In my house the only proper conversation topics were local sports and current TV shows. My dad waxing that our team not doing well could take up half a dinner. Sitcoms would take up the other half. My brother could quote the Office for, I’m not exaggerating, 30 minutes or more.
As little kids, we were put down for using potty humour in the strongest possible terms, which I guess is sorta fine but I don’t think the intensity was needed. My brother and I got told to stop convo as adults were talking about Big Things. As a got older and started to care about social justice issues, I was told that I’m being too political. My brother in law complaining that his workers had no drive was always acceptable.
I half get it. My parents were prole, albeit settler white prole, and TV was their mental health support. I do wish my parents did therapy, we were expected to do it at an early age (I started at 9!), and a lot of it was just dealing with an imperfect home environment.
Anyhow, I stopped going to family holidays really early, like from 19 onwards. For a long time I thought I was a dick for not getting involved.
Sorry to rant. Honestly I’m not upset now, I’m just wondering if anyone has a similar story.
My family is certainly lib, but i can put forward critical topics like “the Washington Post carries weight for political opinions barely of the left of Hitler because it is manipulated by a megalomanical billionaire” and get a positive response. They’re really just awful when it comes to US foreign policy. In a vacuum, they’re not prejudice, but any mention of Palestinians and suddenly the situation is “complicated”
.My parents are bigots but I can at least curb their racism because they do seem to actually understand that the welfare system failing is due to austerity budgeting rather than those evil immigrants. I haven’t been able to get them to stop spouting transphobia though, only thing that works is telling them to shut the fuck up about it
I’m legit jealous you can shit on Jeff Bezos together. But ya, I feel your frustration at not having an ounce of compassion for Palestine.
I go to see my partners family a few times a year and the conversation is so awkward. Their mom does nothing but watch reruns of law and order SVU and 50’s shows on TV Land, and their dad runs out of normal stuff to talk in about 20 minutes.
We can’t talk about any kind of current events because the dad has incredibly reactionary takes despite claiming to be a progressive Democrat. I had a meltdown when he started talking about the Palestine student protests like they were brainwashed into supporting terrorists.
I’ve tried to have things to talk about to avoid getting into arguments, but they seem so bored with anything I have to say, so we end up sitting in silence for long stretches. Then when we leave they’re like, “Leaving already? You just got here”.
Things have never been explicitly “off limits,” but there was also this expectation to tiptoe around conservative feelings. I just got sick of it. Why am I having to cater to their unhinged racism? Why aren’t they catering instead to my race (I’m mixed)? So now I hide behind “”““irony””“” (when really I’m just saying my actual commie opinions) and playing “devil’s advocate.”
“We should use the second ammendment to shoot scabs.”
“Maybe China had the right idea when Mao was in charge.”
“Banning conservatives opinions in the work place is probably a good thing.”
“Borders should be abolished.”
All of these are just “hypotheticals,” of course. I would never actually suggest we should kill people for crossing a picket line (since I’m against the death penalty). Still, this sends some of them into a frenzy and now I’m not allowed at my sister’s house anymore.
I don’t know if my family was intentionally “limited”, maybe a little, but damn is conversation with my cousins boring now as adults. They just know and care about the most mainstream, dumb shit. They wouldn’t read a book or watch an interesting film to save their lives. Yet they somehow have full conversations about random pop culture shit all night. I’m not exactly quiet or totally alienated but it’s just so boring. We’re not kids anymore but they have the intellectual and social maturity of teens.
I even have the one token fascist cousin who would be interesting albeit torturous to talk with about politics but refuses to talk with me about politics or elaborate on any political points they’ll make in passing, like ‘infamous slumlord Trump will make renting affordable’ or ‘vaxx bad’. I think that they know they’ll just get exposed as an idiot and are insecure about it.
