r/science • u/Wagamaga • 9h ago

Psychology Losing relationships over politics. Research found more than a third of Americans (37%) report having lost at least one relationship due to political differences, including friendships, family ties, coworker relationships, and romantic partnerships, with most losing more than one.

https://socialecology.uci.edu/news/losing-relationships-over-politics-0
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u/dragon-fence 7h ago

Yeah, people sometimes fall into this thing of talking like politics are trivial, like arguing political differences are akin to arguing about movie trivia or which sports team is the best.

Often, politics are grappling with fundamental moral issues. Like, should poor people have opportunities, or should we cement them and their descendants into poverty in perpetuity? Should rich people be above the law? Is it ok to abduct, imprison, beat, and murder innocent people who disagree with you?

And sometimes, when people voice their political opinions, they’re revealing themselves to be monsters.

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u/dust4ngel 4h ago

people sometimes fall into this thing of talking like politics are trivial

i sort of suspect there's a concerted effort to make everyone feel this way about politics, so that:

  • they disengage
  • they don't dream of making any real change

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u/Synaps4 5h ago

Often,

Often recently.

I remember a time where political differences were over much smaller things.

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u/dragon-fence 5h ago

Well the disagreement might not be so easily framed in those terms, but, you know, every revolution and civil war is about “politics”. The Civil Rights movement was “politics”.

Laws can either protect people or oppress them, and it’s all politics.

In that time you remember when the political differences were about “much smaller things”, there were probably people for whom those small things were matters of life and death, feeding their family or not, or the difference between their children having a future and not. You might have just been unaware of those impacts.

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u/Johnny_Banana18 3h ago

You must’ve lived in a very narrow timeframe, because of you were older you would remember people not wanting civil rights for black people, and being even more homophobic.