The Classic Date and Switch: Dating Outside of Your Political Views

In 2020, I found myself in a situation that I said I would never allow myself to be in—dating a person who could not be farther away from me when it came to our political views. This was something that meant a great deal to us both.

After getting six months into our relationship, this was a shock—to say the least. In such divided times, people might wonder how we ended up making it work. I’m not one to talk about myself so personally, but I feel like it could help other people who might have found themselves in a similar situation.

I know what you’re thinking—how did I not know my partners' political views for the first six months? The answer is simple. My boyfriend danced around it, and I straight up did not notice. To be clear, I’ve always identified as independent.

However, it was 2019 and I was fiercely against Donald Trump in particular. With that being said, people at the time would often place me in the liberal box. I didn’t mind that so much, as I didn’t necessarily find it insulting. What I did find insulting was the amount of praise and worship that certain people would give to our president at the time. Yet there I was, dating one of his biggest fans.

It came out on a rainy Tuesday date night, at a restaurant called Hot Pot. I had voiced my opinion on the political turmoil in our country many times prior to that night, but the guy I was dating would always just reply with a slight shrug and a smile; saying things like “Eh. It’s all a mess right now...” For the first six months, it was replies like this that put me under the impression that he saw where I was coming from.

On that night, however, he finally came clean. As I ranted and raved about whatever agitating Tweet or speech that Donald Trump had given that day, my boyfriend cut me off and said the unthinkable. As he poked around at the food on his plate he said, “I voted for him.”

I completely froze and just stared at him in shock. He then smiled and said, “and I’m gonna do it again.” I was absolutely gobsmacked, dumbfounded, and stupefied with confusion. I felt like I suddenly knew nothing about the person sitting across from me. It was almost as if we instantly had to redo every conversation that we had ever had—and that’s exactly what we did.

We revisited and unpacked every conversation from the past six months, only this time with completely unfiltered honesty. The more he shared his ideas and beliefs, the more floored and outraged I became. We had countless back and forth debates, sent each other every political post we could find throughout the day, and even started to compare our childhoods and the ways that we were raised.

Thankfully, doing all of this made two things abundantly clear. The first was that we were never going to fully agree with one another. The second was that we didn’t want this to hinder us from moving forward.

After weeks of heated exchanges, we finally put down our fists and just listened to each other. Learning the art of not interrupting proved very difficult for me. For him, it was learning to control his face when I spoke about my values and beliefs. In the end, we both had our own individual perspective shifts.

Eventually, we came to find that we actually had very similar politics, but what we disagreed on was the ways that things should be done. Nonetheless, the end goals for both of us were almost identical. It was only the execution that we did not see eye to eye on.

I think life served a very necessary lesson to him and me. At the end of the day, we decided that we cared for each other more than we cared for the debate. We even developed a sort of teasing sense of humor about it after a certain point. I know there are a lot of people out there who can be very dismissive of those that come from a different place politically—people who are the way that I used to be.

I think that if two hot-headed and monumentally stubborn guys can reach an understanding, then anyone else can do the same. It’s just a matter of being more open to one another's ideas and deciding what should really bother you.