Hellobee Boards

@periwinklebee: I should not have used the word bad person. You elucidated it much much better than me!

@2littlepumpkins: My post was kind of harsh and I totally see both sides. This is a tough time and it's hard to figure out how to navigate it! I really am just referring to people complaining on Facebook itself to stop posting about politics. I think we need to strike a balance between being aware and actually doing something about what is going on and then also living our lives.

My facebook has definitely gone through a noticeable change both in how I use it and in my feed.

I am liberal and have a fairly liberal dense friend list, so there hasn't been a ton of fighting. I've only unfollowed one person who was a childhood friend I haven't seen in years and posted tons of very bigoted stuff and just wasn't worth engaging. There have also been several posts from conservative family members where I've offered a dissenting view, but we've been able to keep it civil. Among my liberal friends, people have just ramped things up a bit. So the ones who posted political stuff pre-election are now in overdrive, those that occasionally posted political pre-election now post regularly and those that never posted political are now occasionally posting about political stuff.

On my side of things, I never used to post anything political, but now I've started. And I plan to post more. Not a ton (I've never posted much), but I'm making a conscious effort to make it known where I stand on issues. I try to present this through experiences rather than just spamming articles. Like I posted about taking my son to his first political rally. And I'll post about going to our local Islamic Community Center tomorrow. I don't particularly like politics but I'm just not comfortable being silent right now. Somebody posted something like "Ever wonder what you would have done if you were in Germany in 1933? Well, whatever you're doing right now, is what you would have done". And while I'm not saying Trump is Hitler, the sentiment really shocked me and since reading that I haven't been able to ignore all the political stuff. I don't like politics, but I feel like I have to fight.

I've also joined several social justice groups and one political action group since the election. The social justice groups have been incredibly informative and helped to show me so much that I wasn't aware of in this country. The political action group has been a really good motivator to get me active through calling my representatives and community action. I know I respond well to peer pressure, so seeing other people fighting for good causes prods me into action, which is good for me. Exhausting, but good for me.