“I’m queer, so if someone wants to date me but also voted for a politician who campaigns on taking my rights away, I’m gonna decline (and be very confused).” —u/badb-crow “This. My rights and my identity are unfortunately political right now. I don’t want to fuck someone who doesn’t view me as a person worth respecting, and I don’t want to introduce them to my friend circle.” —u/NekoArtemis “I’m bisexual, so when I date a guy, I need to know I can say that without it being weird. I don’t feel the need to casually date if I have to hide in order to participate.” —u/Plenty-Ad365 “I feel this so much. Met a girl, and we were pretty much two peas in a pod. Then, we started talking politics. It wasn’t even a ‘I’m one side and you’re the other.’ It was how we both saw the world. She became far less attractive after that.” —u/IamAWorldChampionAMA —u/ArtesianDiff “I dated a guy, and I got pregnant, like, reeeeeally early into the relationship. He was so cool, I just assumed he shared my political views. I had an abortion and didn’t think much of it other than feeling like a dumbass for not using a condom that one time. I found out 2.5 years later when we broke up that he never loved me because he couldn’t respect a woman who so easily chose an abortion. Turned out, he cheated on me with a girl who shared his traditional values and got her pregnant months after we broke up.” —u/YoDJPumpThisParty “If a man doesn’t believe in my right to control my own body when it comes to abortion, that tells me a lot about what he thinks about my rights to my body in other situations. Throw in a surprise whoopsie, and he could make your life a living hell in a multitude of ways. When I was casually dating, a lot of men would present themselves as ‘moderates,’ but it would come out over the course of chatting that they were really conservatives who had one gay friend, and they were always offended when I ended things over their political views. They couldn’t understand why something so ‘minor’ as my rights to my body would matter to me.” —u/herodogtus —u/SeasonPositive6771 —u/sillybear25 —u/JoeSchmoe314159 “There’s the big thing. Nowadays, people who have different politics don’t just have different world views, they literally live in different realities. That’s hard to build a relationship around.” —u/calm_chowder “People act like politics are just singular issues when they are an entire worldview and also how you view collective good vs. individualism (aka morals). You need to be on the same page as your partner in most respects.” —u/Skill3rwhale —u/YakOrnery “This is why the ‘it’s just politics’ line showcases an utter lack of understanding or caring, neither of which are good.” —u/RandomName01 —u/sirseatbelt “This has been my view when people argue about ’listening to the viewpoints of all sides.’ I’m fine with a debate about how to address an issue. Higher minimum wage? Or UBI? But when we’re disagreeing about facts and reality, there’s an issue (COVID existing, who won the 2020 election, etc.). When we’re disagreeing as to whether certain people should have basic rights or be treated as equals because of their gender, skin color, or orientation, we have issues. When the other person doesn’t even support our continuing to have a democracy, we have issues.” —u/macphile “Political views fall into two categories, I think: issues of opinion (how much money should be used for infrastructure, where to allocate funds) [and] issues of morality (should other groups of people get treated like people?). No room to disagree on the second.” —u/Mindless_Bed_4852 —u/apostate456 “Your political views are how you see the world. If your views are that some people are simply less human and less deserving of rights than others, that’s a dealbreaker. Why would I want to spend any time with someone like that?” —u/Azidihaka “Yeah, it’s like…human rights aren’t something we can fundamentally disagree on and have a relationship. Romantic or otherwise.” —u/ISpyM8 “A lot of political views are not political, they’re moral. Political views are ‘How much money should be spent on this project’ and ‘Should we build a park here’ and ‘What should this budget be used for?’ and so on. ‘Are women human beings?’ ‘Do LBGTQ people deserve to live?’ ‘Should poverty be used as a weapon?’ ‘Are immigrants human beings?’ and so on are not political. They’re moral issues. And I won’t be with someone who has garbage morals. Because I prefer to cultivate long-term relationships, and I won’t spend years with some bigoted dickhead if I can help it, lol.” —u/SeveralLargeLizards —u/EleanorStroustrup “If you vote for candidates that hold those beliefs, even if you don’t, I’d be worried you’re hiding those views under the pretense of ‘It’s just their economic policy I agree with.’” —u/ISpyM8 “If you are someone who wants to pretend political issues exist in a vacuum, and that political affiliations are like your favorite sports team, or your favorite color, or pizza topping…it just tells me a lot about how you walk the world vs. how others do. Many of these issues are not theoretical to those of us who know people in the communities being affected by targeted legislation. When you choose to only associate with people who look and think like you, you may lose sight of that.” —u/Mindless_Bed_4852 —u/taqPol12
