Feel free to ask Aunt Acid a variety of questions at [email protected] at any time. Previous installments can be found here.
Help. Help. Help.
I have a large and spread-out extended family; my mother has six living siblings and they are spread from California to Pennsylvania, so we rarely all get to see each other in person. Most all the aunts and uncles and cousins are extremely liberal humanists, with a couple of exceptions (one year, my atheist aunt hosted Thanksgiving and a huge fight nearly broke out because she did not want my born-again Christian uncle to pray at the table–final ruling was her house, her rules, but it was a near thing). We’re all friends on Facebook, and for better or for worse, I’m probably the family member who uses it the most. Today, over my lunch break, I saw that the same uncle that featured in the Thanksgiving debacle had replied to a comment on a news article about the events taking place in Baltimore. And it is HORRIBLY, virulently racist and anti-our-President. Based on some of his previous behaviors, it probably shouldn’t have surprised me nearly as much as it did, but there you go.
So my question is this: I have been working hard over the last few years to be a good ally, in any way that I can be, to marginalized people in our society. Part of that has been developing enough courage to call people out when they’re being racist, sexist, bigoted, etc. So there’s a big part of me that DESPERATELY wants to call him out (or, you know, tell my mom, because she’s his big sister and is also far more diplomatic than the rest of us) but also, there’s a vested interest in not having a family detonation. How can I balance allyship with keeping the peace??
–Super sad
Dear Super Sad,
I love this question because it is so abstract. This is not a matter of “Should I spend money on X or save money for Y?” or “Should I marry Z or do what the cool kids are doing and be a pomo spinster?” This is more along the lines of, “How should a person be?”
You are asking, in essence, whether is it more important to be a good member of your family – i.e., dutiful, diplomatic – or a good member of society – concerned for the less fortunate, active in the face of injustice. To whom do we owe our primary allegiances: our uncles or our neighbors, our family of origin or our intentional families? To whom do we answer, our people or ourselves?
Thing is, SS, it seems like you know. You are outraged by the behavior of your born-again Christian uncle. As an emissary from the next generation, as a witness to the crimes against humanity that are the ribs and bones of white supremacy, as a person being who is tired of watching some people get killed while other people shrug their shoulders or, worse, say the dead deserved it, you want to speak out.
You just don’t want to face the consequences for doing so. You want the points from your community and from your conscience. But you don’t want to lose points from your family, either.
Can you be the good person you want to be and be the good kid, the one who doesn’t upset anyone in the family? No. So what matters more to you? A) “Keeping the peace” or B) being true to yourself?
If the answer is A), okay. Know thyself, said the ancient Greeks. More classical wisdom: “Honor your father and your mother.” Your uncle too? That’s implied. (The operative verb in that commandment in the Leviticus version is “fear,” by the way, as in “Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father.” That’s less well reported and well remembered. I thought you might appreciate it, though, given that you seem to be governed a bit by fear.) “Love thy neighbor as thyself” gets quoted a lot, but that didn’t make it to the Hebrew Bible Top 10.
If you are tempted to choose A), though, I would ask you to consider: what family pond doesn’t get some stones lobbed it in now and again? Ponds are meant to withstand and absorb stones; they’re not plate-glass windows. Real men, women, and children are risking their lives throwing real stones, demanding attention and something approximating the justice they have been denied for so long. Why are you nervous about causing a few ripples? Is this a pattern in the rest of your life, and does that bother you?
A peace built on silence and censorship is a dumb peace – literally. And that peace is already broken as far as you are concerned, anyway, right? He broke it by saying something offensive and hurtful in public. That was his choice.
If the answer is B), and you do decide to challenge your uncle online, be prepared for the fact that you probably will not change his mind. Most people use Facebook as a megaphone inside an echo chamber inside a padded room. We don’t sign on to have our horizons expanded; we want to coo at dog pictures and chuckle at jokes and splash sympathy at each other while feeling acquaintances gently splashing sympathy back at us. Even IRL, especially once folks get past a certain age, we are notoriously uninterested in anything that conflicts with our preferred worldviews.
So, do not expect that your uncle will listen to you. That’s okay! You are not doing this for him.
Since you value family harmony and want to maintain cordial relations with this uncle while still getting your message across, you can reply to his posts with some great #BlackLivesMatter reading. Every time he posts something offensive, respond with three links, one after another. You can be polite and persistent at the same time. Even if you affect him not one whit except to annoy him, perhaps that will serve as a deterrent. And perhaps you will spark some other reader’s imagination. At the very least, you will know that you didn’t get bigotry go unchallenged for the sake of the status quo.
You can also use speak his language and use the Bible, if you like! That same page of Leviticus also contains some more great stuff. Here are a couple of relevant verses: “Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment; thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor favour the person of the mighty; but in righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbour. Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people; neither shalt thou stand idly by the blood of thy neighbour: I am the LORD.”
Perhaps your uncle does not see the people of Baltimore as his neighbours. Perhaps he sees them more as strangers in his midst. Well, Leviticus has an answer for that, too: “The stranger that sojourneth with you shall be unto you as the home-born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.”
So there. –God
Good luck, SS. I hope that your family is strong enough to withstand a little bit of disagreement in its midst. I believe that it probably is. But if there is indeed a detonation, remember that you weren’t the one tossing Molotov cocktails. That was your uncle’s doing.
Vale,
Aunt Acid
*
Illustrator: Liana Finck’s work has appeared in The New Yorker, Lilith, Tablet, and The Forward. Her first graphic novel is called A Bintel Brief. Her webcomic, Diary of a Shadow, can be read on her website.
Tags: advice, aunt acid, family, racism, solidarity
Three links! This is brilliant and is my new move.
Isn’t half the fun of Facebook getting into it with bigoted relatives and acquaintances?
A good friend of mine was facebook friends with a distant relative. Said relative was a right wing whackjob, would frequently do things like post pictures (within threads on my friend’s wall) of aborted fetuses, and was just generally creepy, but a bunch of us would get sort of emotionally involved in arguing against him. He was sort of a running joke among my friend group.
And then I got a text one morning telling me he’d been arrested on charges of child porn (which he has since plead guilty to).
I like to think that I knew he was a creep all along, but I seriously really didn’t.
ETA– uh, this was more relevant in my brain when I started typing. I guess my point was that I totally enjoyed arguing with this guy at the time, and in retrospect I feel sort of… slimey about it all?
I feel like this may be a good place to use “I” statements. In my personal situation where my own mental health and wellbeing are concerned, NO.
I don’t know if fun is the word except in the sense of ‘the fun never ends’
Facebook is in my experience a great tool if you want to learn to actually kinda hate all your friends.
The unfollow and block buttons are your friend. “My facebook? Oh, I deleted it. More peas?”
Also filial piety and families are overrated go shit in Uncle Freedom’s boots when his back is turned and don’t look back, is he really something you want to spend precious thoughts/time in your life on?
I never talk to my mom about: religion; politics; racial matters. The last time we went to a museum together, she took a moment in the native American section to bring up the topic of miscegenation, and how it was against ‘natural law’…I remember HER mom as being worse.
Not to say she isn’t hilarious sometimes; If you mention Bill Clinton, she’ll shout something like “That Adulterer!” and make a spitting noise.
My high school Latin teacher used to do that with Ted Kennedy and “that drunkard”. I don’t know how she managed to bring him up so much while we were supposed to be learning Latin, but she REALLY hated Ted Kennedy.
I’d be more willing to confront my relatives’ idiotic posts if I thought they would respond in good faith AND prevent their even-more-ridiculous friends/relatives from piling on.
My cousin once noted, in a screed against our “socialist” President Obama, that the Nazis were socialists. When I pointed out that the Nazi party was called the *National Socialist* party but that they were actually fascists, not socialists, my cousin’s step-grandmother (my uncle’s mother-in-law) told me that if I liked socialism so much, I should move to Canada. After that, I realized it wasn’t worth my time to get into specific discussions with individuals unless the threads were occurring on my own page, on links to social justice articles I was posting myself.
yep, I am definitely on the side of “keep it on your own social media,” mainly because if I want to jump into an argument on X’s facebook post, I have no idea which of X’s friends are being sarcastic vs. serious, which are A Bear You Had Best Not Poke because they’ll respond with a 500-word screed, etc, all those social cues you get from people you either know well or are interacting with in person.
I also think there’s a lot of value in “you are entitled to your own opinion but not to your own facts.” If we’re not agreeing on basic facts (e.g. one of us is coming from a religious principle that the other doesn’t believe in; one of us is simply flat-out denying that racism exists and therefore lives in a different universe) then, unless you really like arguing for its own sake, you’re not gonna get anywhere. So I’m all for the “well, we’re obviously not coming from the same place here, so let’s call it off” bow-out.
Yeah. A friend once jumped in on an argument about gay marriage with my uncle. I was handling it just fine, but she can be no-holds-barred and I’m not sure it changed his mind, he just felt ganged up on and talked down to.
Which of course does not mean I don’t ever get into arguments I shouldn’t on other people’s threads…
My bro-in-law occasionally trolls my facepage when I post social justice stuff. I thoroughly enjoy the pile of allies that shut his crap down, as, I think, does he. Otherwise he’d stop, no?
You’d think! I know there are people out there who LOVE a good (bad) argument but I just don’t get it.
Not to get #NotAllChristians, but I’d like to divorce Uncle Racist’s behavior on Facebook from his religion here. Baltimore wasn’t religiously motivated and neither is Obama’s existence. Also, I don’t know what exactly he was trying to get everyone else at the table to do that caused the Thanksgiving fight, but if it was nothing – if all he wanted was to pray by himself or lead other interested people in prayer – I actually think the aunt was in the wrong.
I mean, I definitely get the urge to defend the uncle’s ability to pray over his meal, but from what I know of growing up as a Catholic among Southern Baptists, prayer at the table is often used as a way to make statements aimed at other people in the room. Uncle’s prayers could include a “and let us pray for those of us who have strayed from your way, O Lord, that they may be saved from the fires of hell” aimed specifically at the liberals and atheists in the room. I’m guessing the aunt had some good reasons to make a fuss. The uncle could pray quietly over his meal (like my best friend does before eating), and nobody would have ever known it.
Sure, I definitely realize that – my original comment didn’t cover it, but if the fight was something like “you can pray if you want but I don’t allow talk about my children suffering eternal damnation at the dinner table,” “WELL TOO BAD because THAT’S WHERE THEY’RE HEADED,” then yes, fair enough, Aunt.
It’s this.
“Also, I don’t know what exactly he was trying to get everyone else at the table to do that caused the Thanksgiving fight…”
That’s the catch, I think. I’ve experienced three kinds of prayer at extended family gatherings. The first is a sort of perfunctory, vague wave at any supernatural power who happens to be passing by–a twenty-second “Heavenly Father, bless this food we are about to eat, and we thank you for conducting everyone here safely. Amen.” It’s hard for me to take genuine exception to that.
Another kind is exactly what you describe–someone who is interested in praying by/for himself or leading a group of people who’s interested. I don’t take offense there, either, and it sort of alarms me when other atheists do.
But the last kind is specifically aimed at “winning” by getting the unchurched to participate in a prayer. My type example for this was a long time ago, eating with a friend’s family in South Carolina. The friend’s atheism was a source of conflict with her mother, and before anyone was allowed to eat dinner, Momma insisted that each of the people at the table take their turn praying aloud for someone they knew to “turn toward the Lord before it’s too late.” (The rest of the meal was exactly as warm and welcoming as you’d expect from that prologue.)
So the aunt in the story could have been entirely in the wrong, as you say, or she could have been protecting her guests from someone who was angling for a chance to stand on the soapbox.
Y’know, if he really wanted to sit quietly with his head bowed, or say something quickly with a couple of people at one end of the table, I’d agree with you. But sadly, my experience with these stories/families leads me to assume there’s some sort of passive aggressive “and may God forgive my heathen family from the hellfires they have earned through their many sins” or some such.
Yeah, like others have said — I doubt it was a silent prayer that she so strongly objected to. And frankly, it is about her house, her rules. If she doesn’t want to listen to an obnoxious family member lead a self-righteous prayer over everyone — or if it’s even a question of prefacing a family dinner with a religious ritual that everyone’s expected to observe, even passively — she can say that that’s not what’s happening this Thanksgiving.
For someone who’s been forced to participate in those rituals all their life, without it ever meaning anything to them (and often used as a cudgel), I can certainly understand her taking a strong stance on what happens now that she’s an adult with her own home and is hosting a meal. No, she shouldn’t have to participate in it now, or let someone else insist on doing it in her home. (Again, silent prayers are another matter.)
I should have added “or if he has a history of saying obnoxious inflammatory prayers,” which yes, I agree, he might, even if the LW didn’t say so.
Yep. If you know that your host is an atheist, I think it is bad form to try to get everyone at the table to say grace, but if your guest wants to bow their head and say a silent prayer before they dig in, there is no harm in that. Respect goes both ways.
You don’t get to try and sell the fam on Amway at thanksgiving dinner and you don’t get to try and sell them on your church. The atheists come over to your place for the holidays they don’t get to read Dawkins quotes at you over the peas with impunity; you want free food, that’s the deal.
Oh man, this is so good. And pretty timely, because I’ve been worried about the ramifications of starting to date another guy at the beginning of this month and how my extended family is going to treat it.
Nah. For people like Uncle, their spewing IS tied up with their religion, and coming to my house house and imposing your religion on me? Nah again. Evangelical types are always praying AT you – and I don’t know if Uncle is evangelical, but if you are going to someone’s house and making a big deal out of praying in front of everyone, you aren’t doing it for your own spiritual edification. I respectfully disagree with you, is what I’m saying!
I know what you’re saying, but the LW didn’t give any details to that effect. And even if he does try to make other people join in or convert or whatever (and if he doesn’t, seriously, who cares, let him pray), that’s a matter of him being annoying and overzealous, not being a bigot – it’s a problem, but a different one from the one LW is asking for advice on.
yeah let’s just stop pretending nobody knows who’s being described by ‘hyperconservative racist Christian uncle’, that dog don’t hunt
rightwing evangelical asshole is a specific and for most people instantly recognizable breed of asshole similar to but distinct from from “have you heard the good news about Ron Paul?” asshole and ‘has a thousand guns and a detailed plan for the racial holy war’ asshole because these are large, organized, highly vocal groups of people who’ve done much to set the tenor of their larger communities, they do have a unified ideological vision that folds all these aspects together rather than just being some random unrelated traits chosen a la carte, and most people who aren’t of that subset can deal with recognizing the basic common traits while still being able to comprehend that not everyone who goes to church, engages in fringe party politics, or shoots is a racist
Thank you for this. I was having a hard time getting my thoughts in a row about this whole line of discussion and this pretty much nails it. The LW obviously thinks the two incidents are related, and based on what we know about the current flavors of conservatives in the US, we absolutely CAN draw certain connections.
If that hurts your religious feelings, take it up with your coreligionists and stop obligating everyone hurt by this vitriol to stop talking about the harm these people are doing to take care of YOUR hurt feelings.
What bothers me is actually not that religious people are being unfairly maligned by the suggestion that they might possibly be racists or that their religiousness might be connected in some way to their racism (I know both can be and often are true), but the idea of taking for granted that it is true in a given situation. Not for the person’s sake – in this case the guy is clearly a total asshole – but because of the us vs. them mentality it perpetuates, which sometimes leads to people mistakenly thinking that distancing themselves from religion will distance them from racism. I’m not saying anyone here is personally perpetuating it, just that it’s always something to be aware of.
Well…he’s an actual complex human whom none of us knows and whom we only see filtered through an anonymous LW who may or may not be a reasonable person. If I’d known it was houblonchouffe I’d have given the benefit of the doubt, but I needed that benefit of the doubt to feel comfortable drawing the connection between his religiousness and his bigotry when a more explicit connection wasn’t drawn in the letter. So no, I didn’t know exactly who was being described.
People are a unique and complex universe unto themselves and all but most folks just ain’t that iconoclastic, you talk about your anxiety about how good an ally you’re being most folks will be able to guess the broad strokes of the rest of your politics with a fair degree of accuracy (with some exceptions, gotcha I love Walmart and rolling coal ha-HA) and you try to bully people into letting you pray at them in their own house and tell everyone how Obama’s a monkey it’s reasonable to guess you ain’t spending your weekends with the Unitarians. Maybe those assumptions will turn out to be completely wrong but, y’know, overwhelmingly probably not.
The two have tied together for him in a lot of ways. He is annoying and overzealous and a bigot.
That’s what I figured. Sorry I didn’t stress the conditional (IF he was being innocuous) as much as I could have.
That’s totally fine.
I think the illustrative example of this is the time he talked to me for… well, let’s call it an extended conversation’s worth of time about how the Duck Dynasty family was just a stand-up group of people that he respected in every possible way, to the point where he entered a contest to go and meet them, and he won, so he pulled his young kids out of school and loaded them into a plane to go meet them, and it was their favorite best day in the world.
Also, possibly more to the point, his degree is from Liberty University. The one founded by Jerry Falwell.
Oh, friend. Your family. My family. Oh. I’m sorry. It’s so dispiriting, isn’t it? Just here to say I understand.
Hugs to you.
oh my god duck beardo pilgrimage
‘praying at you’. Oh I hate that soooooo much.
I really enjoy when my ill-informed sister posts not-vetted links to inflammatory racist “news” pieces, where I get to respond with a simple Snopes link to disprove the entire thing.
Being right is an addiction, just like everything else. Mea culpa.
yes, this is the best! And Google Image Search is your friend.
I can’t wait til Facebook has full snopes integration and everything requires a snopes check before you can hit “share.” I mean, if I were in charge…
I’m so grateful for the presence that Snopes and various other debunking sites have on facebook. I belong to many of them and post from them regularly.
But I really like your idea. That would be the best thing to happen to Facebook.
I always appreciate the conspiracy theorists because then I get to invent my own, countervailing, equally implausible conspiracy theories
hell with research gimme competitive fiction writing
Color me pessimistic, but has calling out these type of family members ever changed anyone’s opinion on iota? All that happens in my family is I get labeled the crazy liberal and all my opinions get discounted.
These days, I do push back, but a lot more gently and in an effort to meet people where they are. Maybe that wouldn’t be enough for some people, but it seems marginally more effective. Conservatives don’t like government authority, so you could emphasize the need for checks on police power, for example.
Or maybe he’s a lost cause and you just want to make a symbolic stand, in which case I like the three-links advice quite a bit.
Even if it doesn’t change people’s minds, it shows them where you stand and trains them to think twice before opening their mouths.
exactly, the likelihood of changing minds via arguing…not great. The likelihood of changing minds via showing you care and making information available…better. Particularly if those minds are not Awful Uncle’s but Not Really Into Politics Second Cousin’s.
This. Not white, but I’ve been waging a patient years-long campaign against my parents’ views on immigration and marriage equality. I don’t think we agree, but they have figured out that there are things they shouldn’t say in my presence, or my kids’ earshot.
This years-long campaign can pay such huge dividends! A decade ago, a loved one (with so so many LGTB friends!) shocked me by saying “I’m all for gay rights*, but gay marriage* seems a bit much.”
WHAAAAAAAAAT
I have vigorously, persistently disagreed with her over the intervening years, and I’m sure that’s just a part of the complex social shift that now has her celebrating advances in marriage equality every time another landmark bill passes— like, she bakes a cake and everything!
Almost no one will change their mind based on one conversation, but lots of people will shift their opinions over years. Goodness knows I have, on a lot of things I was raised to believe.
[edited to add: And I was all “YOU MEAN EQUAL RIGHTS?” and “YOU MEAN MARRIAGE EQUALITY?” Even changing the language people use to describe their beliefs can change their beliefs.]
This. It makes a difference who is witnessing the exchange. It is so important to counter bigotry if children are present.
Exactly. You never know whose decision on whether to come out is hinging on how many people might have their backs, in calculations built up from hints over years.
I came here just to say this! My family is pretty solidly progressive, but I have this one uncle (as we all do) who is a bigoted prick, and even though I know my dad and the rest of his siblings hate it they’ve sort of given up on trying to talk about it because it always ends in a fight over dinner. HOWEVER, I always try to say something because I have younger cousins and I don’t want them to think that it’s ok to just let these things slide.
(I will say that I approach it a bit differently than I did when I was a teenager- I spent years of boxing day dinners just flat out calling him and his wife racists, or homophobes. I tend to now say “That’s an awful thing to say, and it’s not true because of x.” I find it slightly more effective for dinner conversation.)
Haha if only they were so trainable.
No, you’re right, and I do think it’s important to say something so they know you’re not tacitly in agreement. But there is a middle ground between getting righteously argumentative on someone and just sitting silently, so just know your goals going into it, I guess is what I’m saying.
Or, as a friend-of-a-friend said recently when I yet again pushed back with cool civility against yet another of his transphobic remarks, “Y’know, it’s getting so I’m afraid to make that kind of joke in front of you.”
OH REALLY NO KIDDING GOSH
YES THAT IS THE POINT
I don’t think my frank disagreement will dismantle most people’s bigotry, but it does dismantle their comfort in displaying it freely. Silence suggests everyone hearing a bigot speak agrees with them, more or less, or at least that their ugly opinions will be tolerated. Speaking up, even civilly, shows otherwise.
And in the end, if all it results in is that someone stops saying transphobic/homophobic/misogynistic/xenophobic/etc. stuff around me, it’s still a small win because I don’t have to listen to their garbage!
Exactly. If all I’ve done in this specific case is make the friend-of-a-friend think twice before he spouts his bigotry, that’s something.
If it also makes other people consider their own hidden bigotry, that’s more — maybe much more. I say that because I used to be one of those people. I grew up in a family with plenty of homosexual friends who nevertheless felt fine about Othering them; in a white family that was nominally liberal but steeped in a stew of subtle racist expectations and frameworks; in a not-especially-religious WASPy family that had a lot of tacit prejudices about various religions. It was no one else’s duty to educate me on my own prejudices, but hearing people speak out was a huge help in teaching me to observe my unexamined bigotries, and it still is.
And expressing the not-okayness of bigotry can be a lifeline to someone in the family (or friend) group who’s a member of, or connected to a member of, the marginalized population that the bigot is disparaging.
I just learned that [under-age member of social circle] has come out as gay, and I’m so, so glad that anytime I overheard another member make a “harmless” little crack at the expense of some actual or imagined LGTB person, I pushed back. I’m so glad that [underaged member of social circle] knows that not every adult in [group] thinks it’s okay to talk that way, or to think that way. And I’m so, so glad that maybe I modeled to that younger generation —no matter their orientation — that it’s not okay to speak that way, and one way to push back against bigotry.
As T-Rex so wisely said a few weeks ago, “Hey, you know the difference between a world where nobody’s sexist and a world where everyone just PRETENDS not to be sexist?? Answer: LET’S FIND OUT, DICKWEEDS”
This exactly. I’m too old to think I can change the world at large, but I can change MY world into one where bigoted bullshit isn’t tolerated. Save it for you Klan meeting, gramps.
Then again, I defriended a racist uncle on FB and told him exactly why I did it. We don’t speak anymore and I am not even a little bit sorry about that. Now I don’t have to deal with listening to him rant about aboriginals and he doesn’t have to deal with someone judging his crappy opinions. Win win!
Yuppppp. I feel like it’s a win if this person understands that there are places where this stuff isn’t appropriate.
Yes! I no longer expect to change anyone’s mind (to be fair, MY mind is never changed by these interactions) but I have at least trained troublesome folks to not engage me in this shit. It wasn’t the most fun I’ve ever had, but the last time my pop started to needle me about some dumb political thing or other, I threw a minor hissy – I did not travel 3000+ miles, spending lots of money and vacation days just to be teased or harassed about my beliefs.
Yeah, I don’t know much about this vis-a-vis family members, since most of mine seem to be on the same page about these matters. But in my general experience, there’s a difference between confronting someone because you think it will stop them from doing harm, and confronting someone because you want them to acknowledge that they’re wrong and you’re right. I think in most situations it’s enough to make it clear that you do not agree and you don’t want to hear certain kinds of comments at your family dinners. But when it comes to obnoxious crap on Facebook? Just block them.
I do really think there is something to be said for being thoughtful about where you expend your time and energy to support the cause, and it is fairly rare that arguing on Facebook is the best use of that time. I have definitely wasted hours on a fruitless and demoralizing Facebook arguments and thought, shit, what if I just made a donation to a group taking action every time I saw this shit instead of engaging? If I didn’t spend so much time bickering with people whose minds will never change, would I have more optimism and energy to spend out in the streets advocating for change? I think everyone has to be the judge of whether certain people are worth engaging with, and I don’t think we should have to feel guilty for every single time that we choose not to.
I think that is what I like about this 3 link suggestion though. You don’t need to spend a ton of time and emotional energy arguing, just happily post some links and walk away. It probably won’t change this person’s mind, but it probably will eventually make this person stop spouting racist things on her Facebook wall and make him edit himself a bit when around her at least.
I’ve had some luck, though absolutely not on Facebook which is a soul-destroying waste of a life but a lot of folks feel really pressured to Have An Opinion On Politics without really knowing or caring about some shit that’s going on on the ass-end of the country or to groups of people they aren’t a part of, and they can be a lot more flexible than they look if you come at them from any angle other than the one prepackaged talking-point battle they’ve been armed for by whoever the hell got them ranting in the first place. Most people actually have really informed and established opinions on, like, two, maybe three big talking-point issues that resonate with them personally, and everything else is just whatever those around them or who agree with them on those key points is saying. Trying to start with points of agreement and work back from there works pretty good in my experience.
I have actually had some success with sending a person a private FB message to say “FYI, that thing you shared can be construed as pretty racist, you might wanna take it down,” but of course that wasn’t what I really wanted to say: you’re a racist asshole, lady, and I can’t believe my dad is dating you.
I think this is a good middle ground. I’ve blocked / defriended people before and while that makes things more pleasant for me, it just results in all the racists sitting around in their racist echo chamber talking about how normal it is to be racist. That is far more dangerous long term than actually saying “Wow, that thing you said is really not cool”
Yeah, not that you shouldn’t try to be an ally and call out bigotry where it rears its ugly head, but family can be tricky. I come from a family where people like to argue for the sake of argument and whoever’s the loudest the longest wins. People pick a side, dig their heels in and continue to defend their positions even when they know they’re wrong.
That said, if it’s possible to have a real conversation with Uncle, countering his opinions with facts sounds solid. Even if you have to begin with a somewhat passive, “Hmm, you know, it’s interesting that you heard *insert horrible thing* about the riots in Baltimore/immigration/gay marriage, a lot of sources I’ve looked at see things differently, here’s another perspective.” Again, this tactic usually works if the other person is actually interested in a dialogue. If they’re talking to hear themselves talk sometimes all you can do is say, “I disagree,” and excuse yourself.
Thank you for this. I’m off to visit my very conservative relatives soon for a family celebration and this is really helpful.
I totally lived this last summer. I had made the hard decision to be an ally in difficult circumstances, happy in my self-made bubble where awful people do not exist. But then I made my gentleman friend make arrangements for us to see his far away grandma when we were in the neighbourhood. We visited his aunt and her new husband as the meeting place, and new “uncle” spent a good hour spewing the most virulent racist crap – from “adopt my ways, immigrants!” (I’m the child of a human who came over on a boat, yo) to “Yeah, well, we conquered [aborgiginal people], and when you are a conquered people, you adapt to the conqueror” _without missing a beat_. Grandma took new uncle’s side, and we left shortly after she spat that aboriginal people had never contributed anything to our country. New uncle’s wife saw us to the door with a “well, we certainly won’t talk about that again!” and gave us a hug.
Gentleman X knew of my allyship decision way ahead of time, was fully versed in my “new uncle is not going to be able to be awful in my presence without sh*t going down” resolution, and had my back during the argument. And I got to have his over the course of the following 6 months, while his grandmother sent him abusive letter-mail (she called me a whore, which was GREAT). Which is when Gentlman X’s _dad_ stepped in, telling his mother to mind her own business, and she had her head examined for tumors because she didn’t understand where “all that hate” came from. Actually.
All of this to say; it is possible to be a good ally AND a good family member. Because probably there are other people in your family who want to be good allies, and who do not see unthinking loyalty/respect/whatever-ther-word-the-olds-use-for-conformity as being a good family member.
Then again, I moved halfway across the continent to not be around people who make fun of accents and “weird names” for hahas, so maybe I am not the best judge of “how to be a good family member”.
Gentleman X knew of my allyship decision way ahead of time, was fully versed in my “new uncle is not going to be able to be awful in my presence without sh*t going down” resolution, and had my back during the argument.
Knowing you can stick together on this stuff is soooooo important, and makes it much easier. Not that your experience sounds remotely easy, but once you’re resolved, it’s vastly easier if the person whose family it is has your back.
110%. No. 120% This would have shaken down a LOT differently if he had made “please don’t poke the bear” noises.
“it is possible to be a good ally AND a good family member”
THIS THIS THIS THIS
Yes. And that’s pretty much what I did in recruiting my mom into the situation.
Related: my mom is all caught up in the anti-Gardasil movement and keeps posting those links and tagging me. I am pro-Gardasil and pro-vaccines and pro-science.
Help!
Remove the tag every single time if you are not already.
I would also suggest asking her to stop. Then, if she persists, reply to each one with the same sentence and don’t engage further. Something like, “Mom, you know I don’t agree with you here,” or something like that. Good luck! I have had a lot of luck with repeating the same line, or the same line but with the words changed around so it’s not quite so obvious. People who do this enjoy the argument and hate it when you won’t really engage.
That’s a good tip! The same calm line to ask her to stop. Thank you!
(I currently have the setting where nothing gets posted to my page without me accepting, so every time she tries to tag me I click No to it showing up on my timeline)
I have that, too! I really, reeeeeally wish FB would allow me to make that person-specific; there’s only one family member whose tagging privileges I need to deny.
Reply with counterlinks to articles about the efficacy of vaccines. Nothing else. Maybe you won’t educate your mother, but maybe someone else reading might learn something.
This is so timely! Reunion with the racist and sexist family is coming up. I know I should make some ripples in the pond, but man… I don’t know if I have the energy for that. Maybe some cutting laconic responses?
Depending on the event and how people would react, is simply walking away an option?
Like, every time the discussion turns racist or sexist, you say “excuse me” and go refill your drink or use the bathroom or go somewhere else to read a book. That’s a really passive way to do it, but at least you don’t have to expose yourself.
You can also do the same thing in a slightly more assertive way – “I am not going to participate in this conversation. I do not want to start an argument, but I also cannot sit here silently while this continues, so I am going to excuse myself.”
Oh I’m definitely going to be using the “walk away” option. I have a reputation of aloofness with them anyway. I think any sort of statement acknowledging their bigotedness will start A Thing, since it’s so casual and ingrained. But maybe it’s time for that.
With an arguing-for-sport type in my extended family circle, the kind who just spouts forever and never listens, I started using some variation on “We are not going to agree on this,” then walking away if he doesn’t desist.
The cumulative effect, over a half-dozen occasions, has been gratifying. He no longer bothers to spout his half-baked nonsense at me for more than a few seconds before stopping, and those few seconds convince me he’s thoroughly on auto-pilot: He reflexively starts in on his hobbyhorse, then takes a second to notice who he’s ranting at.
I’ve been really wanting to try the “Uh-huh, that is a position” for this. (Thank you to to the Toastie who came up with that!)
Oh, and with this one guy, I also use variations on “I am aware of your views,” because JEEPERS WHO ISN’T ALL HE DOES IT YAMMER THEM. He doesn’t even care if you agree with him; I could say “Yup, that’s true*!” and he’d keep arguing at full clip.
*no i couldn’t because even when he gets within hailing distance of the truth it is jam-packed with unsubstantiated baloney at maximum bombast levels
Not even going to lie, I’ve been having practice conversations. Learning to make my point quietly but firmly and without insults, no matter how badly I want to swear or yell. These are my family members that I love, but saying racist shit is offensive and needs to be addressed so I figure if I have some rehearsed answers and some articles I can point people towards, it will help me feel prepared for a shitty conversation.
A part of me just wants to just dive into it. I blame my inner dirtbag wanting to get out.
“How offensive!”
“What kind of person says such a hateful thing?”
“What kind of person believes such a hateful thing?”
All of these can be delivered on the way out of the room.
To add another potentially useful verse to the ones that Aunt Acid mentioned:
“Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered.” Proverbs 21:31
There is rather a lot in the Bible about taking care of the poor, advocating for the oppressed, and taking in the stranger, and it is very satisfying to keep a few on hand to quote at people who seem to have missed that. Stephen Colbert is pretty much the king of that, it’s worth going and watching some of his very pointed clips if you have to deal with particularly frustrating bouts of religiosity misdirected into bigotry.
My personal favorite is “whatsoever you do unto the least of these, you do also unto me”
This is part of why I love Colbert so much. Liberation theology for the win!
OP’s uncle IRL
He replaced the booze addiction with the evangelism.
It might also be worth considering that an interaction on facebook isn’t the same as one in person. Starting a “public” argument with someone (especially someone very set in their views) isn’t necessarily beneficial to anyone. If you really want to educate the other person and try to change their mind, a private conversation/message may be a better forum for it. “Calling out” isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution.
Bingo and that is what we settled on.
Cheers! It’s great that your mom has your back on this!
I agree with this. It’s way better to call people out in person, and in private.
I have all the sympathy in the world for being in this position, because my family is an even split between casual liberalism that responded well to me being a big gay and born again Catholicism that doubled down on the hellfire.
It’s hard, because you’re not just saying telling Racist Uncle McGee that he’s saying some racist fucking things with the expectation that he will huff and puff and probably type more shitty things at you with CAPSLOCK for emphasis. It’s knowing that there’s every chance your whole family is going to come down on you, because You Made It Weird and Now It’s Awkward and Racist Uncle Is Entitled To His Opinions. (This is often, in my experience, further complicated by Racist Uncle being older than you and a dude and you being younger and a lady. Know thy unspoken place, child.)
The thought that has sustained me through many, many of these conversations is that I don’t actually like my Racist Uncles. I have more than one, and despite being branches on a shared genetic tree, I think their terrible opinions lead to terrible words and thoughts and actions. I don’t like them, and I had to let go of caring if they liked me. The corollary to that is standing steadfast in the face of relatives who like/have an obligation/care about both of you and just want the two of you to get along. I can compromise, but it’s going to be a compromise and not a surrender. I’ll avoid politics if politics are not brought to me, but I believe in what I believe in and I’m not going to listen to diatribes about those people over there ruining America and say nothing. In the immortal words of every toddler ever, THEY STARTED IT.
I wish you luck. It’s a shitty, awkward, often thankless situation to be in. But I have found that ultimately, it is more than worth it to stand up for the things you believe.
because You Made It Weird and Now It’s Awkward and Racist Uncle Is Entitled To His Opinions. (This is often, in my experience, further complicated by Racist Uncle being older than you and a dude and you being younger and a lady. Know thy unspoken place, child.)
Yes. Yes. That is exactly what was percolating in my skull. Thank you for summing up.
I created an account just to reply to this!
I am a first-generation bi-racial young woman. I grew up in a two-religion, three-language household, with no extended family because they all lived overseas. Intersectionality? I LIVE THAT SHIT.
I JUST married into a very white and in many cases, very conservative family. Many of them find me strange: my parents, my food, my cultures (gasp, you can have more than one!), my politics. As the newcomer, I feel thoroughly muzzled — in any forum — from speaking up when ignorant, racist, or otherwise hurtful things arise. If I do, I will lose credibility in that family and be vulnerable to being dismissed offhand as some pinko feminazi “illegals”-lover who “plays the race card.” (It’s like a game of bigot bingo up in this piece.)
This means that whenever someone speaks up who is, by blood, connected to that family (most often my SO), I am flooded with incredible gratitude. They may not know it, but they’re using their privileged platform (as a blood relation) to stand up for me and others who can’t speak so frankly.
So this is my personal plea to Toasties. If your family spews ignorance or hatred, SPEAK OUT. Don’t let yourself be a fairweather ally! Not only will you be taking a stand for justice in the abstract, you will be taking a stand on behalf of people very near you — you just may not even realize it! Maybe it’s someone like me, maybe it’s your closeted cousin, maybe it’s someone who’s just kind of embarrassed that they voted for Obama — whoever it is, I guarantee you that your words are important and necessary within and without your family circle.
So hi, LW here, and thank you so so so much for taking this on. I have ALWAYS been the good kid in the family that didn’t make any waves and kept everyone happy, so that’s a big part of why I was so conflicted about what to do. At the same time, I have zero problem calling out friends or strangers on intolerance and bigotry, so yes, the a) peacemaker vs b) true to self was very very on my mind.
Outcomes!
The evening that I wrote this in, I called my mother and let her know of the situation. She asked what he said, I read her the comment. She said, “Wow. That’s… that’s really ugly.” She was genuinely shocked at its content and tone. And we talked about a lot of things. We talked about their father and how he affected the men in her family (short version: they have basically become him, that is, they are alcoholic bigots in varying states of recovery), and we talked about the echo chamber that is Facebook and the insufficiency of text versus face-to-face interaction on charged subjects, and we came to a good agreement on how to handle this as a family.
Rather than getting into a debate or argument online, I decided to bring it up with him one-on-one when he comes up to visit us this summer. She is going to do the same. And we’ll deal with the fallout from there.
ETA that I have been noticeably more vocal regarding social justice on Facebook since this incident.
Thank you to everyone who’s chimed in. It’s a really fraught thing, and it’s reassuring to know that others are dealing with it too.
You and your mom sound like you’ve got it cased. And if your experience is anything like mine, the outflowing of support that you will get for alienating the bigot will be worth any familial waves cased.
Luck!
So glad to hear this! Thank you for writing. –Aunt Acid
I debated a lot about this myself in the past, and then realized that the main reason I didn’t want to engage my relatives is that I’m actually afraid of them because they’re the kind of bigots who are legit frightening. It was a very interesting moment, to sort of ask myself why I even have the most minimal contact with these bozos! I ended up skipping merrily away, washing my hands of the whole lot of them! Not to be underrated as an option.
Yes. At least one of my bigoted relatives is a member of the KKK. And he has black ops training from the US armed forces. A truly dangerous bigot.
EEEEEEEEEEE. Mine are “just” your regular too much rage, not enough mental health care kind of scary. Not like, organized about it. 🙁 May your frightening relatives remain far, far away.
I completely empathize with this dilemma. Having spent many go-rounds trying to change family hearts and minds (and I’m sure many more rounds are to come), my go-to solution these days is to quietly delete any offending comments from my page to minimize harm to others who might see them, and to continue to post stuff that I find more productive/interesting/persuasive re: the subject at hand. So far, no deleted commenter has called me out on it, but if/when they do, I’m just going to tell them that I while I appreciate their rights to disagree/free speech, my personal Facebook wall is intended to be a racism/sexism/classism/sizeism/ablism/homophobia free zone, and they are welcome to engage people in these debates on their own pages. (I’m sure this won’t go over well, but I’m working on firm boundary making, even if it’s unpopular…)
Can I just say, re: responding to conservative family members, that I find there’s a difference between responding to bigoted comments in person, on your own Facebook page, or on someone else’s? I find my policy is to speak up tactfully but firmly in the first instance, delete really problematic comments in the second instance, and not engage unless I think it will be actually be effective in the third. I mostly just rant to my husband instead to get the anger out of my system a little.
To those who choose the ignore/change the subject/walk away approach with bigoted family members, how do you deal with impressionable young kids who may overhear their grandparents spouting such remarks? My father is very homophobic, rather racist and a bit sexist, and he has a really bad temper, to the stage where he has cut off all contact with friends when they seriously offend him. I’ve chosen not to call him out on his crap because I don’t want to lose contact with my mother or teenage brother. But now that I have a child of my own, I’m not sure how to approach this issue. It’s easy to just tune out a racist rant when there’s not a child in the vicinity who might parrot such comments. How do you explain to a child that what his grandfather tells him is actually wrong?
Have a conversation with the kid when the offending relative isn’t there. Make sure the kid has openly LGBTQ people in their life. Comment positively on LGBTQ-related public figures or current events. Have a conversation with the relative about how they’re allowed to have their views but you don’t want certain things voiced in front of your kid, just like some people don’t like swear words uttered in front of their kids or don’t want their kids to watch movies above a certain rating. (Of course these are not actually morally comparable, but maybe it would help to frame it like that. Your kid, your rules about what the kid is exposed to.)
Just throwing out suggestions here (from my perspective as a queer person of color who doesn’t have kids) — I realize every family is different and these may not all work for you. It sounds like a very difficult situation you’re in!
I have always been a keep-the-peace bystander type. In the case of my racist uncle (ug, why does he not understand he’s such a boring trope), I always tried to respect my mom, who had been through enough shit at his hands that I felt like she was entitled to deal with that and grant whatever scope of forgiveness she wanted to without me throwing monkey wrenches. Having kids definitely changed that dynamic, but I still err on the side of bystanding/peace. I’ve always avoided my uncle but I make a conscious effort not to let my kids be around him. I try not to visit my parents if I know he’s visiting at the same time and if we overlap I make a shit ton of excuses – I’ll take my kids on prolonged errands to help my mom out and “accidentally” fall asleep while I’m putting them to bed early (because the errands were so exhausting).
If he says something even borderline racist in front of them, I usually remove them from the room as quickly as I can (without scaring them). It depends on the circumstances whether I say something to him in front of them. If it’s just our immediate family and it’s a comment the kids can clearly understand I try to call him out unless everyone has been drinking. But if there are any complicated factors I just make a bullshit excuse and remove the kids to another room.
If its a comment they didn’t understand I explain why what he said is unkind and against our family’s values. (One of the hard things is that kids don’t really understand a lot of the racist tropes you do as an adult. So you end up struggling to decide whether there is an age-appropriate way to discuss why a certain comment was racist and sometimes there just isn’t — my uncle is fond of talking about “baby mamas,” and it goes over my kids’ heads completely. There’s no way to explain it without bringing up why people’s moral judgment of promiscuity is wrong and, ug, too much for a 5 year old.)
I will say that I think your decision about whether to publicly call out relatives is a personal one and I don’t agree with a lot of people on this thread saying you have a duty to do it. Everyone in my family disagrees with my uncle and as long as we’re on the same page and the kids know what’s up I’m not sure what value it would have to engage in the fight he’s always spoiling for. He’s an irredeemable asshole and my unilateral declaration of war against his toxicity wouldn’t do the world much good but it would really upset and hurt the rest of my family.
I just want to reiterate what prawnsong said above. I think a lot of the conversation misses the point that it’s not about changing Uncle Bigot’s mind, nor even just signaling to other on-the-fence family members where you stand and giving them information. It’s also about showing your friends who are members of the disparaged groups in question that you will not stand for them to be treated this way without some response. Even if it’s a more measured response than “holy shit you racist asshole,” just showing that you are not going to leave them hanging when one of your people brings the hate is crucial, I think, to being any kind of ally.
(This applies most when it’s on your own posts/feed/wall/whatever. I don’t think one is obligated to expose oneself to the trash that they post on their own accounts; that’s what the “hide” button is for.”)
His own feed is pretty much just pictures of his kids and church stuff, which I can mostly ignore (church) or not (my cousins). This particular instance was one of those times when “So-and-so replied to a comment on this article” popped up on my feed, so I think HE thought he was anonymous, I guess, or at least that it wasn’t a place where anyone he knew would be likely to see it. Because of that, I think it’s probably closer to his honest thoughts than what he’d ever say directly to one of us, digitally or otherwise.
Ah, I mistakenly assumed he was responding to a news article that you had posted/shared. I see why it’s murkier in this case.
Though I would give a whole lot of 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 to someone who just busted out with a “holy shit you racist asshole!”
I disagree that the only two options are A) “Keeping the peace” (saying nothing because of wanting to be “good”) or B) being true to yourself (public callout).
The truth about me can’t just be “will hold public callout”, and keeping the peace isn’t only for “being good”. Peace is VALUABLE, not just a stage for displaying goodness or goody-two-shoes-ness, and I have many more character traits to be true to than just willingness to fight in public. (In fact, that’s not even one of my favourite traits. I admire courage, but not everything that feels unpleasant to do is courageous.)
Standing up to injustice is one of my values, though. But what do I want with it? What is it FOR? Well, justice is for creating peace, isn’t it? Equality, stability, freedom from having to defend yourself because no one is attacking anyone any more? That’s peace, right?
There are two kinds of justice, and we have to be careful which one we aim for. There is punishing the offender, and there’s helping the victim, and they are often two very different things. Just think about the court system and the way victims get nothing if they lose the trial, even if no one believes they weren’t victimised, because the trial is focused on punishing the offender. When you choose to act for justice, which goal are you fulfilling? Is it the one you want? What should everything ideally look like when you’re done? Is your path likely to take you there, or to some other place? Basically, when you go to war, plan for peace.
Personal story time! I bought the bystander argument hook, line and sinker – if you don’t speak up, you’re complicit. Doing nothing counts as consent. So if I don’t want to consent to a certain behaviour that someone may be doing in my vicinity, I have to say so, otherwise I automatically consent. I have to TAKE RESPONSIBILITY.
Eventually, I started to feel very stressed out literally all the time, because my time and attention could and would get kidnapped at any moment, and I felt I wasn’t allowed to not be kidnapped (because it makes you complicit). I didn’t realise why this was so stressful, until it hit me that the bystander argument is some straight up Rape Logic. Oh, so I have to clearly say no every time someone does something I don’t like, otherwise it counts as participation? I have to drop whatever I’m doing when someone else wants to pull me into an activity, even if I don’t want to, otherwise I’m a bad person? And somehow that’s feminist? (I know this was about racism, but feminism is where I learned.)
No. Nope nope nope. Me and my Nopetopus get on the Nope Rocket and nope alllll the way to Nopetunus.
Tl;dr: I still contradict people all the time when they’re this wrong, but I watch out like hell for the peace vs truth dichotomy. It’s completely false. Truth should create peace, and peace should be used for telling the truth. They are not opposites and should never (IMHO) be allowed to be opposites.
I understand what you’re saying, but it does sound like the Uncle is actually destroying the OP’s peace with his words and actions. It’s not keeping the peace if only one party, the Uncle, feels any.
My family just starts with a “Rub-a-dub-dub, Thanks for the Grub, yaaaaaaaaaaaaay GOD!” and a healthy dose of booze and Thanksgiving usually ends up in a food fight, so if anyone wants to come by my house you’re welcome to. We won’t notice any extra people, I already have like 27 cousins with their spouses and kids, you could just say “Oh I’m dating your cousin”, it’s not like we keep track. Just don’t wear anything you don’t want to get gravy and/or cranberry sauce and/or beer on.
Yeah, not that you shouldn't try to be an ally and call out bigotry where it rears its ugly head, but family can be tricky. I come from a family where people like to argue for the sake of argument and whoever's the loudest the longest wins. People pick a side, dig their heels in and continue to defend their positions even when they know they're wrong.
That said, if it's possible to have a real conversation with Uncle, countering his opinions with facts sounds solid. Even if you have to begin with a somewhat passive, "Hmm, you know, it's interesting that you heard *insert horrible thing* about the riots in Baltimore/immigration/gay marriage, a lot of sources I've looked at see things differently, here's another perspective." Again, this tactic usually works if the other person is actually interested in a dialogue. If they're talking to hear themselves talk sometimes all you can do is say, "I disagree," and excuse yourself.
But what does one do when one lives with the offending family member? Please send help, I’m honestly asking.
Ehhhh….I don’t think being hesitant to start what would in all likelihood devolve into a Facebook flame war and ruffle family peace is being “governed by fear.” Maybe that’s the Minnesota in me talking, but I just don’t see the point.
I try to nudge the relatives I disagree with gently *in person* and also I share things on my personal page that make my views clear – this isn’t about hiding from beliefs, and as the asker mentioned that most of her family is more like her I doubt it is for her, either. I fail to see how engaging with Uncle “Barack HUSSAIN Obama!!!” accomplishes anything but further entrenching him against Those Damn Liberals.
My older sister is a bigot and the worst kind she is a bully, homophobe, tries to control everything, she went to a roman catholic school see people think its the christians who are the bigots it isn't its the roman catholic's. Two of my older sisters went to a Roman Catholic School and so did a family friends son and they all share this same bigoted sick attitude they are always butting in and telling others how to live their life according to their belief system. Stupid bigots don't get it, if other people don't share their views all hell breaks loose.