politics are weird

[schmerica]

My friends list reaction to the DNC is freaking me a little. I mean, not you people yourself, more -- apparently there are still kneejerk reactions I didn't even know I had, which disturbs me.

The thing is, you know, I grew up in a household that spoke about Democrats the same ways my flist speaks about Republicans. (Like, seriously. There are some posts I've read that I could copy and paste into early childhood memories of my dad. Which gets into completely seperate issues I have about personal-and-non-personal stuff and what it means to be a decent person, but that's a whole nother issue.)

Anyway, last election I was a sophomore in high school, so I was still living at home, and even though my politics were *already* way different than my family's (I identified as a feminist, for god's sakes! That alone could brand me a crazy radical, let alone some of the stuff I think now), there was still, I guess, that atmosphere.

I mean. I didn't know people *liked* Bill Clinton! (My parents both voted against him -- not necessarily for anybody else, but *against him*, the way so many people are going to do for W in the fall.)

None of this should be a surprise to me -- I've spent most of time, online and real life, among left-leaning people since I went off to college -- but it still just hits me anew sometimes and I have to go back and sort through my deprogramming.

I'm not sure if this entry entirely makes sense outside my head, but ah well.

Comments

[holyschist.livejournal.com]

I grew up in a pretty left-leaning environment, but sort of -- moderate intellectual left, rather than knee-jerk hippie left, to stereotype a bit. Most of the Republicans I knew were fiscal conservatives rather than social conservatives, with the exception of the Fundie friends who told me repeatedly I was going to hell for not subscribing to the Way (they wouldn't even call themselves Christian). So -- I suppose it's not as extreme for me, but yeah.

Although I did rather like Clinton. In retrospect, I like him even more, largely because he didn't constantly witter about God while ignoring the actual tenants of his supposed faith....