jupiterswoon
Permanent Fixture
- MBTI
- ISFP
- Enneagram
- 3
My boyfriend loves posting political essays on facebook. Normally I am completely supportive because I love how passionate he is about politics, it's a big part of his history and identity and I think he has a lot of good points. However, he was particularly inspired by a Rolling Stone reporter who uses very colorful and flowery language. The problem is that whenever he posts these essays he has written it tends to alienate people that we are both friends with.
There are three main problems.
1) Although he spends a lot of time researching this and creating his arguments, he does not include any factual evidence- no statistics, no links, nothing to corroborate what he writes about. This is unfortunate because I know that he wants to be taken seriously, but it gives his pieces an air of standing on a soapbox.
2)He writes these hoping for discussion, but since he doesn't provide a thesis and antithesis, and doesn't have factual claims people can really only argue against the premise. He spends hours cultivating his logic for these pieces, and he ends up sniping all people who participate and actually disagree with his statements. This ends up alienating the people who do oblige to engage in a debate.
3) When I tried to bring this up to him and offer advice for improving his essays, in my hopes of not losing friends and helping him to reach a broader audience, he freaked out, deleted my comment, and sent me an email saying that if I'm not knowledgeable then I shouldn't even participate. I talk about politics with him for hours on end. I felt completely dismissed. And it hurt doubly so, because when he gives me advice or criticism I always try to take it seriously. Instead, he said that I don't know what I'm talking about and that he doesn't want to write an academic paper. I know that these essays are alienating some of our friends, and I am concerned that people will take him less seriously. He is really dedicated to this and it hurts me to see him being not taken seriously.
I think what hurt most was that he didn't respond to what I actually said, and instead picked apart all of my logic into little tidbits, totally dismissing the rest of what I said. I rarely criticize him, but this is something that is very important to me.
Is there any way that I can make him see my perspective. It feels like talking to a barricade.
There are three main problems.
1) Although he spends a lot of time researching this and creating his arguments, he does not include any factual evidence- no statistics, no links, nothing to corroborate what he writes about. This is unfortunate because I know that he wants to be taken seriously, but it gives his pieces an air of standing on a soapbox.
2)He writes these hoping for discussion, but since he doesn't provide a thesis and antithesis, and doesn't have factual claims people can really only argue against the premise. He spends hours cultivating his logic for these pieces, and he ends up sniping all people who participate and actually disagree with his statements. This ends up alienating the people who do oblige to engage in a debate.
3) When I tried to bring this up to him and offer advice for improving his essays, in my hopes of not losing friends and helping him to reach a broader audience, he freaked out, deleted my comment, and sent me an email saying that if I'm not knowledgeable then I shouldn't even participate. I talk about politics with him for hours on end. I felt completely dismissed. And it hurt doubly so, because when he gives me advice or criticism I always try to take it seriously. Instead, he said that I don't know what I'm talking about and that he doesn't want to write an academic paper. I know that these essays are alienating some of our friends, and I am concerned that people will take him less seriously. He is really dedicated to this and it hurts me to see him being not taken seriously.
I think what hurt most was that he didn't respond to what I actually said, and instead picked apart all of my logic into little tidbits, totally dismissing the rest of what I said. I rarely criticize him, but this is something that is very important to me.
Is there any way that I can make him see my perspective. It feels like talking to a barricade.