Dear Pete: It's Not Me, It's You
I've referred a couple of times over the past few weeks to a former friend known as "Pete." To sum it up: at one point we were friends who had different world views. That devolved once President Obama was elected. It was no longer simply just a difference of opinion. I didn't like what I saw and rather than dealing with what I saw as a selfish and racist point of view from someone who likes to pat himself on the back quite frequently about what a good Christian he is, I unfriended him. I didn't block him, so a few months later there would be a friend request from him (in retrospect now I guess he thought I'd "cooled down"). The first time I just renewed the friendship. The second time it took some persuasion on his part of how he enjoyed our conversations and he respected me, blah, blah, blah. When the same conversations kept happening on my page where he kept making the case that him being selfish and racist amounted to him being a good Christian, I ended it again. I was just tired of having the SAME DAMN ARGUMENT with him every time. And the same thing happened, after a few months he requested my friendship again.
The final straw was prior to Trump's winning the election for me. This time I publicly stated I was ending the friendship and blocking him so he couldn't send me another request and I wouldn't even see his posts on our mutual friends' pages. It's the only time I have publicly stated that I was unfollowing or unfriending and blocking someone.
I have to say my world has been better without him in it. Every now and then, though, a mutual friend tells me about something him or one of his "buddies" say. I don't much care, really, because I don't hold them in high enough regard that I care what they think about me. They seem to think they have some inalienable right to spew their right-wing propaganda on everyone else's Facebook pages. No, you don't. It's funny how their "discussions" never happened on their own pages, only on other people's. They don't have the balls to have these discussions where THEIR friends and family can see what they actually have to say.
This time apparently he decided to say that anyone whoever unfriended him over "politics" is a very angry person. Now, I know I am quite passionate about what I believe. I get angry at injustice wherever I see it, which is more and more lately. But his uneducated pseudo-psychological analysis of those he disagrees with are so way off base. He's a Trump supporter, though, so he won't get it. They think their uneducated drivel is the same thing as a factual analysis of the situation by a trained professional.
The following letter, when I look at it after I wrote it, could actually be applied to several people I no longer consider friends and have unfriended on Facebook. I edited it to include points of view that might not be ascribed to any one person.
Dear Pete: It's not me, it's you
You see, when we first "met" on the internet, I thought you were a decent person whom I had a difference of opinion with. That was when Dubya was President. I guess having "your guy" in the White House allowed you a certain amount of decorum that vanished the minute the Black guy got in. You began spouting certain opinions that I not only disagreed with, but that I found pretty reprehensible. Yet you also wanted the reassurance everywhere you went that you were indeed a well-liked nice guy.
You can't have it both ways.
You can't spout racist crap and say you aren't a racist. Whether it's the Birther nonsense or stating that President Obama had a bigger responsibility to people in the inner-city and should have done more for them because "that's his people" while not holding White Presidents to the same standard, you are indeed a racist. I don't care where you live, who your neighbor is, how many "black friends" you have. You.are.a.racist.
You can't say you don't want to see the problems with social security solvency solved by raising or eliminating the income cap so you have "a few extra dollars in your pocket" and not be seen as a selfish bastard. There are people on social security who have to choose between housing, food, medicine, and heat at any given time, and you want "a few extra dollars" in your pocket. You don't get how privileged you are to say that?
You don't get to say that current civil employees such as police officers and teachers aren't entitled to the same level of benefits you enjoyed from that job and still do as a retiree. You sure aren't advocating for your taxes to go down by renegotiating retiree benefits. No, those have to stay the same because it directly benefits you. However, you're happy to throw future generations under the bus as long as it benefits you.
The fact that you see those who will die as a result of losing the ACA coverage as "collateral damage" makes you a reprehensible person. I suspect if you were about to watch one of your grandchildren lose health care and face death because he or she couldn't get treatment for something, your tone would change. Once again, it's because it affects you or benefits someone you actually care about. I don't want to know you. That line of thought alone makes me ashamed that I ever thought of you as any kind of a good person. You obviously aren't. You can pat yourself on the back all you want, but the bottom line is that I think you are selfish and evil. I don't see anything redeemable in you any more.
Seriously, why would I want to be friends with you? I don't like you. I don't think there is truly anything good about you.
The final straw was prior to Trump's winning the election for me. This time I publicly stated I was ending the friendship and blocking him so he couldn't send me another request and I wouldn't even see his posts on our mutual friends' pages. It's the only time I have publicly stated that I was unfollowing or unfriending and blocking someone.
I have to say my world has been better without him in it. Every now and then, though, a mutual friend tells me about something him or one of his "buddies" say. I don't much care, really, because I don't hold them in high enough regard that I care what they think about me. They seem to think they have some inalienable right to spew their right-wing propaganda on everyone else's Facebook pages. No, you don't. It's funny how their "discussions" never happened on their own pages, only on other people's. They don't have the balls to have these discussions where THEIR friends and family can see what they actually have to say.
This time apparently he decided to say that anyone whoever unfriended him over "politics" is a very angry person. Now, I know I am quite passionate about what I believe. I get angry at injustice wherever I see it, which is more and more lately. But his uneducated pseudo-psychological analysis of those he disagrees with are so way off base. He's a Trump supporter, though, so he won't get it. They think their uneducated drivel is the same thing as a factual analysis of the situation by a trained professional.
The following letter, when I look at it after I wrote it, could actually be applied to several people I no longer consider friends and have unfriended on Facebook. I edited it to include points of view that might not be ascribed to any one person.
Dear Pete: It's not me, it's you
You see, when we first "met" on the internet, I thought you were a decent person whom I had a difference of opinion with. That was when Dubya was President. I guess having "your guy" in the White House allowed you a certain amount of decorum that vanished the minute the Black guy got in. You began spouting certain opinions that I not only disagreed with, but that I found pretty reprehensible. Yet you also wanted the reassurance everywhere you went that you were indeed a well-liked nice guy.
You can't have it both ways.
You can't spout racist crap and say you aren't a racist. Whether it's the Birther nonsense or stating that President Obama had a bigger responsibility to people in the inner-city and should have done more for them because "that's his people" while not holding White Presidents to the same standard, you are indeed a racist. I don't care where you live, who your neighbor is, how many "black friends" you have. You.are.a.racist.
You can't say you don't want to see the problems with social security solvency solved by raising or eliminating the income cap so you have "a few extra dollars in your pocket" and not be seen as a selfish bastard. There are people on social security who have to choose between housing, food, medicine, and heat at any given time, and you want "a few extra dollars" in your pocket. You don't get how privileged you are to say that?
You don't get to say that current civil employees such as police officers and teachers aren't entitled to the same level of benefits you enjoyed from that job and still do as a retiree. You sure aren't advocating for your taxes to go down by renegotiating retiree benefits. No, those have to stay the same because it directly benefits you. However, you're happy to throw future generations under the bus as long as it benefits you.
The fact that you see those who will die as a result of losing the ACA coverage as "collateral damage" makes you a reprehensible person. I suspect if you were about to watch one of your grandchildren lose health care and face death because he or she couldn't get treatment for something, your tone would change. Once again, it's because it affects you or benefits someone you actually care about. I don't want to know you. That line of thought alone makes me ashamed that I ever thought of you as any kind of a good person. You obviously aren't. You can pat yourself on the back all you want, but the bottom line is that I think you are selfish and evil. I don't see anything redeemable in you any more.
Seriously, why would I want to be friends with you? I don't like you. I don't think there is truly anything good about you.
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