re: Have any of you lost close friends or family relationships over politics?

Nope… shite not that serious to allow it to affect real relationships…

Your relationships have no impact on any of that.

It’s so easy to NOT talk about controversial topics with people you actually know. I avoid these topics in real life because it’s just not worth it.

you could frick up an anvil. couldn't ya?

I stated here many times. Former staunch Dem. Lost many "friends" as the party went more off the rails.

If I disagree with a leftist friend, they call me the most vile things and tell me to frick off. If I disagree with a friend on the right, they agree to disagree and we remain friends.

This is why I laugh when progressives on this site call anyone they hate in a "cult". This is true projection.

I never have. Not anybody close. Although I never hang with far left lunatics either.

I don’t talk religion or politics with friends or relatives. If they try, I flip the subject to sports, kids, work, yard projects, or other activities. It’s served me well for many years.

A few.

I raced bicycles (road, mountain, cyclocross) for over 15 years here in Houston for a local team. The last 8 years of which I was the president of the team, so I knew everyone on the team pretty well. Prior to 2016 we all got along well enough and almost never talked politics. Cycling, especially mountain biking, can be a bit of a hippy, left leaning sort of demographic, especially in a big metro city like Houston. But it's still Texas so we have a strong conservative population as well.

Anyway, the team was always a really tight knit group of friends and we spent a LOT of time together. We all trained together, 3-4 times during the weekdays, and raced together on the weekends. We rode to races out of town together and shared hotel rooms. We celebrated victories and drank away losses. It's safe to say these were my people. My family not of blood.

Then Trump gets elected and all hell breaks lose. The more leftist members start to get really vocal on social media and team chats. I kept quiet until the summer of the BLM riots. I couldn't hold my tongue and say nothing. So I started trying to have civil, logical conversations with these guys and girls. It did not go well. I deduced that I had been unfriended by a few, and I was fine with it. By that time the shop we raced for had closed down and the team had mostly fallen apart. The guys I was closest with stayed close and we still are to this day. The more loony leftist ones have faded away and I'm fine with it.

There's only one that I feel was a true friend that has written me off. Super nice guy who was in the inner circle of the team. He and I were what I would call true friends. I never talked politics with him but assumed he was fairly conservative. He worked for Shell in downtown Houston for over 20 years in finance. He was originally from Colorado but had lived in Houston since the late 90s. But around 2000 he married a hard left liberal chick from New York City. She is the stereotypical snooty NY liberal elitist. I think over time she warped him. What's funny is, she ALSO worked for a big oil company and they both got pretty wealthy working for EVIL OIL.

They retired and moved to Colorado a year before Trump was elected. After he was elected he jumped on the team group chat and went on a hysterical rant, calling me out specifically and demanding I explain how I could DARE to vote for or support Trump. I was shocked. I messaged him separately and told him I'd be happy to have a civil conversation with him in private about my beliefs but I was really hurt that he had called me out publicly in front of all my friends. He blasted me with more rhetoric and then ignored me.

Liberalism is a mental disorder.

Those type of people shouldn’t have been friends in the first place.

Well, I lost acquaintances in 2016 for my support of Trump, and lost more because to me the 2020 election was rigged and I wasn’t letting it go.

FFW to today. I’ve now lost acquaintances on the right because we are now entrenched in a war with Iran at the behest of Israel that I think is not America’s fight. Also, I’m not letting the Epstein list go. How can we not go after cannibalistic pedophiles?

Both sides suck a lot.

Yes I sure have.