On my quest to find somebody politically different than me, I well… got lost. I couldn’t find anybody, probably because I didn’t search very hard. A close friend of mine who I told about the assignment told me he was of democratic view. At first, I felt kind of stupid for not choosing him earlier. I had never really talked politics with him before.
I chose to do the interview in the car while he was driving us to watch a play at SPSCC. For questions, I merely made a list of subjects in disagreement by democrats and republicans and asked him about each one. He didn’t have much reason or story to why he believed what he did. But merely based his beliefs on a few ideologies which I will get into.
My first question was gun control. Should we ban “assault weapons,” or “extended” pistol clips, and should we increase the level of background checks needed to purchase a gun? On this subject, we were on a full agreement of opposing such laws. He had no story for why he thinks that merely that he believes such laws will not help the gun issue in America in the least bit. Which I agree with.
Next, I asked him what he thought of abortion. My friend said he is for it in certain situations. He believes that people should have the right to do whatever they want. But, if the pregnancy goes beyond the early stage of a zygote, which he believes after that it becomes its own living thing, then the abortion would be murder. Even though I did not previously hold this belief, it made sense when he talked about it. And I came to agree with him on that matter. However, he believes there should be a limit to how many abortions somebody can get. That if the girl really can’t raise the kid, or the situations were not good, then okay. But if the girl is purposely not caring about getting pregnant because she knows she can just get just an abortion, then it’s wrong. How exactly you would facilitate such a process or limit, he was unsure of. If the situation was rape, we were both completely in agreement about allowing abortion.
Continuing the drive down the freeway, I inquired about his beliefs on gay marriage and transgender. For both these subjects, he merely said nobody should tell them what to do. If they want to live that way let them, it is their choice. However, he is against the huge push for it. For example, the LGBTQ signs all over schools, the numerous bathroom signs, plays, and movies. Because why try to force people to accept your beliefs when you won’t accept theirs. Saying, why force people to accept your beliefs of LGBTQ when you won’t accept their beliefs against it. My friend believes the laws should allow it, but not enforce it. I gave him a real example of where a gay couple asked a Christian bakery to make them a cake for their wedding. The Christians refused. And the gay couple sued them until they ran out of business. He said that was wrong.
We again had the same views on the death penalty. Which was that only people who have committed serious crimes on purpose should be put to death(eg murder). Or people who would not live out a normal life, people who will not change. That if these people are basically staying in prison their whole lives should be put to death. We should not be wasting public money to feed them and keep them imprisoned. But, the people who will change should be allowed to, allowed to be given another chance.
The only issue we did not agree on at all was immigration. He sees it that people who are looking for a better life in America should be allowed as long as they are not bringing big problems with them. I never did inquire to what “big problems” were, I assumed he meant diseases or if they were victims of murder so they came to America to avoid their government. My friend is half Asian and half white. Being raised in a family where one of the family was an immigrant if he said he was against immigration it would be like saying he wished he was never born. With this background, I can see why he holds those beliefs.
My friend has the ideology that people should be free, able to do whatever they want as long as it is not harming others. He grew up in a family with one Asian parent and one white. His father was in the marines. And he currently goes to SPSCC with me, in the past, we both went to ORLA together. On political subjects like these, he leans toward the factual and freedom side of things. Rarely did he have an experience, story, or childhood to support his beliefs. He just held on to facts and freedom. As he did not believe in gun-control because there is no proof to how it will help. And freedom to LGBTQ people to do as they please.
Through this whole interview, it became less of an interview as it did a discussion. We went back and forth sharing our opinions and what we thought of the other’s opinion. Coming to the conclusion that we were basically neutral in the scheme of politics. We changed enough in opinion for me to be a Republican, and he a Democrat. But we were able to discuss and agree on most subjects. This really made me begin to see Hochschild’s dilemma, the ever-increasing divide in politics. Even though we had different beliefs, we could discuss and come to a conclusion. This I think the real issue is what Hochschild(as far as I read in her book that is how it seemed) thought, which was that people needed to understand each other’s experiences and why they believe what they believe. But that isn’t really the issue, the issue is just a lack of communication. The political sides debate, yes, but they don’t really try to find something that suits everyone. They want to be right, they want it their way. But, do take into account this is a much smaller scale, my friend and I could discuss and come to a conclusion. We did not try to make ourselves right.
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