NYT: why i despise and shun by blue collar brother in law
| Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | Copper Demanding Nursing Home | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | slate love of her life lodge | 07/13/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | Outnumbered Boltzmann | 07/14/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | Wonderful giraffe | 07/13/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/14/25 | | vigorous up-to-no-good mental disorder | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | aphrodisiac field | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/13/25 | | Maroon Floppy Pistol Feces | 07/13/25 | | concupiscible library | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/13/25 | | avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | kink-friendly excitant stain | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | iridescent indirect expression | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/13/25 | | odious organic girlfriend | 07/13/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/13/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/13/25 | | Know-it-all Insecure Stage | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/13/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/13/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/13/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/13/25 | | Domesticated plaza antidepressant drug | 07/13/25 | | Salmon bawdyhouse cuck | 07/13/25 | | thriller patrolman mother | 07/14/25 | | shaky chapel | 07/14/25 | | passionate fuchsia abode | 07/14/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/14/25 | | crystalline juggernaut | 07/16/25 | | bossy rose kitty | 07/16/25 | | Maroon Floppy Pistol Feces | 07/13/25 | | Burgundy Multi-colored Keepsake Machete | 07/13/25 | | vigorous up-to-no-good mental disorder | 07/13/25 | | slate love of her life lodge | 07/13/25 | | Diverse orchestra pit mad cow disease | 07/13/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/14/25 | | vigorous up-to-no-good mental disorder | 07/13/25 | | Sable school | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | Orchid slippery black woman roommate | 07/13/25 | | Diverse orchestra pit mad cow disease | 07/13/25 | | Orchid slippery black woman roommate | 07/14/25 | | Salmon bawdyhouse cuck | 07/13/25 | | Vengeful Stage Haunted Graveyard | 07/14/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/13/25 | | iridescent indirect expression | 07/13/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/13/25 | | Pink Meetinghouse | 07/13/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/13/25 | | Topaz station | 07/13/25 | | Abusive Jew Generalized Bond | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | White house knife | 07/13/25 | | nubile pit | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/13/25 | | avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth | 07/13/25 | | avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth | 07/13/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | Know-it-all Insecure Stage | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | Khaki curious national security agency | 07/14/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/14/25 | | Salmon bawdyhouse cuck | 07/13/25 | | concupiscible library | 07/14/25 | | Topaz station | 07/14/25 | | arousing marketing idea native | 07/14/25 | | Sticky cruise ship | 07/15/25 | | Sable school | 07/13/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | Glassy provocative market yarmulke | 07/13/25 | | avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth | 07/13/25 | | crystalline juggernaut | 07/14/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/16/25 | | Talking Locale Skinny Woman | 07/13/25 | | cracking casino | 07/13/25 | | odious organic girlfriend | 07/14/25 | | Razzmatazz turdskin | 07/14/25 | | Salmon bawdyhouse cuck | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | Glassy provocative market yarmulke | 07/14/25 | | avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth | 07/14/25 | | Mewling tanning salon | 07/14/25 | | Sable school | 07/14/25 | | Low-t heady church building | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/16/25 | | Topaz station | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | concupiscible library | 07/14/25 | | Maroon Floppy Pistol Feces | 07/14/25 | | Khaki curious national security agency | 07/14/25 | | cobalt tattoo stag film | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | Salmon bawdyhouse cuck | 07/14/25 | | Sable school | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/16/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/16/25 | | godawful twinkling location death wish | 07/17/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/17/25 | | Spectacular base headpube | 07/17/25 | | shaky chapel | 07/14/25 | | Khaki curious national security agency | 07/14/25 | | swollen digit ratio | 07/14/25 | | green motley jap hospital | 07/14/25 | | cobalt tattoo stag film | 07/14/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/14/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/14/25 | | amber genital piercing newt | 07/16/25 | | ruby 180 coffee pot party of the first part | 07/14/25 | | Talking Locale Skinny Woman | 07/14/25 | | vigorous up-to-no-good mental disorder | 07/14/25 | | Talking Locale Skinny Woman | 07/14/25 | | citrine bonkers forum fanboi | 07/16/25 | | ruby 180 coffee pot party of the first part | 07/16/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/16/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/17/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/17/25 | | Racy Reading Party Theater Stage | 07/17/25 | | Adventurous Voyeur | 07/17/25 | | Glassy provocative market yarmulke | 07/17/25 | | Duck-like vivacious corner | 07/17/25 | | crystalline juggernaut | 07/17/25 | | swashbuckling sanctuary | 07/17/25 | | shaky chapel | 07/17/25 |
Poast new message in this thread
Date: July 13th, 2025 4:54 PM Author: Adventurous Voyeur
https://archive.is/2ABC7
Opinion
Guest Essay
Is It Time to Stop Snubbing Your Right-Wing Family?
July 13, 2025, 9:00 a.m. ET
An illustration of four people sitting around a dinner table that has a big turkey in the middle. Each person has crossed their arms across their chest and is turning their head away from the others.
Credit...Tim Enthoven
Listen to this article · 7:11 min Learn more
By David Litt
Mr. Litt is the author of “It’s Only Drowning: A True Story of Learning to Surf and the Search for Common Ground”
Not too long ago, I felt a civic duty to be rude to my wife’s younger brother.
I met Matt Kappler in 2012, and it was immediately clear we had nothing in common. He lifted weights to death metal; I jogged to Sondheim. I was one of President Barack Obama’s speechwriters and had an Ivy League degree; he was a huge Joe Rogan fan and went on to get his electrician’s license. My early memories of Matt are hazy — I was mostly trying to impress his parents. Still we got along, chatting amiably on holidays and at family events.
Then the pandemic hit, and our preferences began to feel like more than differences in taste. We were on opposite sides of a cultural civil war. The deepest divide was vaccination. I wasn’t shocked when Matt didn’t get the Covid shot. But I was baffled. Turning down a vaccine during a pandemic seemed like a rejection of science and self-preservation. It felt like he was tearing up the social contract that, until that point, I’d imagined we shared.
Had Matt been a friend rather than a family member, I probably would have cut off contact completely. As it was, on the rare and always outdoor occasions when we saw each other, I spoke in disapproving snippets.
“Work’s been good?”
“Mhrmm.”
My frostiness wasn’t personal. It was strategic. Being unfriendly to people who turned down the vaccine felt like the right thing to do. How else could we motivate them to mend their ways?
I wasn’t the only one thinking this. A 2021 essay for USA Today declared, “It’s time to start shunning the ‘vaccine hesitant.’” An L.A. Times piece went further, arguing that to create “teachable moments,” it may be necessary to mock some anti-vaxxers’ deaths.
Shunning as a form of accountability goes back millenniums. In ancient Athens, a citizen deemed a threat to state stability could be “ostracized” — cast out of society for a decade. For much of history, banishment was considered so severe that it substituted for capital punishment. The whole point of Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter was to show she had violated norms — and to discourage others from doing so.
But that was before social media. We live in a world of online fandoms, choose-your-own-adventure information and parasocial relationships. Few people who lost friends over the vaccine changed their minds. They just got new friends. Those exiled from one version of society were quickly welcomed by another — an alternate universe full of grievance peddlers and conspiracy theorists who thrived on stories of victimized conservatives.
There has been a sorting into belief camps, algorithmically and in real life. It dictates whom we match with on dating apps and where we live. We block those we disagree with online, we leave the group chat, we don’t show up for Thanksgiving. Recent data suggests that today, one in five Americans is estranged from a family member over politics. More points of deep disagreement will surely arise: over Trump’s immigration crackdown and use of the military in domestic affairs, over Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA mandates, over antisemitism, over a megabill that takes health care from the poor while cutting taxes for the rich.
No one is required to spend time with people they don’t care for. But those of us who feel an obligation to shun strategically need to ask: What has all this banishing accomplished? It’s not just ineffective. It’s counterproductive.
Editors’ Picks
This Jungle Plant Is a Good Landlord to Its Tenant Ants
Unpacking the Past (and the Groceries) With Your Therapist
‘I Noticed a Building Handyman Washing Down the Sidewalk’
These days, ostracism might just hurt the ostracizer more than the ostracizee.
I wish I could say I learned this through self-reflection and study. What actually happened is that I started surfing. After moving to the Jersey Shore in 2022, I signed up for lessons. Despite my advanced age of 35 and lack of natural talent, I got hooked. Matt was the only other surfer I knew. I put my principled unfriendliness aside.
From the moment we began paddling out together, I could tell my cold-shoulder strategy had backfired. I’d spent the peak of the pandemic in a cultural bubble, and he had done the same. Driving to a break or changing into our wet suits, he’d often express opinions — about the merits of vigilantism, or the health benefits of Mexican stem-cell injections — that I found slightly unhinged.
Where is this coming from? I wondered. The answer was nearly always “Joe Rogan’s podcast.”
I assumed our surf-buddy experiment would either fail spectacularly or bring Matt over to my side. Neither of those things occurred. Instead, the connections we found were tiny and unrelated to politics. We agree that “Shrimply Irresistible” is the perfect so-bad-it’s-good name for a seafood restaurant, and that Taylor Swift’s “Love Story” is a classic. Although I still wouldn’t call myself a Rogan fan, we share an appreciation for his interview with the surf legend Kelly Slater. Matt and I remain very different, yet we’ve reached what is, in today’s America, a radical conclusion: We don’t always approve of each other’s choices, but we like each other.
It helped that in the ocean, our places in the pecking order reversed. Matt’s a very good surfer — one might call him “an elite” — and I am not. According to surfing’s unwritten rules, he had the right to look down on me. But he never did. His generosity of spirit in the water made me rethink my own behavior on land.
Three years after my first surf lesson, Matt and I haven’t really changed each other’s minds on major national issues. But we have changed each other. His fearlessness in consequential surf made me more courageous. His ability to go “over the ledge,” launching himself off breaking lips, helped me curb my overthinking. Ostracizing him wouldn’t have altered his behavior — and it would have made my own life worse.
I suspect that’s true for Matt as well. While I’ve never asked if our friendship made him more open-minded — we’d find that embarrassing — I’m confident the answer is yes. Last year, when I briefly considered running for office, Matt said he’d vote for me. When I asked why, his answer had nothing to do with party or policy. “You’re a regular guy,” he told me. “You walk the dog.”
When I share stories about surfing with my brother-in-law, people often tell me about relationships in their own lives pushed to the brink by politics. Sometimes, they’re proud of ties they’ve severed. More often, they’re hoping for a way forward. How can we pierce bubbles of misinformation? Can friendships fractured in the Trump era be repaired?
My advice is always the same. Our differences are meaningful, but allowing them to mean everything is part of how we ended up here. When we cut off contacts, or let algorithms sort us into warring factions, we forget that not so long ago, we used to have things to talk about that didn’t involve politics. Shunning plays into the hands of demagogues, making it easier for them to divide us and even, in some cases, to incite violence.
There are, of course, some people so committed to odiousness that it defines them. If Stephen Miller wants a surf lesson, I’ll decline. But are most people like that? In an age when banishment backfires, keeping the door open to unlikely friendship isn’t a betrayal of principles — it’s an affirmation of them.
https://x.com/davidlitt/photo
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098260) |
 |
Date: July 13th, 2025 4:56 PM Author: Adventurous Voyeur
top pick Readers comment
===
Lee
Phoenix
8h ago
No, It’s Not Time to Stop Snubbing Your Right-Wing Family
I don’t normally respond to op-eds, but this one struck a nerve. The suggestion that we should now open our arms to right-wing family members as a gesture of reconciliation ignores what we’ve all seen with our own eyes: cruelty is no longer a byproduct of that ideology—it’s a feature.
This isn’t about tax policy disagreements or rural vs. urban perspectives. This is about a sustained embrace of dehumanization. Of cheering for policies that cage children, strip bodily autonomy, demonize the poor, and erase entire communities from public life. And now we’re being asked to make room for that at the dinner table?
No.
Human decency should never be up for negotiation. If someone supports or defends cruelty—whether through apathy or applause—they are not simply holding a different opinion. They are making a moral choice. And we are allowed—obligated, even—to make our own choice in response.
That doesn’t mean there’s no path forward. But that path is repentance and change—not coddling and comfort. Calls for “unity” ring hollow when they come with no accountability. Asking people to let down their guard while the harm continues is not reconciliation; it’s complicity.
If your political identity tolerates hate, justifies harm, or insists others must endure injustice to preserve your comfort, don’t be surprised when people choose distance. That’s not snubbing—that’s survival.
30 Replies2513 RecommendShare
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098267) |
 |
Date: July 13th, 2025 5:13 PM Author: Mewling tanning salon
To be fair,
Lmao
I'm going to start sending that photo to guys who express bewilderment that the Democrat Party could think that Tim Walz is "a regular ol' guy's guy" and then, after brutally losing the male vote across every single racial demographic, find it necessary to shell out $20 million to a bunch of faggy professional consultants just to "learn" that men really don't like being scolded and told what to do by packs of angry middle-aged shrews.
"How is that possible?!"
This is who you're dealing with. That's how.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098315) |
 |
Date: July 13th, 2025 5:29 PM Author: Adventurous Voyeur
on that point, Adam Kinzinger just wrote a Substack saying that "no! it's the MAGA males who are lost!"
https://adamkinzinger.substack.com/p/the-beta-brigade-trumps-faux-alphas
The Beta Brigade: Trump’s Faux-Alphas and the Crisis of American Manhood
They pose as tough guys—but follow Trump like lost puppies. Our sons are watching, and it's time for better role models.
Adam Kinzinger
Jul 10, 2025
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098338) |
Date: July 13th, 2025 4:59 PM Author: swashbuckling sanctuary
“ As it was, on the rare and always outdoor occasions when we saw each other, I spoke in disapproving snippets.
“Work’s been good?”
“Mhrmm.”
My frostiness wasn’t personal. It was strategic. Being unfriendly to people who turned down the vaccine felt like the right thing to do. How else could we motivate them to mend their ways?”
Lmao, libs really think being passive aggressive fags can have a positive impact?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098275) |
Date: July 13th, 2025 5:07 PM Author: avocado misanthropic range scourge upon the earth
"I suspect that’s true for Matt as well. While I’ve never asked if our friendship made him more open-minded — we’d find that embarrassing — I’m confident the answer is yes."
*90s sitcom laugh track plays*
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098295) |
 |
Date: July 13th, 2025 5:20 PM Author: Mewling tanning salon
To be fair,
"I mean let's be clear, I'm still the 'elite' here on land, haha..."
*Loses job within the next six months to an AI program*
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098325) |
 |
Date: July 13th, 2025 7:37 PM Author: Sticky cruise ship
unreal. bravo at this effort
Had Matt been a friend rather than a family member, I probably would have cut off contact completely. As it was, on the rare and always outdoor occasions when we saw each other, I spoke in disapproving snippets.
“Work’s been good?”
“Mhrmm.”
My frostiness wasn’t personal. It was strategic. Being unfriendly to people who turned down the vaccine felt like the right thing to do. How else could we motivate them to mend their ways?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098664) |
Date: July 13th, 2025 7:32 PM Author: Sable school
https://archive.ph/I1YR1
Mr. Litt, 31, is a former speechwriter for President Barack Obama and the author of “Thanks, Obama: My Hopey Changey White House Years” (Ecco, 2017). He graduated from Yale.
He is the son of Sara M. Litt and Dr. Andrew W. Litt of Bainbridge Island, Wash. The groom’s mother is a board member of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Projects and of Bend the Arc, a progressive Jewish coalition, both in Seattle. His father is a neuroradiologist and an executive in residence with G.E. Ventures, also in Seattle.
The couple met through the dating app OkCupid.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098656)
|
Date: July 13th, 2025 9:32 PM Author: Glassy provocative market yarmulke
"It has pomosdoro on top. Are you sure?"
"Whatever, man. It sounds delicious."
"Never mind. We're going someplace else."
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49098976) |
Date: July 13th, 2025 10:00 PM Author: Talking Locale Skinny Woman
Then the pandemic hit, and our preferences began to feel like more than differences in taste. We were on opposite sides of a cultural civil war. The deepest divide was vaccination. I wasn’t shocked when Matt didn’t get the Covid shot. But I was baffled. Turning down a vaccine during a pandemic seemed like a rejection of science and self-preservation. It felt like he was tearing up the social contract that, until that point, I’d imagined we shared.
My frostiness wasn’t personal. It was strategic. Being unfriendly to people who turned down the vaccine felt like the right thing to do. How else could we motivate them to mend their ways?
I wasn’t the only one thinking this. A 2021 essay for USA Today declared, “It’s time to start shunning the ‘vaccine hesitant.’” An L.A. Times piece went further, arguing that to create “teachable moments,” it may be necessary to mock some anti-vaxxers’ deaths.
do you think this arrogant faggot is getting his booster shots in 2025? libs have shit for brains, but sometimes even i am amazed at the amount of shit
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49099024) |
Date: July 13th, 2025 11:59 PM Author: cracking casino
1. It's interesting this guy was a speechwriter for Obama and this got picked for the Times. The writing...isn't good? This should be a fun, moving piece - and instead it reads like political policy.
2. Why use the COVID vaccines as a starting point when the BIL is largely correct? You think he'd be smart enough to go with ICE raids or something. This dudes probably had COVID 4 times now and is like "can you believe my BIL isn't vaccinated?!"
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49099348) |
Date: July 14th, 2025 2:27 AM Author: Razzmatazz turdskin
This guy is such a giggafagot I could only stomach a few paragraphs of this
Imagine thinking that going to Dalton and Yale makes you better than an electrician surfer bro who married into the same family as you. And then having the poor judgment to write an NYT op-ed blabbing about it. What a piece of shit.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49099572) |
Date: July 14th, 2025 1:09 PM Author: ruby 180 coffee pot party of the first part
In the BILs whole lifetime I bet he hasn’t spent as much time fretting over the author’s political beliefs as the author spent writing this article.
Fuck libs. That is all.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49100344) |
Date: July 17th, 2025 12:09 AM Author: Adventurous Voyeur
kind of funny that the NYT ran that piece and then this one:
For Trump, Domestic Adversaries Are Not Just Wrong, They Are ‘Evil’
The president’s vilification of political opponents and journalists seeds the ground for threats of prosecution, imprisonment and deportation unlike any modern president has made.
https://archive.ph/hFwVu
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5749931&forum_id=2...id.#49107822) |
|
|