OP as you can tell we have a similar problem. The issue is with my FiL is that he readily brings these subjects up and tries to bully people into agreeing. He’s had a huge mouthful off my husband recently so am hoping he might stick with not bringing it all up from now on. It’s very difficult.

It does seem that many on the left are incredibly intolerant of views that differ from their own. Are you quite young?

If you don’t agree with gay marriage in 2022 you’re probably just a cunt. Nothing wrong with calling that outlook for what it is.

But the thread is right - no point trying to change their minds and no point in discussing politics.

This post is a symptom of much that is wrong in Britain today.

Well, the OP hasn’t been back.

I guess they weren’t prepared to listen to posters who disagreed with them. Shocker.