Politics and Assumptions Irritate Me

Politics. It's one of those things people used to be told not to talk about. Sometimes I wish that were still the norm. Recently I either read or heard someone say, or maybe I saw a Meme, I don't remember, but I read, heard, or saw something like this: "We've been raised to not talk about politics or religion and all that's done is create a society that can't discuss politics or religion." I had it good when I was a child. My father was a staunch Republican and my mother was a die-hard Democrat. On days when they voted, I remember them laughing and saying how their votes canceled each other out. They never talked about politics when us kids were in the room - not that I ever heard anyway. This is all to say that I have never personally taken politics very seriously. Just so everyone knows... I am an Independent voter. I refuse to be tied to either political party. I was listening to a podcast the other day and heard Nicole Wallace say, "I think republicans lie to their constituency and donors and democrats lie to themselves". In today's political environment in the U.S., no statement could be more true. I believe completely that if the democrats had not run Hillary Clinton in 2016 we would never have had Donald Trump as a president. The democrats could have run anyone else and they would have taken the White House. The democrats were and still are lying to themselves about the level of hatred people feel for Hillary Clinton. Does she deserve it? No, but it is what it is and if they had only faced reality we never would have gotten Trump as president. I blame the democratic party for that. Of course, then there are the republicans. Where do I even begin? I'm speechless - something that never happens. I mean, seriously. I'M SPEECHLESS. Are they from another planet? WHO votes for them? The fact that the current republican party is becoming more and more the Christian National party means that am super irritated by them. I can, and will, write much more about my feelings on both political parties because they irritate the hell out of me. I happen to live in a RED state. It doesn't get any redder than the state I live in. There are small pockets of BLUE in the state, but the state is nowhere close to being PURPLE; it's as red as red gets. People live here because it's pretty (if you like mountains, rivers, and wildlife, that is). I grew up here. I was married here. My son was born here. My family lives here. My dad is buried here. I don't want to live anywhere else, but I have to say, I am thoroughly irritated with the politics of my state and the way people act. I drive down the street and see giant flags on the back of huge pickup trucks that say "FUCK BIDEN". Sometimes on the other side of the pickup bed is another giant flag; the confederate flag. I am disgusted by the level of hatred these flags represent. I'm not a fan of Biden (or white supremacy!) and I'm irritated by the fact that people feel the need to display a flag from their vehicle telling the whole world exactly how they feel. There's no civility in it. Yesterday at the end of a yoga class I was teaching, a woman I had never met before approached me. Yadda, yadda, yadda we began that sort of chit-chatting, get-to-know-you kind of conversation and she tells me she and her husband had recently moved to the area from Massachusetts. Next thing I know she's telling me how truly awful (her opinion) the Covid restrictions were back in good ol MA and how much more freedom there is in the West. Obviously, I'm not on the west coast because Covid restrictions were pretty tough in those coastal states. Anyway, she went on for a short bit of time about "those liberals" in places like MA and how refreshing it was to live in another environment. From the way she talked to me and from the things she said, she clearly assumed I was a member of the Republican party and that my politics were exactly the same as hers. She seemed to believe that I moved to this area because I enjoyed seeing those big-ass FUCK BIDEN flags flying from big-ass pickup trucks. She never asked me questions that could have told her anything about me and why I live in this deeply red state. She just made assumptions and that really irritated me.