News Health: Broken Relationships

Happy Sunday,

“A hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but he who is slow to anger quiets contention.”

Proverbs 15:18

Have you had a relationship damaged by the news?

Prior to my cannonball into the 24/7 news cycle (read that story here), I was almost annoyingly unflappable; I rarely got angry or anxious, even when I was woken in the middle of the night to deal with a fraternity brother’s self-inflicted problems. 

Post-cannonball, it wasn’t just strangers on the internet that I was labeling as stupid and ignorant… it was friends, classmates, and family. I ruined an otherwise fun evening by getting into a heated argument with a friend of a friend over gun ownership (even though neither of us owned a gun) and had a similarly joy-killing argument with someone over potential legislation in a state that neither of us lived in. 

You know, important stuff.

If you haven’t personally felt the news making you angry, anxious, and judgmental, you’ve watched it happen to someone near to you. A January 2017 Reuters/Ipsos poll reported that one in six Americans had “stopped talking to a family member or close friend” because of the 2016 presidential election. And America hasn’t exactly been the picture of reconciliation since then. (There was that brief moment in March 2020 when the country came together to mourn the certain death of Tom Hanks after learning he had COVID-19… But Sheriff Woody recovered, and the country turned to fighting over masks, vaccines, and social distancing.) 

Since the pandemic, we have found new things to divide over. 

This sounds weird, but I’d like to hear what those things are in your life. If you’re willing to share with a guy on the internet, will you hit reply and tell me about a relationship you’ve had broken by the news/politics? What was it about? How did it happen? How are things now?

I will read them all and reply to as many as I can. 

Thanks in advance for sharing,

Jason

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