My solution for the “grandmother problem” was to have open and honest discourse about the importance of halting the spread of misinformation. I still stand by that, and I still believe that it’s important to engage the people we are able to change and disengage those who will never change their minds.
I ran into the latter. I say ran into, but it was really just another conversation that just so happened to occur in a group chat between a group of my friends. This didn’t occur this week but actually when President Trump’s impeachment trial ended and the result was that he would not be removed from office. I try to keep a pretty diverse-thinking network of friends. One of my friends, in particular, falls pretty far to the right on the political spectrum. He isn’t committing hate crimes or politicking for White Lives Matter, but he is the type of person who was happy to see President Trump acquitted because “it showed the libs” among other things.
He also mentioned that President Trump was on trial for racism and “hurting feelings.” While this conversation was only happening in a small group chat, I sort of took it upon myself to steer him in the right direction as best I could. I explained to him that the president was not on trial for hurting anyone’s feelings and gave a brief summary of why he truly was on trial. It didn’t really result result in any positive change. His main takeaway was that “the Dems lost,” which is par for the course when it comes to most political conversations I have with this group of friends.
I have both liberal and conservative political viewpoints, but I thought, objectively, it was important to let him know that President Trump wasn’t on trial for hurting feelings and that he wasn’t acquitted because the Dems got owned. I’d love to try this with someone who is more open to having their mind changed. In fact, I’d love to have this tried on me. If I ever come to a group chat with information that is verifiably incorrect, I hope I get corrected. I believe that day will come, and I think I’m well-prepared to handle it gracefully and look deeper into the issue.
