Flynn Taggart Do people actually read this stuff?

The Church of Facebook

I've decided that people who regularly use Facebook as a way to push their political agenda irritate me immensely. I didn't join Facebook to have left- or right-wing agendas shoved down my throat via the daily News Feed. I joined the site to find out how my friends are doing, reconnect with old contacts, and share media. Instead, a solid 25% of daily updates seem to center around things like "Vote for Proposition 3847A and help shut down the Democratic party!" and "Barack Obama is the great American savior. Be sure to vote for him again in 2012!" For the love of everything holy, don't these people ever stop?

I have no problem with someone announcing that they want to expand the death penalty to include misdemeanors or that they blindly support socialized medicine regardless of the facts, but only if they post about it once or twice. When they turn their status updates into a virtual pulpit and preach about it multiple times per day, my irritation increases exponentially. The only thing that keeps me from posting a snotty remark on their profile is my steadfast policy of keeping my political views off of Facebook.

In modern America, friendly political discussions are becoming far more polarizing than ever before. I used to post about it all the time on my blog, but I've seriously scaled back. I only talk politics with my closest friends now and only after we've agreed to drop the topic entirely if the discussion becomes too heated. That's not to say I don't enjoy a good political discussion (which, thankfully, most of my closest friends are intelligent enough to maintain). In fact, I enjoy hearing opinions that differ from my own... which is probably why I have so many liberal friends. That's not to say that I'm conservative, as I sit more in the middle. On a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being extreme liberal, 10 being extreme conservative), I probably sit around a 5.5 - 6.0. If you averaged all of my views together, I'd probably come out slightly on the conservative side of a moderate stance.

I don't appreciate extreme views, which is probably why I don't belong to a political party (hang with me, my point is coming up in a second). I feel as though I should be flexible enough to take a little bit from both sides of an issue. There is no right answer anymore. Political issues have become far too complicated to allow for black and white thinking and, in my opinion, it's dangerous to take an extreme stance. Not only does it pigeon-hole the person, but it polarizes people who have not yet formed an opinion. When someone preaches to the extreme, it's a turn-off for me. The person comes across as being crazy, forceful, and ill-informed. My initial reaction is to take an opposing viewpoint to create balance. I don't like being strong-armed into supporting something.

This is exactly the kind of reaction that Facebook political preachers elicit from me and the reason I keep my politics off of Facebook. I've also decided that I will no longer post political opinions on my blog. If someone wants to know my stance on something, they'll have to first earn my trust, show they can make an informed decision, and then talk about it in a calm and controlled manner.