I want to cut people out of my life…

I want to cut people out of my life. Does that sound bad? Does it make me a bad person? I struggle with this and not just on social media. I mean there are some people I just don’t want to be around anymore. I want to tell them “you’re a bad person and I don’t want you in my life”. I want them to know that they’re no longer worthy of being my friend, that that’ve reached such a low point that I want nothing to do with them. But I struggle with this, because it feels petty. Worse, it feels counter productive.

It Feels Petty

Petty because I want them to know. If someone is really toxic and you want them out of your life that’s one thing, but in this case I want them to know. I want to hurt them because I feel betrayed. I feel like they committed some unforgivable act by believing what they did and now I need to punish them. But did they?

If I force myself to pause and think about it I realize that each of them has a reason for believing what they do. I may or may not agree with the reason, but in their mind they are doing the right thing. None of them thinks of him or herself as evil. None of them is twirling their mustache in their secret lair and plotting to take over the world. So are they evil? Are they even wrong or misguided? And if I can rationally admit to myself that they aren’t evil, then why do I feel the need to punish them? Why do I feel the need to shame them for their stance?

It Feels Unproductive

Also, how productive would it be to cut them out of my life? On the one hand, they represent an opinion that I probably should expose myself occasionally, if only to understand it. Without understanding, there can be no reconciliation and isn’t that the goal? I force myself to read the news sites of view points which I disagree with, should I not force myself to hear the personal viewpoints of people I disagree with? I know the horrible nature of echo chambers and shouldn’t I resist putting myself into a self constructed version?

And if reconciliation is the goal for me, is it any different for them? If I rationally know that they don’t see themselves as evil people, can I rationally admit to myself that they probably want to reconcile as well? And if they do, should I not keep them around so as to expose them to my own views? What hope is there for them to ever see what I’m talking about if I cut them off and don’t let them hear me?

Easy For Me To Say

Or is that a position of privilege? It’s easy for me to preach tolerance, I’m male, married, Jewish, immigrant, solidly upper middle class, an executive in a large tech company. Neither side is coming after me or my rights. So it’s easy for me to preach “can’t we all just get along?” Am I tolerating the intolerable when I even dare to think of allowing opposing views into my personal life?

Can I Even Do This?

And honestly, am I emotionally capable of doing this? Yes, in theory it sounds nice to meet people with opposing views and it sounds nice to have reasonable discussions with them about the topics that plague our world but am I emotionally equipped to do that? Doesn’t seem like it from my own on and off Facebook experiences. But if this is true, should I not see this as a challenge to overcome instead of a boundary to adhere to?

Even worse, can I go back to the people I’ve already cut out and pull them back in? I can’t even imagine that. It feels dreadful. Like somehow I’d be admitting that I agree with them just by inviting them back into my life. It feels like an apology and I want to rage that “I DID NOTHING WRONG!” But maybe I did. I was the one who cut them out. I was the one who said “go away!” so maybe this is my atonement. Assuming I can stomach it.

TL;DR

In the end, I feel like I should try to grow emotionally and personally. I think it would be better for me, for the people around me and for society if I tolerated people with different opinions in my virtual and personal life. It feels like it’s the wrong move for me to cut people off just because I want to punish them for holding opinions I find wrong.

But I still want to.