When Someone Disagrees with Us About Political Matters

 I am back trying to get my unpublished book “The Split Second:  In Consideration of Others or Look Up from the Phone and How to Deal with Rudeness in Others” published. I will not give up for right now whatsoever; however, there is enough “pushback” against my concept of a society where we all get along and are nice to each other. Then there are others who motivate me to go on with this project. I am incredibly grateful to them. I hope I can get the good word out there. Some love it; some think it is useless.

I want to continue to discuss an important consideration of life and how we might be more considerate of others is sad these days for me and for others. I am discussing when people do NOT value other people’s opinions even if they differ strongly from their own beliefs. These several blogs will deal with how we might be a better society if we try to understand views different than our own and enjoy the difference.

I am sorry to write that there is too much demonization of people who think differently than us or people who are of “the other political party.”  Personally, I love to have discussions about political matters with other people. And I will add the last person I want to discuss such matters with is a clone of myself. That is not fun whatsoever. Yet, I know people who have dismissed friends because they are of the other party, they think differently, or they voted for someone else, often the person who we dislike. I find this abominable.

I had the potential to make three friends recently and at first, I thought each of these friendships would be very meaningful. Then each of these people (these are separate incidents) found out that I was of the “other party.” In all cases, these people said comments like, “I can’t be friends with a person of your party” or “I can’t get close to someone who voted for or supports a given candidate.” I find this extremely shallow.

The late GREAT news commentator Cokie Roberts often commented that when her father, Hale Boggs, was Majority Leader of the House of Representatives, he would debate Gerald Ford, Minority Leader for a good part of the day on the floor of the House. When the working day was over, they would often go out and have a drink together.

Also, my late aunt and uncle who were married for over 60 years would tell anyone that the two of them did not belong to the same political party. They would laugh about going to the voting precinct and would cancel out each other’s vote. But they were laughing about it! Obviously, they respected each other’s opinion if they did not agree with it. This is the type of interaction we all need to have with others who may disagree with us. I am reminded of that old saying, “Can’t we agree to disagree?”  It would be a nicer world if we could.

My book is about thoughtfulness for others and openly showing it. Many have told me that this is slipping away in society. I believe that we can truly become a society where we can all think of others as we “go out in the world.”  It must start somewhere.