I had the opportunity to overhear the open private feelings of a Christian religious conservative man in the Seattle area

He was not aware I could hear him

It was very disturbing to me but not for reasons you might expect

I felt very sad for him

He was confused and frightened by the zeitgeist and afraid for his children to the point where he is planning to uproot his whole family to move to a more conservative area

Away from the place where his family has lived for generations

He was willing to take a significant pay cut and uproot his whole family’s lives to make this happen. That’s how afraid he felt.

He had some not so great things to say about trans and gay people too but it was in relation to what his children were being taught in school and in line with his religious beliefs

I don’t agree with his beliefs at all but it still makes me sad that he’s feeling so much fear

As someone who’s experienced generalized fear and anxiety simply for being who I am, I don’t want anyone to have to feel that way

And it was an interesting lens into the internal life of someone very different from me

I felt bad for him

I don’t have a point except that I wish we could collectively work on solutions to ensure that no one has to feel afraid or ostracized for their way of life or their beliefs

This is an important part of the value system that’s allowed me to live my life true to who I am

Why can’t we all just get along

Think of the children

Delighting in the suffering of your enemies is not an ideal anyone should aspire to

Even when evangelicals have been jerks to me I want them not to be jerks—not for them to suffer

Live by the sword and die by the sword and all that

I want a safe and happy world for everyone

I watched that video of the cops shooting that guy in the back in Atlanta and it was appalling. He was just taking a nap in his car and they harassed him and then shot him when he ran.

I heard about those cops who were served bleach in their shakes and it was appalling.

I don’t want hurting and oppressing our enemies to be a norm

This sucks

I don’t want any Americans to BE our enemies

How to get people to stop hating people different from them is probably the question I’m most interested in

Or at least not to seek to harm them

Because this protects ME and this protects YOU

We need to solve this problem