Dealing with Deplorable Family and Friends

That latter only respond to tit for tat behavior, so the way to put them in their place is to reciprocate their malice.

I’ve let go of a desire to put them in their place, or for me to be some catalyst for their change. I consider reciprocal malice to be evil.

I don’t. I suspect tit for tat is close to the GTO political strategy in an era of polarization.

In any case, I’ve found that abstract advocacy of leftist violence tends to make them not want to engage with you. It paints you as someone whose mind cannot be changed and maybe they are afraid of something happening to them if they poke the bear. Don’t be afraid of discussing politics with them. Make them afraid of talking politics with you.

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This is really good but i think there are exceptions to the rule. Like if you try the above and someone still is constantly making racist remarks and you want them to stop around you switching to they are a racist can make it stop.

Pretty good. I just go into the conversation with good faith that the other person probably has good intentions.

The robber analogy falls apart a little though in that robbers typically mean to steal from you, so their intent of course matters, even if they don’t call themselves a robber.

But in my experience, most racists are well-intentioned people who are oblivious to the racist aspect of their behavior and the racism around them, such as the white woman in the earlier video who assumes that because she doesn’t intend racism or see it around her, Orange County is a racism free zone.

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But if they persist and shoulder shrug how do you deal with that?

I prepare myself to make difficult assessments about whether that conversation or any relationship at all is possible with that person. We can shame them into doing what we want, but they’ll go back to who they truly are as soon as we stop coercing them. It’s a kind of self reflection and change that has to come from within.

OP here. Nice post.

As mentioned above, the wife’s family is Jewish. When I first started dating her, I told her parents I was part German because my grandfather told us we were and we celebrated German heritage (food and music) at his house but come to find out after the Google was invented that we are in fact not German. Every now and then I have a brat and smile thinking of gramps.

Her parents despise German people and obviously disliked their daughter’s choice in men. I am empathetic to their POV on that issue though listening to their bubbe’s stories of surviving the Holocaust. Luckily they are pretty liberal.

It’s my family that are mostly deplorables, save a few. I have the standard racist uncles that everyone has. But on the mom issue, I think it is that she’ll never vote for someone that isn’t anti-abortion. She’s accepted to just not talk politics around us, even though she agrees with most of the “liberal agenda”. If there is any hint of politics I use it to make a point, politely and amicably. For other family I am more stern. And for friends/acquaintances I call that shit out.

Where do you draw the line with things that you consider to be pointless fights and things you will call out?

I know you didn’t really ask me this question, but I find it’s pretty easy to tell the difference between something said out of ignorance and something said out of malice.

I’m gonna give an example of one that is sadly common: when someone uses the expression “to Jew down” when referring to bargaining a price down. You’ll hear this one out of the blue, usually when you’re not even talking abut anything political, and 9 times out of 10 the person saying it is oblivious to the anti-semitism. It’s an expression that they’ve always used because their parents did, and they just never ever stopped to think about how terrible it is. This is the type of thing you can gently correct via education.

Now, if someone is talking about the globalist conspiracy and how libtards are funded by George Soros, and THEN they use that expression…well, they are the 1/10 who know what it means, revel in it, and no amount of educating will change their mind…and you even mentioning it will make them joyful that they were able to trigger a lib. That’s the one you just ignore and walk away, because they are lost.

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I haven’t heard “jew” used as a verb since the 90s…

in my experience, the one that people really dont understand is “gypped”. i feel like there are tons of people that heard their parents say it, and for some reason dont understand that you are calling gypsy/romani people thieves. there is even a campaign to try and say that the phrase just developed independently of the same named religion/ethnic group, and somehow has nothing to do with them…

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“actually it’s complementary, since when did being good at negotiating become an insult?”

Wait until you look up the history and etymology of “janked” O_o

And there it is. Someone doesn’t intend any racial or anti-Semitism by using that phrase, so they absolve themselves of any accountability for the racist impact. I don’t really know how to have any kind of conversation about such a position beyond “cool” and moving on.

That’s hard for me. IRL, I experience something similar to the forum-mind where as soon as a person starts spouting casual racism or right-wing talking points, it’s hard for me to engage with that person instead of assuming they’re following the same script. Especially hard for me to listen and try to understand their POV and maybe learn something myself before I leap to counter. But I’m working on it.

Mostly because Romanies aren’t much of a thing in America. They’re just some gimmicky fortune tellers on a TV show.

But man do people hate them here.

N---- please