Unfriending due to Political Differences

[Final-Fan]

robzo100 said:

So, a former colleague of mine posted on Facebook that he wants any friends of his who are Trump supporters to unfriend him.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/americans-are-already-voting-on-facebook-by-unfriending-political-foes-2016-11-05

http://mashable.com/2016/11/05/stop-defriending-trump-supporters/#F7riUGsmcqqB

Those two sources are two of many showing how many other people are following suit.  So...how reasonable is this? Is it moral? Is it practical?

Myself, personally, I know that I can't change (perhaps nudge or persuade to a fraction) the viewpoints of my friends and family. We can't choose family, and in many ways we only choose friends to a small degree. And colleagues? Definitely don't choose those. Between those three groups, all very important groups, how on Earth could it be smart to alienate them even if we disagree with them? And even if it wasn't smart, is it nice??? As you can see I disgree with how my my former colleague went about this. That being said, he is a bigger Hillary fan than me. I'm more in the middle, and only slowly warmed up to Hillary.

So, what's the verdict?

First, this guy is the scum of the earth.  He can do his own damn unfriending. 

On the subject of whether it's ok to "do your own damn unfriending" over politics, I think it depends.  If the stances a person takes on various issues are so repugnant to you that you can't stand to associate with them, I think that's understandable.  But it really seems like that should not be the case most of the time.  I mean, no matter how much you disagree with someone else's stance on an issue, are they evil for it?  Or are they misguided?  Or perhaps they even see something you're missing that you will never find out if you refuse to have a dialogue. 

What bothers me about this is really the trigger:  "supporting Trump".  There are any number of reasons a person might not see Trump as unelectable, and it's often a disagreement about the facts of the accusations against him (or perhaps those against Clinton) rather than them thinking it's okay that he does all the stuff he's accused of.  And maybe they just haven't put that much effort into vetting their chosen candidate.  Is being ignorant a good reason to sever ties with someone?  I would argue:  not if you are trying to participate in politics as a citizen—you should be trying to get them to reduce their ignorance, whether or not they end up agreeing with you about everything. 

For me personally:  fuck that noise.  In fact, just tonight I had a debate about voting system reform (moving away from first-past-the-post) and another about abortion, and I think a real and fruitful exchange of ideas was had, and we not only better understand one another's positions but also are closer to agreement on at least one of them.