In Spite of Our Differences?

I keep thinking about this thing that happened and really want to put words down about it.

Bear with me, because my brain only works a little right now (thanks Mercury poisoning!) and it’s frustrating as hell.

A friend of mine recently unfriended me, not just on the social media but it’s all official and shit. I guess. I had to reach out and ask them to confirm because they couldn’t even be bothered to break up with me directly. Welcome to 2023 where everyone is ghosting.

And the reason they unfriended me without so much as a passing phrase to mark the occasion was our differences of opinion about whether transsexual men should have the same rights as biological women.

My friend, as far as I’m aware doesn’t really have a pony in this race. They aren’t directly affected (being a straight man identifying as a man), but regardless I was willing to have conversation around their opinion on the matter and continue our friendship even if we are at polar opposites of the spectrum.

But my opinion as a biological woman was too much for them to bear.

Curiously, I was immediately mad and wanted to point out how bullshit it was for him to draw the line there. After all, I was willing to see them as a human being even after they used me to cheat on their girlfriend (now wife). And no, I’m not that type of person, he had kept his relationship with her hidden until after the fact.

But then I think two things:

1. At some point in my life I was him.. or rather this particular mindset he has which has invaded our culture. That if you disagree with me I can’t possibly talk to you let alone have any kind of relationship with you. That if you disagree with me you are the devil incarnate and no longer human.
2. He wasn’t worth the friendship to begin with when he manipulated me for sex (and cheated on his girlfriend), and that really showed his true feelings about women.

The actual details of our recent disagreement aren’t even relevant because an opinion is just that; and it’s something which should always be open for changing if new information or evidence warrants it.

What bothers me is that I’ve been lucky enough to avoid interactions like this with real people in my life. I’ve managed to surround myself with people who hold very different opinions from my own but yet remain willing to have conversations and even arguments trying to convince each other to change our minds. And at the end of the day still see value in that person where keeping them in your life means more than losing them over a difference of opinion.

These aren’t blood relatives either.

I’m not sad to lose a friend who wasn’t actually a friend (as it turns out). I’m sad they somehow got left decades behind in coming to realize that differences of opinion can only improve both people’s lives if they are willing to engage with one another.

All the things we could have learned from each other, not in spite of our differences but because of our differences. Completely lost.

Feels good to get that out, now I can stop thinking about it.