Yeah I had a pretty liberal friend in LA from Atlanta like that. Then he moved back to Atlanta and become a full-blown Trumper. Can’t be an outcast within your family (he has 8 siblings). That’s no fun.
The really interesting part to me is he used to hate his older brother, who’s something of a body-builder steroids influencer (anti-vaxx of course), with a passion. Now they’re best buds.
This is the brother FWIW: https://jaycampbell.com/
I just spent 4.5 years writing a book and at least a month arguing about semicolons; I still have no idea when to use them.
Period would work just as well there, maybe?
I think so.
I view semicolons as basically the same as periods, but semicolons show a higher degree of connectedness between the two sentences.
The only time in the book that I was 100% sure I needed to use semicolons was this paragraph:
Not in Central Baja. It’s the Walmart Supercenter of cactus viewing. We rolled through miles of garden wonderland packed with, among other flora: giant cardón cacti, which look similar to the iconic saguaros of the American West; ocotillos—spindly branches that look like a dead bundle of sticks half the year but produce blazing red bottle-brush blooms in spring; a variety of chollas—with their barbed spines that slice through clothing and embed into flesh; several species of iconic organ pipe cactus—including the “old man” variety, sporting his mop-top of gray hair; barrel cactus; prickly pear; and striking elephant trees—their pot-belly trunks sprouting gnarled, white-bark branches with dark creases at the knuckles.
And I still had to fight with my copy editor over it. But I found some stuff online that said semi-colons were ok for lists where commas didn’t work. So I stuck to my guns.
And yes, I use em-dashes way too much.
I look at semicolons as a substitute for “and” when “and” would sound awkward. Periods can often be used instead, but to me (and I write and edit for a living, but was neither educated nor formally trained in that field, so this is just my feeling), that makes it feel like two separate thoughts. A semicolon keeps them linked.
Again, just my opinion, not a formal writing rule.
Do you have some examples of when you would and wouldn’t use semicolons in this vein?
There are times when I want to use a semi colon, but I’m only like 80-90% sure and using a semi colon incorrectly is like super embarrasing as it’s like saying I think I’m really intelligent, but actually am not and just pretentious.
Again, disclaimer that I just go by feel. I write and edit online gambling news, so it’s not like I’m editing books or something.
This example isn’t amazing and just ignore the actual quality of writing. This was sentence I recently edited:
“The term lengths start at six months and go up to a five-year reversible ban, with 440,000 people currently on the list.”
I changed it to: “Term lengths start at six months and go up to a five-year reversible ban; 440,000 people are currently on the list.”
A period would have worked, but I like the idea of linking the two parts to continue the thought.
EDIT: So it’s not an “and” example, but “and” could be used there, it just wouldn’t sound great.
This is fucking deranged. Dude is like deep into a bender,
I’m rarely confident when a semi colon is warranted; as a result, I rarely use them
Or periods.
Dude needs to follow the playbook of Michael Jackson, Prince or Matthew Perry.
I’ve heard it may have changed for the younger kids. But folks who grew up under apartheid. Impossible not to be damaged.
I even knew a lady who had been an anti-apartheid white student leader, had met Nelson Mandela, and helped bring the system down… Still super racist in how she viewed the world.
Just refuse to use semi colons.
Any language that is ambiguous and relies on the maintenance of confusing rules deserves to evolve out or be regularised.
Show me one bit of language that you need semi colons that you can’t do with . … or , or extra words.
If you don’t like semi-colons and other punctuation, come on over to Japanese, where they don’t even put spaces in between words.
The semi-colon is peak civilization imo; I use it all the time! 
what is confusing about semicolons??? they join independent clauses, it’s not that hard.
fyp