I was recently talking with some friends about the state of the nation, and as it often happens, the conversation turned to people we know who still support the current president.
Someone mentioned their frustration with their neighbors who still haven’t repented Maga, saying, “But the thing is, they’re good people”.
I gently pushed back and replied, “The question is: are they good people, or are they just good people?”
I wasn’t engaging in semantics, I wasn’t flippant, and I wasn’t playing devil’s advocate. I am really trying to figure this out.
How do we value the well-being of the people around us when their political affiliations, theological beliefs, and personal ideologies are causing irreparable harm to other people? Does the way they treat us really have any bearing on their heart’s content? At what point does one’s politics become a moral complaint?
I think we should be careful not to mistake niceness for goodness, because the two are not automatically mutually exclusive.
Cuteness is a skill, not necessarily a personality trait. Most of us are at least capable of being polite in social settings, maintaining the camaraderie necessary to exchange pleasantries while fetching the trash can, talking to strangers in the checkout line, and running into work acquaintances at the gym.
Few of us are outwardly rude to people personally, even those with whom we have fundamental worldview differences. For the most part, we are tactically civil. We smile, make small talk, wish them well, and the moment they leave, we exhale and celebrate to have survived a potentially universal catastrophe.
We are not exactly fake, as much as we are treating people with common decency and not inviting unnecessary turmoil. We try to navigate already exhausting days by minimizing conflict, avoiding an honest airing of grievances that could derail our day and set off a relationship nuclear bomb.
I’m sure my friend’s Trump-supporting neighbors are pretty cool theirAs they are known, straight and white. This specificity, surface familiarity, and perceived safety enable them to maintain an attitude of respect and even kindness toward my friend. They are not the monstrous villains of inflammatory evangelical sermons, the satanic bogeymen of presidential social media diatribes, or the fake news fodder of partisan propagandists, so they are the beneficiaries of courtesy.
My friends’ neighbors might even be reasonable excellent To Latinos who work in their homes or to same-sex couples who have lived next door for a decade. But if my friend was an immigrant moving into their community, or a transgender woman walking into their church, or a new hire at work, what would their neighbors think and say about them?
And, more importantly, as members of vulnerable, marginalized communities, how will their lives be marred by hardship and discrimination as a direct result of their neighbor’s MAGA worldview? This matter. We cannot judge a person’s character just by the surface behavior of other people of their privilege. We also have to weigh the harm to already oppressed people that they involve.
When we’re tempted to lash out at someone’s politics or handle them with kid gloves because they’re nice to us, we need to remember the people on the other side of the laws they establish, the cruelty they co-author, and the suffering they celebrate.
I believe humans are incredibly complex, and we must constantly look for the humanity that may be buried beneath layers of bigotry, political tribalism, and ignorance. I believe that there are good people who have been blinded by dangerous lies that they have come to see as truth.
But I also know that there are thousands of “good” people around us who think, post, and support the toxic hate that plagues our nation; Evil currently leaves people traumatized and terrified.
Finally, we may have to face the reality that some very nice people around us may not be very nice.
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