Don't Let Politics Ruin Friendships

Let's Avoid a Personal Cancel Culture

Many years ago, while studying government, part of my course work included learning about the French and Italian communist parties. The French Communist Party was ideologically closest to Moscow, rigidly following the Party line even during the brutal squelching of the Hungarian Revolution in 1956. The Italian Communist Party was much looser, to the lasting chagrin of the Soviets.

One memorable item was how the French communists constructed a separate society. There were communist newspapers, schools, sports leagues, nightclubs, and restaurants that made it possible for a communist to live, for the most part, a life that had little contact with the noncommunist majority of French society.

You can imagine how surprised they were when the Iron Curtain and the Soviet Union fell.

This came to mind the other day when Senator J.D. Vance said: "If you discard a lifelong friendship because somebody votes for the other team, you've made a terrible mistake... Don't cast aside family members and lifelong friendships. Politics is not worth it. If we follow that principle, we'll heal the divide in this country."

I’ve had the pleasure of having relatives and close friends with whom I strongly disagree on politics. My wife and I used to joke that if we ever had a party with all of our relatives and friends, there might be a riot.

Such “reaching across the aisle” is important even if you rarely discuss politics. It fosters a certain humility while reminding us of the areas in which we agree. If I know a bright and decent person who happens to have a different political opinion, that usually causes me to examine my own reasoning. It helps to restrain arrogance and dilute anger. The result is a better understanding of the issues.

When watching presidential campaigns, it can be beneficial to understand party strategies that often determine the nature of the campaign rhetoric. Doing so helps us to keep the passions of the national races away from our personal relationships.

It is not unusual to find that the majority party is more critical of the opposing party. Why? Because all the majority party needs for a victory is to get its members to vote.

The minority party needs to win over independents and perhaps even members of the majority party in order to win. Its rhetoric tends to be more inclusive. Simply firing up its base won’t be sufficient for a win. It has to attract the votes of non-members.

Needless to say, the current race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump has been an odd one. The Republicans have a slight national edge in registration, which is unusual because the Democrats have long held that advantage.

The Democrats adopted “Joy” as a main theme at their convention. That was akin to the “Happy Warrior” label adopted by politicians such as Hubert Humphrey and Al Smith in the past and it represented an outreach to voters on the other side who might have reservations about Donald Trump.

Trump, on the other hand, did something both old and new. He revived his “Make America Great Again” slogan but then, as the campaign progressed, he formed a coalition with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and made “Make America Healthy Again” part of his program. In keeping with that outreach strategy, he focused his attacks more on Harris personally than on Democrats.

At that point, the race was a battle between two outreach campaigns that publicized endorsements by members of the opposing parties, e.g., Cheney versus Gabbard. Each wanted to attract votes from the other side’s pool of voters.

Trump has pretty much stayed with that strategy. Kamala Harris’s recent speeches comparing Trump to Adolf Hitler may indicate that she is now worried about losing members of her Democratic base. The Hitler allegations are unlikely to attract Republicans, but they may dissuade Democrats from defecting to Trump.

Which explains why a campaign that started with “Joy” has now moved toward rallying its base by calling its opponent a fascist.

What does that mean to us as individuals? Campaign strategies should not be extended to personal relationships. We have no direct control over what the candidates or their managers decide to stir into the national debate, but we can adopt a personal strategy of treating people courteously and respectfully as individuals and not as campaign surrogates.

In short, we need to avoid creating a cancel culture with our relatives, friends, and business associates.

Whichever candidate wins, that person will be our president. It won’t do the nation any good if the American political camps embrace the insular and isolated nature of the French Communists, who sought to ensure that every societal contact be within a political comfort zone.

A comfort zone can easily become a prison.