Friendship and politics | article

Article on friendship & USA election

I am not a republican or a democrat. I am not from America. So to say I had little skin in the game during the 2024 election cycle would be understated. I had not one inch of influence to offer in a race that overtime—felt anything but close.

But why oh why did democrats refuse to see the red wave of populism flooding over them for weeks? Or a shift in American consensus that common sense priorities needed to return to the ballet box, replace debate relating to pronouns, virtue signalling issues and the controversial: DEI? Whether you support these minority focused issues or not— right now the mass population of America care far more about the cost of groceries and safe streets. Much more and nope—that doesn’t make someone racist or any other ‘ist’ for stating the criminally obvious. These types of wild accusations belong with the panel of the fated The View.  

A quest to better understand liberal left ideology  

As left and right election campaigns gathered hot steam (now inclusive of mugshots and a presidential coup), I wanted to learn more about what Americans were thinking. So, I reached out to a native source, an old friend I met in South Korea nearly two decades ago. Jimmy, we will call him. Jimmy is a blue-collar American living in a blue-collar American state. Socially liberal and well-read in American political history, he knows a bunch about the constitution, state laws and government policy. Jimmy is someone who looks out for minorities and the little guy—something I felt a kinship to on our first meeting way back then. Jimmy cares about people and this was obvious on introduction—he has time for almost anyone. But something changed over the years. I thought he was someone who looks at the implications of a policy and isn’t afraid to change mind or opinion based on new factual evidence. Oh, how I thought so…

November 2020 was a different political conversation for Jimmy and I. We spoke openly about the state of American politics as another ugly election cycle drew to a close. The division, rise in identity politics and activism on campuses, all of it was chatted about in a casual and often objective tone. It was fun and enlightening, despite concerns about the future, we learnt a lot from one another. Jimmy can be fun—even if today being someone who would ‘vote for a corpse’ if it meant winning.

Back then, however, we left emotion at the door and took a bird’s eye view approach to political discourse and interpretation. There was good faith in our discussions. How stupid and at times dangerous a lot of what Trump was saying back then, potential impact on American society, were concerns we shared. Even if we both knew things were taken out of context, Trump had gone way overboard with the verbiage. The culture wars, the racial division, the ridiculous idea of cancelling everyone for every single mistake they ever made past or present—including the police, well, it didn’t make complete sense to us. Even if the underlying anger did. We were two logical people who felt empathy for the numerous social disruptions ripping America apart. Two individuals who wanted change but practical application of change. Two everyday people, in that sense, looking for a better future.  

When Biden won the election in 2020, I felt we both considered it better for the American people. A return to ‘normalcy’ was required, a return to some sort of political and social stability. This meant having a senior statesman at the helm, one who knew how to speak to patriotism, promote the hope of a better future—not dispute election results in public and make millions go insane.

Fast forward four years and the conversations we shared late at night over a beer in our native lands, well—they could not have been more different.