Scuffles

I've been fighting on the internet again..

There is a good chance this will keep up. The election is getting closer, there is a lot of bad information out there, and it's important to me; I feel a responsibility to post things. However, that's not how the first one happened.

For a while now, every political post that either of my younger sisters has posted has been attacked by their former hairdresser. They would sometimes ask me for help with rebuttals, but it would always result in more frustration. Sometimes the things she said were too poorly conceived to answer easily, but when they would do a reasonable response anyway she would shrug it off, saying she needed to get back to doing something else, and she didn't want to get unfriendly. She was already so unfriendly that it was hard to take that justification seriously.

She had been getting worse, and I was pretty fed up with her, so much so that on the day of the dust up I had posted a Facebook status about how frustrating she was. It got a lot of likes, but I didn't think that much about it. After all, I know she is not the only person like that out there, and my status also complimented my friends for not pulling that crap. Then she went after both of them again.

A picture of the president with a child (lots of good Obama/child pics out there) and a compliment to his nature drew on a scathing argument that he couldn't be a good kind person because he is pro-abortion. Then on another post she put her incorrect, poorly articulated comment followed by a "Done" so you would know that you are not supposed to answer.

I try to avoid conflict, but once I'm in, I'm in. I came out swinging, and I was pretty clear about her being stupid. The thing is, she's not intelligent, but I wouldn't have made a big deal out of that if she had not been being a jerk, which she continued.

One thing I had not been anticipating was that other friends of mine came to my defense. I don't even know how it happened, because only one of them was a mutual with my sisters and I, and I know none of them were friends with Rachel (and unlikely to become friends now). I'm sure she felt piled on - which is not a good feeling - but she did not learn anything. She claimed I had nothing better to do than be a troll when the precise reason I was there was because she has been trolling my sisters consistently. No sense of irony whatsoever.

It was nice to have others affirming my intelligence and goodness, and this is where it gets interesting. One of the things she threw at me was that I am just a sad, lonely single. She is Mormon, like my sisters and I, and our church is very family-oriented. My friends who contributed are not LDS, so I know that particular insult seemed very wrong to them, though most members I know would be horrified at that being thrown out as an insult as well.

I mention it, because I think in Rachel's mind, well of course we are liberal and pro-choice and can support Clinton and Obama - we are not doing what is right. She had previously ended a lot of arguments to Julie with Julie just not understanding because she doesn't have children. Whether the issue is merely that we have not been quite righteous enough to be blessed with husbands and children (and once you have those, you are never sad or lonely) or we are rebelliously staying single and childless on purpose, I am not sure, but it gives her the moral high ground.

I think that for her - and for a lot of other people - there is a mental block that anyone can be smart and good and still believe differently politically. I don't say it based on this interaction alone. Saturday night one of my posts got an unusually scriptural response from one Mormon, but also a kind of aggressive response from someone who wasn't. And when another friend (who is Mormon) stepped in to defend me, he flew into attack mode on her, calling her stupid and accusing her of being on food stamps. (She has a PhD and has never been on government aid, though that would not be a crime.) Because obviously if she is liberal, she must be poor and stupid, as must I. (But I am only poor, and clearly I have friends who will vouch for the smart part.)

This division is not right. No political party has a monopoly on good or evil. As everything becomes more polarizing, it can seem that way. Certainly, I can feel like people don't question themselves enough, or their political alignment, but even as execrable as I think Trump is, I can't automatically assume someone who supports him is that execrable.

Rachel unfriended my sisters, and that was my goal. I was tired of them getting abused for daring to think differently and they were reluctant to unfriend her because that's like giving up. I deliberately disrupted that. (And although she only unfriended them she said she was blocking them, because she isn't even smart enough to know what those things mean.)

However, I have not unfriended the people from the other interactions. I did delete some posts, but I am going to try to preserve those relationships. Abuse is a reason not too, but if we can manage to disagree without abuse, then we should do that. I'm going to try.

Spell check does not like my use of "unfriend" as a verb, and frankly, it feels weird having a post where I get so specific on everyone's religious affiliation, but it seemed relevant. We'll' see how tomorrow's post goes.