I have made a point to not make any new friends with average liberals. The type of a person who gets their worldview told them by browsing, say, a CNN or BBC website once every few days. Everyone's so emotional, and of course world events are exacerbating this more and more, there is just no way to have a normal conversation when it comes to politics or interpretation of certain events.

The problem is there is a couple of old friends, decent normal people, who are rabid liberals. And even a bigger problem is my mom is one of them. So I cannot get rid of them all.

And I just put so much energy into trying to avoid certain topics with them. But you probably know how it is. They, on the other hand, have made this particular lens or worldview a huge part of their personality, without even realizing it often, so it keeps coming out. They keep saying things that make my blood boil.

So of course I cant but push back sometimes. Even full knowing that this is completely useless. Even having many things to say to back up my views. But the darnest thing is they never ask to go that far. They just get mad that for some bizarre reason I don't think the way they do, the only correct way(tm). They psychologize away, for themselves, that I must have been reading the wrong things, must have fallen under the influence of propaganda, must be under some illusions.

I always stop myself from saying back that, well, this is exactly the other way around. Because I realize that this would only confirm their point for themselves. That this will sound insane to someone so sure and secure in their worldview. Someone who is not accustomed to doubt. They'll conclude, and probably already have, that everything is upside down for me. I am the insane one.

How do two upside downs talk to each other? This is a rhetorical question. But it does make me feel insane realizing that I am the insane, damaged, one from the perspective of certain people I love dearly. I want them to open up a bit, but I know they cannot. So they defend their worldview, their personality, in this most primitive way possible. "You are the crazy one." It's exhausting. And as someone who is accustomed to doubt, it does make me feel sometimes that, well, what if, I am indeed the insane one.