Post here
i had the opposite experience, my family with no coherent political beliefs hates cops and landlords and my dad was like the only time ill drink and drive is to run over cops. also they seem to hate israel.
Pleasently surprised this christmas lmao
the only time ill drink and drive is to run over cops.
tagline material?
With political messaging/propaganda in this country being what it is, you probably have a better chance at stumbling into good political positions if you avoid politics all together.
this rocks
Death to America
Can your family adopt me.
I did not have a raging political discussion, however I did have my sister, who considers herself a leftist but probably doesn’t know who Marx was, attempt to express her extremely vibes-based politics in entertaining ways. She showed up to our dinner late and extremely high. A family friend of ours came for dinner who is from South America and is extremely cool, often regaling us with stories of El Salvador and Chile in the 60s. She’d fit in on the site. She brought up Allende and my sister rolled her eyes and said that he was just like “every other mediocre white man who is overconfident”. I asked her why she felt that way and she said she was “just kidding”. I later brought up the book the Jakarta Method and my sister said that “what is happening in Jakarta and the other places in Africa is terrible on both sides”. She then said she’s in favor of the rest of the world adopting the American dollar because it would be “more socialist”.
The subject of the CIA came up in the context of intervention in South America, and my sister related it to the CIA distributing crack in American inner cities in the 80s. This stood out to me simply because I was surprised she knew about it. She then talked about the healing power of psychedelic medicine for about forty five minutes.
Later on, we watched Its A Wonderful Life, which she said was “a good argument for why we need to replace capitalism with Bitcoin” during the scene when Uncle Billy loses the money. I didn’t even ask. I love her and I actually do think her heart is basically in the right place but she’s like a random number generator and seems to invent her completely incoherent world view as she goes along. I’ve thought about recommending at least some theory but I kind of think she’s happier and pretty much harmless in her mind castle.
Your sister is like a political magic 8 ball
I asked her why she felt that way and she said she was “just kidding”
Your sister needs to do a collab with BMF. The sheer amount of what-the-fuckery would either break my mind or help us all achieve CHIM.
lol being willing to put shit out there is an undervalued trait. Imagine if she knew lefty stuff and you turned her loose at a social event to recruit people for an action. She’d probably do great!
She absolutely would. She did well at a job once in wine sales because she was good at getting people excited about the different types of wine. Ultimately she was let go because she kept getting things wrong (couldn’t remember the country of origin, type of wine, what it paired with, etc) and would make things up on the spot. Customers caught on and complained. But everything up to that point went well.
lol so it’s a pattern.
It really does sound like she has a gift if she could get solid grounding in just 1 topic
he kept getting things wrong (couldn’t remember the country of origin, type of wine, what it paired with, etc) and would make things up on the spot
So exactly the same as with politics?
Later on, we watched Its A Wonderful Life, which she said was “a good argument for why we need to replace capitalism with Bitcoin”
What did she mean by this
I think she was trying to say she wants to replace physical currency with Bitcoin so we can end the constant scourge of oafish, clumsy uncles allowing family fortunes to fall into the hands of miserly local slumlords.
Continuingly annoyed at family members saying “I want socialist things implemented in a socialist way by a socialist government, which is why I’m supporting the hard right!”
They just want their “socialism” with a “national” in front.
This is my idiot dad. All he wants is a comprehensive welfare state with high pensions, world class healthcare, impeccable infrastructure, finding for science and education, high wages and no non-whites or LGBT people.
I mean that’s the appeal of fascism
The appeal of pre civil rights era America.
A lot of right wingers who say stuff like this have realized free marker capitalism won’t deliver them a white’s only paradise with mandatory patriotism, there would have to be a huge amount of central planning and protectionism to do that.
Amazingly seemed like my more and more violently coughing midde class family is starting to get disillusioned by the status quo, all had been sick before Christmas with novid obviously. Most of my leftist points were met with comments like “I agree” with glances from depressed and weary eyes. Even my comments on how this virus will end us if we keep this up. That is new.
Boy did the kids especially make me sad though. One 9 year old said when I said their cough sounds pretty bad that “I cough like this all the time now”.
I cough like this all the time now
A few months ago I realized whenever I saw my nephew he was practically always coughing.
Yeah, it’s soul-crushing. This time I was however finally able to have the “covid is not over” talk with the mom of said kid when in the summer of this year she still ripped my eyes out when I very calmly said I don’t appreciate people showing up sick to family gatherings when covid is not over. Then I still got the partypooper treatment.
It’s very sad and depressing that we have to do this the hardest possible way with the most harm possible, but here we are.
I feel like people don’t even believe germ theory anymore. Most friends and family act like I’m insulting them and calling them dirty if I ask them to wash their hands before playing with my kids.
Alright but how do I convince my stupid hippy boomer dad that covid is real and that people actually died?
debating saying “free palestine” around my black israelite uncle to see what his reaction is but I know everyone else will be like “come the fuck on ABC…”
ive cut off the black isrealites in my family, they disgust me.
real. Thankfully it is just the one uncle and both my dad & my other uncle both are basically non-religious despite growing up with a pastor dad, so it doesn’t really ever have a chance to bleed into anything - but yeah it was contentious when grandma died and he wanted to plan the funeral & everyone was like “absolutely not”
whenever he starts posting shit like “Straight Pride ✝️🇮🇱” in July though (literal post I just copied from his Facebook wall smh) I’m always like ‘my man this is why no one likes you and you were fired from your nursing job & now work at walmart…’
What makes it funnier though is that literally no one else in our family or extended family has fallen for the black israelite ‘‘knowledge’’ - again, because my dad and us are all non-religious - he literally found this shit as a pretty hardcore Christian and did a whole conversion for a girl he then knocked up and had a child with but subsequently broke up with cause, his words, she wasn’t ‘feminine and submissive & didn’t respect the Most High’ like what bro…she is raising your child???
yeah one of mines has a BIRACIAL child that he doesn’t speak to, leaching off his mom at 40, talking about how hes a king and one day he will have a castle in the holy land. OK. talking about how “they” are trying to destroy the black race by making everyone trans and biracial. yeah ok dude, the jews made you impregnate that white girl. you know on the plus side this “movement” will never have real power because the only people interested are the most pathetic losers you have ever met.
she wasn’t ‘feminine and submissive & didn’t respect the Most High’
Like I know that the black Israelites exist but the thought of one being in your family is wild to me.
the thought of one being in your family is wild to me.
he’s the most soft-spoken/not physically threatening guy but you go on his Facebook & he’s posting 24/7 shit like “HELL-oween is for the world…not for the saints.” and “The Bible is being fulfilled 🇮🇱” (on October 14th
) but someone else already roasted him earlier at breakfast (by asking if he was gonna see his son today…) so I’ll probably give him a pass unless he says something 
Is Israel genociding Palestinians in the Bible
A disturbing amount, yes. Both the Canaanites (another Semitic people native to the Transjordanian region) and the Philistines. To this day amongst Zionists there are cultural equivalencies made between Jericho and the Palestinians of the West Bank, for instance.
Is black israelitism common? I am genuinely curious because I thought it was a pretty fringe thing.
The whole trans sports thing came up but fortunately they’re not super confrontational so I just rattled off some stats, the line about how no one cared about women’s sports before this and if you really care that much about fairness you gotta ban people like Michael Phelps too. They stopped after that, for now anyways.
Not sure who it’s from but there’s a new talking point about food not being as nutritious as it used to be but in like a conspiratorial way not cus the soil is degrading from industrial agriculture way.
More nutritious food is now more expensive due to corporate price gouging disguised as inflation, resulting in getting less nutrition for the same cost (or even more).
Oh yeah but not that kind of conspiracy. They meant it more in a Q adjacent way.
Impressive that you’ve memorized stats and can dunk with them
Not sure if you’re being sarcastic or not but regardless, just the one about athletic performance being statistically equivalent for trans women (or maybe even worse) after 2 years of HRT as cis women. And the most important one about the lack of trans women dominating women’s sports (either in total or as a percentage of trans athletes), which one would expect to happen if there were a real advantage.
Not being sarcastic! It’s actually impressive.
That’s not a conspiracy, veggies are bred for speed of growth and shelf stability, not flavor or nutrition. Compare an heirloom garden grown tomato to a super market one. Everybody should be taking a multivitamin.
Getting real fuckin sick of so-called “anticapitalists” with 0 materialism, 0 awareness of history and 0 ability to critique capitalism outside of the framework of capitalism, the market and economics
Help, having leftist politics is isolating me even harder than usual
“What do you mean, you hope the dollar collapses? Don’t you know that’s how I pay for my treats?”“Yes.”
Gotta recharge with comrades! We’re surrounded by liberalism and need to educate people but that can be very draining. Spending time with cool people can fill your cup back up!
Also despite me giving advice I wanna say I’m with you on it being exhausting. I have to take a few weeks off of liberals every so often because I’ll just hate people in general if I spend too much time in conflict over things like whether Palestinians are humans and as such shouldn’t have their hospitals bombed by an occupying force.
I thought I knew cool people, is the problem. Especially in queer circles it’s not uncommon to hear people say “eat the rich death to the bourgeoisie” or “capitalism is a death cult the empire is rotting” or similar variations. I figured that reading the Manifesto and absorbing a bunch of stuff through here would give me common ground with these people, but they’re always shocked and confused whenever you try to talk about anything seriously, like the DPRK maybe not being a “personality cult”
So the only cool person I have is my wife (thank fuck) and all other social ventures have failed dramatically for this and other (autism) reasons. Exhausting indeed…
There is a huge leap from “america isn’t perfect but it’s an overall force for good in the world” to “america sucks” to “maybe AES are the good guys.” I have a friend who has made the leap to “america sucks” but he thinks socialism = concentration camps for everyone, China bad, etc. We haven’t had a serious conversation in a year or two now.
I have realised this now and it sucks. You can’t even float “maybe AES are not Literally Hitler II” to these people, without them spewing nato talking points that stink of boot leather.
“You don’t think we should do anything about Ukraine?”
Me: “Nope. NATO shouldn’t be encroaching on Russia, they’re violating non-expansion agreements. And every clip I see of the war, the Ukrainian soldiers are sporting Nazi symbols on their uniforms.”
“But that Putin is just another Trump!”
Me: “Yep. And the war is a bunch of awful people fighting other awful people, throwing more guns at it isn’t going to stop it. We could be spending that support money on taking care of people here at home. We should massively defund the military and pull back our expeditionary units and close our bases around the world.”
“Then what will stop China from invading?!”.
Me: “Unlike the US government, China isn’t surrounding every adversarial county with bases; that should clue you in about their values and priorities”.
Me: “Unlike the US government, China isn’t surrounding every adversarial county with bases; that should clue you in about their values and priorities”.
I hate that everytime I bring this up, libs always go "but Chyna is so agressive in the South China Sea! We need them there!
"“Which sea? Didn’t hear you… The south what sea? Sorry, it’s kinda loud in here. South China Sea? China is in the South China Sea? Where is that anyway?”
Every lib who says this has no idea what the eleven dash line is
pull back our expeditionary units and close our bases around the world."
Um…my brain just had a very lib thought (though in lib fashion, I still think it applies). This actually reminds me of strategies in war games where you keep building troop manufacturing buildings and fortresses next to places you plan to invade next, or plan hostilities towards.
You could be building them as a way to protect allies, but if your foreign policy is pretty hostile to nations in the area (militarily, economically and/or politically), and you have a history of extremely violent aggression, if I was on the other side, I would absolutely expect the worst. You can either be Iraq and appeasement policy yourself into a violent invasion and the murder of a million of your people, or you can be North Korea and threaten to YOLO the other side and split the millions of deaths among yourselves. One got invaded, and the other one hasn’t. China pulls its punches a lot, but I’m glad they don’t back down.
Not just in war games, staging grounds and fall back points are very important for a flexible invasion strategy!
Heated debate about transgenderism. Looks like my dad had taken the bait and watches too much media. He dismissed transitioning as a legitimate treatment for gender dysphoria, insisting that those afflicted should take SSRIs or some such. My wife and I made the point that transitioning IS the treatment; it is drastically better in terms of outcomes and (can be) much less invasive and impactful. I think he also watched that (PragerU?) “documentary” that was promoted on X, I was able to shut him up by telling him that only 1 or 2 people in the last decade have regretted transitioning, but conservative media makes these cases seem more common than they are. Finally moved off the topic by pointing out that I dont really think its a big deal who plays which sports, considering the material state of the world. Now I’m kicking myself for not saying trans rights are human rights, and for moving to a meta-conversation about discourse like a fucking lib.
People like your dad are why I don’t talk much with my family anymore. I’m nonbinary, visibly so, and I got tired of being singled out at every family function
thanks for sticking up for trans ppl <3
I’m not seeing family today because we’re Jewish. But Thanksgiving was hard. I’m the only antizionist in my family, my parents and brother are sympathetic, but the rest of my family are raging zionists- my cousin actually fucking moved to Israel and proudly participated in recruitment propaganda. It was a lot
That’s hard to deal with
Ooh, I posted it in another thread but it seems relevant here.
Ladies and gentlemen: I give you the official DragonBallZinn’s guide to holiday politics!
Number one and also the TL;DR: Do not engage. This is so important I wrote an essay in the rest of this comment about it!
Actually arguing with CHUDs is what they want, it’s the TV trope of can’t argue with elves. So therefore, the winning move is to not play, but you can do this in a way that makes you look good.
Put out an air that you are too good for politics. You can do this in many ways “why talk about politics when we can be enjoying time together?” You can look at some of your other relatives and say “could we talk about something else? It’s Christmas!”. If you slip up and give them something to bite on, just say “oops, sorry. now’s not the time for me to explain but we can discuss this some other time if you’re really interested.” Even if it doesn’t register to them, it registers to relatives, even more conservative relatives that your uncle/grandparent/cousin/whatever, the conservative, is the one being a burden and not the “wokescold”. How pathetic is that when a progressive is outdoing them in the “just enjoy things like normal people” department?
Number two: If you’re feeling confident, push back a little bit but refuse to elaborate.
This is more of a plan B if you slip up and engage. For example, for whatever reason China was brought up yesterday and my uncle was going on about how they ban religion in communist countries. I mentioned that China does have Christmas but it’s just commercial, and that China recognizes 5 religions including Xinjiang having a huge Muslim population. Obviously the Uyghurs were brought up, but I really just mentioned that the Uyghurs have been there for decades and now’s not really the time to go into detail: it’s Christmas after all and we can discuss it later (and “later” will never come). The psychology is that I’m openly left-wing, I know some things they don’t but I have the tact to know ‘now’s not the time for argument, we have a holiday to enjoy.’ so if he brings up politics afterwards: he’s the asshole.
Number three: Especially if you’re younger, NEVER go on the offensive.
Follows with tip 1. Make them feel like the burden. If these types can sense that you came here with a chip on your shoulder, they’re going to try to make their Christmas dream of “triggering their SJW moral[slur] relative” come true. Even if it feels like you’re ‘letting them win’, the worst case scenario is that they will chalk it up in their heads that they ‘won’, but it will be a hollow victory because they never got to see you squirm or actually get an argument out of you. I know I’m repeating myself here, but it’s more like giving off the impression that you’re just a normal guy enjoying the holidays. That does more for the left than any argument ever will.
Number four: If they start going for the jugular and start getting too fashy, and they don’t openly hate you, try pulling them aside.
Pull them aside and mention that what they said kinda sucked, and if you want to explain why say something like “I know a few black/trans people and they’re alright.” obviously they’ll double down and at that point just say “I’m not mad or trying to argue, I’m just saying.”
Number five: If you’re a dude, help out with the setting up or cleaning especially if you simply must show some disagreement.
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Actions speak louder than words. Your aunt can be as much of a tradwife as she wants, she’s probably not going to decline when you ask to assist with washing dishes or bringing food you made yourself. It shows that as a man you don’t see yourself above “women’s work” or her as ‘the help’ for men. Not only does it establish maturity that you’re now part of making it special for the kids, but it can get some of the gears turning on two things: “maybe people who disagree with me aren’t all hypocrites if my woke nephew is willing to walk the walk and lend me a hand.” to maybe “Hey, why don’t the men help out?”
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For anyone who has a more competitive personality type, this can be your avenue for winning a dick measuring contest with your CHUD relatives that can make them look bad by comparison. In addition, you can make some tasty ass food, dress super well for the occasion, or fluff up some of your accomplishments this year.
Number six: here’s another plan B if you do get baited and need an out: If your family is white and/or Christian, you can use respectability politics right back.
- CHUDs think they’re the oppressed ones, or that they’re being subject to excessive punishment for their crimes at best. So if they say something particularly racist, play along with their victimhood and say “No wonder liberals/minorities/LGBT people think we’re all a bunch of nazis. Maybe if we weren’t such assholes, we’d get the respect we deserve. Just saying”
TL;DR: You have too much class to argue during the Holidays, so don’t because investing too much about politics is dumb. If you feel like it, try to win the dick-measuring contest some other way. Make the tastier cookies, tell some cool stories about your accomplishments or skills you’re developing. Outdress everyone.
I really like this. I had a pretty good experience wrt: my family because we all realized what was happening, moved to another room and shut the door on the offending parties when they started talking about that stuff. It fizzled out in about 15 minutes.
Love this advice, very basic but effective stuff.
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I wouldn’t say it was a raging argument, but I had a family member “both sides” Gaza. They stopped responding when I asked why Isn’trael was also conducting operations in West Bank.
Yesterday I had a liberal respond to me with “We should be careful about what we say about countries we don’t live in.” when I called Israel a settler-colonial fundamentalist religious ethnonationalist apartheid state. This person is the one who brought up the conflict (it was an old childhood friend who claimed to be a leftist) and said my takes on Israel were “Left Qanon”
Cut a lib etc etc etc
Similar here
Bill Maher-loving aunt: “Hamas just needs to stop.” 🤮
Your aunt just needs to stop
Existing, that isI agree. Hamas does need to stop Israel
Christmas day family report:
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I gathered my chuddiest relatives to prime them for me having a son this year instead of a daughter. I more or less told them that I don’t give a fuck what they think about it, but if you give my boy shit or make a big deal out of this, I’m going to make your pronouns were/was.
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My 20-something second cousin 110% wanted to fuck. Never mind my partner, or kids, or our generation-wide age gap. We had to have a serious Dad-to-Child style conversation about why that’s fucked up and never gonna happen.
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All the kids under 16 are fucking monsters when they play Uno. This is the most normal thing that happened.
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A (same age) cousin received a warning that he needs to shut the fuck up before we headbutt him so hard we both scream. RE:
CW: gender slurs
he WOULD NOT STOP SAYING “removed”, “removed”, or “traps.” Never mind him rambling non-stop how much he hates homeless people.
All in all it was a lovely Christmas.
I’m going to make your pronouns were/was
That’s such a banger line. I’m going to steal it comrade.
My 20-something second cousin 110% wanted to fuck.
bruh???
:Rudy-Giuliani:
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Not an argument, but good lord Charlie Brown Christmas is incredibly misogynistic
haven’t watched it in a while, how so?
All of the girls bar none are huge assholes for literally no reason and are all obsessed with either looks, money, or boys. I googled and apparently Charles Schultz had some deeply unhappy marriages which explains it I think
i assume all cartoonists are like dilbert guy or rick and Morty guy.
To push back, Lucy is the character that gives Charlie Brown the director gig. I don’t think it passes the bechdel test but my reading of the whole thing is an expression of the felt alienation of growing up in capitalist America. The little girls in the story act as a sort of Greek choruses for the feelings of insecurity and inadequacy that are brought on by the “commercialism” (re: Capitalism) ruining Christmas. Lucy also has a great moment at her therapy stand where, after collecting payment and celebrating it, she begins to try and diagnose Charlie Brown, implying that alone will be helpful. The whole exchange does a great job of mirroring the transactional and alienating feeling of therapy under capitalism. And the punchline at the end is that Lucy, a child, wants real estate for Christmas! Hilarious!
None of this is to say Charles Schulz wasn’t a misogynist, he probably was, 1965 was definitely a misogynistic time. I just feel it’s an oversimplification to call Charlie Brown Christmas misogynistic. There’s a reason that it had an unbroken string of Christmas airings for 5 decades. Something about it resonates with people. Again, there’s undeniably deeply flawed gender politics suffusing the whole thing, but it is an artifact of the past and so that’s part of the story of it.
I guess I’m writing all this because I don’t always feel the positives outweigh the negatives when appreciating historical media. I feel very strongly that the artistic value of A Charlie Brown Christmas vastly outweighs whatever ambient misogyny is embedded within it.
The choice to make many of the most critical comments come from little girls is surely gender coded in a problematic way, and yet it also reads as very realistic. Little kids can be very mean! Especially to each other. If memory serves the male characters are also very unkind to Charlie Brown.
The pacing, the music, the humor, The way it captures the ennui of American existence that is the background radiation of so many American lives. Certainly flawed, but beautiful in a way I really love. If that’s a bad take than you can keep your good ones.
the Vince Guaraldi soundtrack carries it (and all the other Peanuts cartoons) imo
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