Politics these days have become so divided and divisive that it’s become the norm to view the other side of the aisle as “the enemy”. People are being told to “pick a side” and that there’s no room for middle ground. We here at Phetasy believe that there are a lot more people in the middle than politicians and the media would have us believe.
We’re collecting stories from the ever growing number of people who are finding themselves Politically Homeless and posting them here on Substack. If you have moved from conservative to liberal, or liberal to conservative, if you feel you’ve stayed in the same place and your party has swerved drastically away from you, if you had a moment that awakened you to the insanity and hypocrisy on both sides, if you keep your mouth shut anytime a political topic comes up because you’re afraid your opinion will cause you to lose friends or your job, you’re not as alone as you might think.
Our goal is to shine a light on people’s earnest, individual experiences and show them they’re not alone.
Some letters have been edited for clarity and brevity. If you’re politically homeless and would like to share your story, please email us at iampoliticallyhomeless@gmail.com. All submissions will remain anonymous.
Letter 79:
January 25, 2024
Hi Bridget,
Love you and your many endeavors! Thanks for making space for the politically homeless. Here goes:
I always was more liberal leaning politically, but pretty much unengaged. I took a bus to march in a pro-choice march in D.C. in the mid-90’s, wrote the occasional letter to my congressman, and voted in every election. Then Donald Trump was elected. I was terrified. As a psychologist, and the daughter of a father with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, I recognized how absolutely dangerous this man was. I got sucked into the more extreme left’s ideology and got much more involved politically. It seemed like these people had good intent and I did my job by “examining my privilege,” etc. but felt really uncomfortable with the online pile-ons and woke fundamentalism.
Because I was raised by man who was manipulative, gas lighting and abusive I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I was so uncomfortable with my peers. I didn’t actively pile on or try to cancel anyone, but thought that maybe I was just missing something when the social justice fundamentalists seemed illogical and mean. I now recognize that those extremists use the language and methods of the Cluster B personality disorders (antisocial, borderline, Narcissistic and Histrionic) to eliminate dissent and make everyone else feel like they are the crazy ones for not understanding.
Anywho, then the 2nd Women’s March was being planned and you may recall that there was some pretty disgusting antisemitism at the top. I had also been feeling a lot of discomfort with the BLM movement’s solidarity with Palestinians. (I’m a secular Jew, by the way.) I always supported a 2 state solution and felt a lot of empathy for the Palestinians. But since 2016, and particularly after 2020, I noticed an insidious antisemitism hiding on the Left. It became more and more difficult to disentangle anti-Zionism from anti-Semitism.
After the Women’s March issues I began to question things. I sought out different news sources (thank you, Substack!). I found people like Bari Weiss, Jesse Singal, Douglas Murray, and Peter Boghossian. The absolute idiocy and cult-like behaviors of those adherents to the Woke ideology became more and more apparent.
And then October 7th happened. For me this just fully revealed the utter hypocrisy of Wokeism. I saw former friends, smart journalists and many other left leaning people shouting antisemitic rhetoric with no knowledge of what it meant. Accusing Israel of genocide, apartheid, colonialism. It was absolutely baffling, and deeply hurtful. Now I was unwanted on both the Left and the Right.
I still consider myself a classical liberal. Free speech is vital to a democracy. I’ll fight all day long for a Neo Nazi’s right to march wherever he wants, or for an ignorant, purple haired they/them to shout, “From the river to the sea,” but the Democrats today don’t reflect these values anymore. I’m open to conservative ideas and I find some value in some libertarian views, but the extremism I see from the GOP to me seems just as toxic and detrimental to democracy as the extremism on the Left. So, I’m left politically homeless, and as a Jew, pretty scared.
Sincerely,
Politically Homeless
Some letters have been edited for clarity and brevity. If you'd like to share your story, email us at iampoliticallyhomeless@gmail.com. All submissions will remain anonymous.
Politically Homeless And A Pretty Scared Jew