i’m a woman and met a guy in the wild (so no idea about his basic preferences/views) and we’ve been on a few dates so far. Something that was incompatible with my Ex, was that his family held different political views than me and a few of his siblings were openly prejudiced against my religion and were anti-mask (totally respect their reasons for it, but its not compatible with my profession and my older family members quite at risk/vulnerable) and a bit homophobic. It did cause issues between us during the crux of covid. This new guy shares my religion which I am excited about! However, should I be concerned and/or call off a new budding relationship because of things rearing its head now that seem similar?
For background, I am in healthcare and my focus is on social justice
\-He said a word that’s outdated during conversation, considered derogatory for people with disabilities, and when I asked him not to repeat it (which perhaps was harsh and made him defensive) he said he won’t not say it as he talked about importance of free speech given his family refugee background and how he doesn’t ascribe to pc culture, and that normally he wouldn’t connect with someone with my beliefs but likes how I actually care about people so he thinks i’m different than most pc people and he admires me
\- He really respects and admires an older brother of his who I’ve seen has written online about the need to remove fear of upsetting feelings, or furthering marginalization, from educational settings.
\-His sister writes and takes extra efforts to research and advocate for reasons for stopping masking (again, totally valid but not compatible with my personal beliefs and professional needs)
\-He himself moved cities temporarily during crux of covid to avoid restrictions. ALTHOUGH this makes sense as a single man without medical concerns / or a partner in medicine
\-He thinks focus on ‘underserved’ students is overdone
\-He isn’t a marathon texter, whereas I could talk nonstop to people i like. he’s trying with at least a few texts a day though.
\-I find him super cool and interesting. But all my Ex’s and I had major passions in music and were musicians on the side themselves, and I’ve fallen enamored with their performances and creative endeavors, whereas he’s not into music much. I also usually had similarities in personal struggles/vulnerabilities, family illness, being very emotional etc and so far nothing has emerged like that here.
On one hand, his beliefs come from a more refugee background (compatible with my own culture) so is different than the American conservatism of my ex’s family that felt very foreign to me. But i am concerned same problems will emerge, and that I wouldn’t get along with his siblings either.
He thinks our differences will help us learn from each other and are a good thing. Me TOO. I think we are also compatible in the sense of the way he acts romantic/traditional dynamic on dates I like. he does things romantically and touch-wise i never thought i’d experience again after my ex. But.. would it be dumb to pursue anything serious here?
he is extremely successful and intelligent. and our conversations in person are very interesting and fun!
i don’t know if i’m just looking for flaws bc my relationship with ex was for 7 years and became abusive. just bc this guy has opposite beliefs, he seems quite cool headed and i don’t think he’d yell at me like my ex did, so why should it matter that he’s not a musical talent like my ex? and after what i’ve been through, shouldn’t i prioritize how he treats me versus how he views the world?
end of date he told me he appreciated the risks i took for the date since he could tell i would have wanted to mask up indoors, he brought me on train to reorient me to use it to meet him in future after i haven’t been on one for a while, and he’s the first guy i’ve kissed since breakups. he told me everything will be okay, and idk i just melted at this reassurance
19 comments
I’m guessing he said the “r” word and that’s a no from me. Not cool, not ok, not used by mature people in 2023.
If it bugs you now and he’s not willing to refrain from using slurs in your presence it’s going to continue to be an issue, in my opinion. This is likely the tip of a very unattractive iceberg.
Edit: also he doesn’t want to learn from you. He wants you to learn from him. Trust me.
You can’t know. There’s no right or wrong answer, it’s a judgement call
If you think it’s an incompatibility that YOU, not us, but YOU, think is too much for a long term relationship then you have to make the choice. And what I mean by this is that if stayed with him and 10 years from now he uses the word again and is unapologetic about it…could you live with that?
Only you can answer that. Either it’s too much that you don’t want to deal with it or you can overlook it because he has other qualities
I’m a little confused as to how it’s made it this far with a laundry list of problems this long.
A lot of this stuff is really a matter of what you care about and how much you need your partner to share similar views. It really sounds like that’s highly important in your case so I don’t really see this ending well – especially because my view of US (?) politics is such that your social group is going to be largely left-wing and bringing someone who’s seemingly right-wing into the folds is going to cause issues.
I know the whole MBTI thing is frowned upon in this subreddit but this reminds about how a lot of my ENTP/INFJ relationships tend to start out. A lot of mutual interest and respect but over time (usually as friends or light dating) the constant discourse can become a source of discontent – moreso on their side because I tend to remain somewhat emotionally disconnected from the viewpoint (it’s a thought experiment, not an emotional experience for me).
All that said. A lot of this political stuff wouldn’t bother me as long as you’re not heavily active for something I truly don’t believe in. My ex-wife was against same-sex marriage (felt it shouldn’t be called marriage) which I didn’t agree with.. but in the grand scheme of things it never really caused any issues. Always thought it was strange but eh, we discussed it once, it was an interesting discussion, and never really discussed it again.
TLDR: I don’t think a lot of this stuff necessarily has to cause issues.. but it seems like a reasonable part of your identity is wrapped up in social issues/justice so I don’t see this going well.
Only you know whether you’ll be able to tolerate the differences in views expressed in the first 5 bullets. It’s definitely possible to have different beliefs inside a successful relationship — it really comes down to how you communicate about them and whether you can respect your partner and their beliefs.
When people make posts like this, I feel like it’s often been because their gut is telling them to end things and they want to ignore that feeling. I’m not saying that’s where you’re at — but think about whether you have to make yourself smaller or contradict your own values and beliefs to stay in the relationship. That would be a red flag *on you* to reassess how you’re thinking about this, and why you’re staying.
You’re in healthcare and this guy is who you are dating? The guy who moved to avoid Covid restrictions, who calls mentally disabled people retards? Really? No, carry on, I’m absolutely sure you won’t be repeatedly humiliated by him in social settings. 😒
Anyone that cites free speech when trying to justify using slurs has a high probability of being a jerk.
Move on – you can do better.
You said all of this a few months ago , thought you would have settled it by now 🤪
When he says he thinks you can learn from each other, do you see any evidence of him truly learning or wanting to learn from you? Or is he mainly wanting you to be open-minded and change your beliefs to match his?
I knew a couple like this where one day she realized she was listening to all of his music and reading all of the books and articles he’d recommend, and she suddenly had the realization that he had never taken any of the recommendations she gave him. (That was the final straw for her to break up with him.)
Your reasons are your own and it’s fine. My last girl and I parted amicably when we realized she was a socialist and I would never be. Still think she’s a good woman at heart, even if she loves meddling with other people.
These are the definitions of red flags. Things that come up early but appear minor so you push through, then they build over time and become unacceptable, but by then you’re in too deep emotionally. It doesn’t sound like you will be compatible long term.
Ditch him. You’re so much better than him.
Some of this you’re attributing beliefs of family members to him, which I don’t think is fair. Me and my family have varying degrees of political/social beliefs from both sides of the spectrum. Now if his own beliefs are different than yours so greatly, than that is a concern.
I don’t think having differences is necessarily a dealbreaker, as long as both people can be respectful towards each other. I do think when someone calmly identifies they have issues with certain things and requests that they modify their behavior moving forward (such as the r word situation) and the other person is not empathic or open to listen or have a meaningful conversation, then that is a dealbreaker. I’m not sure how the conversation regarding your issue happened, but it doesn’t sound like it was a productive conversation at all.
The communication styles not in person again could be a dealbreaker for some. My bf does not text as much as my exes and made me nervous at first. However, in person it’s clear he cares and loves me. So while I’m not getting as much texting, I’m building a better in person connection than I have previously and it balanced out the need for texting for me. It was a good compromise, as we’ve been together 9 months and I could not be happier. If your issue was only the text communication – I’d say see if you could come up with a compromise.
Yeah, that’s be a hard no for me; I work in healthcare and cannot tolerate people who don’t understand or will not accept COVID guidelines. I understand people have different beliefs, but I cannot get emotionally invested with someone who will not do the bare minimum to protect vulnerable people – it’s just selfish to me. Yeah, I’m young and healthy and am not concerned about ME getting Covid- but it’s not about me, it’s about the DROVEs of people who died and the many more who could have had we not taken such drastic measures to slow the spread.
With that said- only you know what’s acceptable for you.
Seems a solid list of things you don’t care for about him that (IMO) are going to rub you the wrong way time and again unless he suddenly thinks differently.
I’d probably bristle immediately at the notion of you being “not like other PC people and actually caring”, because that reads like a mischaracterization that absolutely is coming from some shitty sources and god knows what other nonsense he takes seriously from those sources.
If this was date one, and all these things are already coming up? I’d walk.
If I already really liked the person for a lot of other reasons and was just now noticing that stuff, I’d probably want to talk about it and see if I’m maybe misreading their opinions and way of navigating the world.
Ask yourself: Do you REALLY want to be with the kind of person who says the R word for “freedom?” Sure, we CAN all say it.. but people who choose to say it are ignorant, assholes, or ignorant assholes.
It is your choice – I wouldn’t be alright with it because these aren’t political differences to me, but moral differences. I don’t mind dating someone with different views on some things, but I want someone who matches with me morally as my morals I have spent a lot of time thinking about and they are very important to me. Also, I’m not going to “learn from” someone around what I view as shitty morals. That would only work if I didn’t already have strong reasons for my morals, and I do.
Also, I view quite a few of the things you mentioned around him relating to selfishness. I wouldn’t want to date a partner I viewed as selfish. I want to be able to look at my partner and view them as a caring and thoughtful person not just to me, but to others around them.
he’s not very good. perhaps the best you’ve met in awhile but everything about him is not what you stand for.
the bullet for less opportunity to underserved students was a massive, massive negative flag to me. i was actually very surprised you bothered to talk to him after that.
there’s a lot of money to be spent and shared in every city, i can’t imagine repurposing any *educational* resource from a underserved community.
we all know knowledge is power and education is expensive. there’s some things you can advocate improve, we want the kids to thrive. some things should *never* be taken away.
This is a really tough one, but I think that the incompatibility would be one of the reasons you’re going to end up breaking up. This issues are extremely important to you and if they are it makes sense that you’ll be bothered by them. Anything derogatory towards people with disabilities is a red flag in my opinion. But it is up to you to decide.
Being a refugee doesn’t give you a pass to be an a**hole. You don’t get to call people name an you don’t get to be anti-vax and anti-mask just because you had to come to a country under tragic circumstances, and I feel like you’re almost defending his position on that. Man is a jerk and it doesn’t matter how funny or charming he is otherwise.