Yesterday, I was a little down because a person I've known for 20 years just will not stop raising transphobic public figures in our correspondence. He's a classic both-sides-ing "centrist", confident that he's simply seeing the "bigger" equivalences in violence at work, and... I don't know why I've tried for as long as I have. Ego maybe? Most every fellow I knew in KW was like him: someone who'd rather pull you into debate to shelter their own prejudice than push beyond the prejudice itself. /x
Most feminized folk will also remember that, around 2016, we started to see this behaviour show up in a BIG way among many people in our lives - folks we kind of thought shared our values, more or less, until we saw the attitudes emboldened during a presidential run.
I think I've stuck with this attempt to get through to this person for so long *because* he's such an embodiment of so many I used to be around all the time. But such emails only steal my joy. I know what what needs to be done.
@MLClark yep. I ended up cutting ties with a dear friend back around then because she was just horrible about Obama. In retrospect, those trends existed even before then, but...yeah, it was pretty awful. And she had been out of the US for some years previous, in Ecuador.
@joycereynoldsward You've pointed to a key issue, Joyce. Some behaviours were *emboldened* by public, political sanction - but that doesn't mean they weren't with us, and with those people, all along. What a heartbreak. I'm glad you knew what was best for you to do. I'm sorry for the disappointment in another person it entailed.
@MLClark the sad thing? They identified as a Trotskyite. Granted, by then I was already very cautious about the far left for other reasons, but...