There’s no question that we’re living — and looking for love — in contentious times, where extreme political ideologies have all but divided parts of the dating pool. Or have they?

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From May to November, I would match with a total of 60 men across a wide conservative spectrum — self-proclaimed MAGA bros, ‘European’ guys looking for their submissive ‘European’ dream girls, white supremacists, conspiracy theorists — although most identified in some way with the alt-right. I’d scour profiles in an effort to figure out where these men were coming from, why they seemed to oppose the things I’d previously spent a career fighting for: women’s rights, social justice, reproductive freedoms, LGBTQIA+ equality. I tried to imagine that maybe we weren’t so different, maybe there was some chaotic internet-age misunderstanding at play.

And maybe I could answer another big question, one that seemed intimidatingly complex: as politics in the US (and beyond) grows more divisive, as the internet fuels hard-line cultural ideologies and social discord, as like-minded communities double down on rejecting anything different, is it possible for romantic connections between contrasting groups to even exist? Could dating be a way to help forge an understanding — of value systems, of experiences that drive beliefs — that could start to bridge the dissonance? Or at the very least, could it teach me about my own rules of attraction? Could I ever be physically enticed by (or even intimate with) someone with very different political views?

  • t3rmit3@beehaw.org
    14·
    16 hours ago

    Yo, these dudes are fucking crazy.

    Guy 1:

    I asked what other kinds [of lists] he made.

    “Lists of lies liberal white women tell about Donald Trump,” he replied.

    Suddenly, his leg was shaking. He grabbed the edges of the table and raised his voice: “White, liberal women are a plague on our society.”

    Guy 2:

    I asked him whether his future wife has to be white. He paused, then replied, “I believe, on principle, that white people have a right to maintain a positive identity, and our collective well-being must be maintained with healthy families. White guilt is poisoning kids.”

    Guy 3:

    “If we lived in a different time, we would be hanging white liberal whores in the town square and dragging them through the streets for the lies they spread,” he roared. My immediate reaction was an attempt to de-escalate the situation.

    “Let’s take a deep breath,” I suggested. I took one, then he took one, and we repeated it. He reset. Later, though, when I had my hand on the table, he grabbed my wrist and started ranting again about how liberal white women create witch hunts.

    “They say horrible things about me and make everyone hate me and think I’m a bad person,” he said. He was staring at a point in the distance, speaking like he was in some kind of trance.

    “What did they say about you?” I asked.

    He snapped out of it. “Oh, not me,” he answered. “I meant Donald Trump.”

    YO WTFFFFFFFFF BRO

    • Areldyb [he/him]@beehaw.orgEnglish
      5·
      7 hours ago

      Not sure whether it matters, but Guy 3 and Guy 1 are the same Guy, who also sent death threats to the author years ago. Dude needs some serious help.

    • dumples@midwest.socialEnglish
      8·
      15 hours ago

      I think the scariest part is how normal they seemed until these weird breakdowns. They seem to be barely clingling to sanity