On political divisions & splitting the bill
Welcome to the fourth edition of ASK THE OVERTHINKER, a different kind of advice column. I’m your semi-solicited advice-giver, Eleanor Cummins, and this week I’m fielding questions about the greatest divides of our times: politics and the dinner bill. Have a question for The Overthinker? Share it anonymously here and it might be included in the next edition.
Dear Overthinker,
About a month ago I told a friend, who I’ll call Liv, I was driving to a city four hours away. She said she knew someone who needed a ride there and would I give her one. I’d met the woman once before and thought it would be nice to have company. The woman, “Marie,” had a set time she had to get there so we agreed to a schedule that left us an hour to stop for dinner along the way. She picked a Mexican restaurant she likes but the service was slow and when my carne asada arrived it was so burnt it was inedible. The server offered to make a new one but we had no time to wait for it. The server comped my meal and Marie paid for hers. We continued on our way. About 45 minutes later I dropped Marie at her destination.
Last week I ran into Liv who told me she couldn’t believe I’d been so rude to Marie! When I asked what she meant Liv said I hadn’t split the bill with Marie when I got my dinner for free. I said I didn’t get a dinner and why would I pay for Marie’s. She said Marie had told me she didn’t have much money (when she told me she couldn’t pay me for gas) and that I should have paid for half of her dinner. I walked away shaking my head but when I told a third friend about all of this expecting commiseration, she too thought I should have split the check! Am I missing something?
Sincerely,
Comped & Confused
I’ve been eagerly awaiting a scenario that backs me so far into a corner there’s nothing for me to say except, “These people suck, run away!” And here it is, served up on a platter, and only in the fourth issue! So allow me to say: These people suck, run away!
Setting aside your third friend — and the bill, for that matter — the real issue here is that you are being sucked into a classic Karpman drama triangle: Marie is the self-styled victim; Liv has happily accepted the role of rescuer; and they have offered you the bit part of persecutor. Refuse it.
Stephen B. Karpman, a physician, actor, and psychoanalyst, articulated this model of human behavior in 1968. In Karpman’s view, it describes a bad faith method (or “game”) people commonly use (or “play”) when they want to believe they are resolving conflict, but instead are creating or exacerbating it for their own unconscious ends. To convince themselves they have a right to be sad, spiteful, or otherwise brimming with resentments, a “victim” needs both a persecutor who has wronged them and a rescuer to affirm their worldview.
If you’ve been recruited into the role of persecutor, you probably loathe this narrative from the outset — Oh really, I’m the asshole? — but Karpman argued this, too, was part of the triangle, and precipitated another integral element of the drama: the role switch. When you feel you have been falsely assigned the position of persecutor, you may feel victimized, and seek a rescuer of your own. The current conflict becomes entrenched, and new dramas (like the one simmering between you and the friend you expected to console you) may emerge. If you’re not careful, the triangle becomes the container of your life.
The only way out is to refuse the inferiority (or superiority) that Marie’s drama demands: Stop taking the blame. Stop blaming. And stop carrying other people’s emotional baggage. What, exactly, does that look like for you? Shake off this split-bill nightmare, and proceed cautiously with these two: Marie is a dangerous casting director, and Liv is all too willing to read from her script. The situation may evolve, for worse or for better, but those developments won’t be the result of your attempts to make your case or smooth things over.
Dear Overthinker,
I realize this works both ways, but how do I interact with friends and family whose politics are in complete opposition to mine? I don’t argue well, I don’t think I can change their minds and don’t really want to try. It’s exhausting. But so is avoidance, which is what we’ve all resorted to. There seem to be fewer and fewer topics that don’t touch on what one of us views as something political.
Sincerely,
Stealth Mode
Fair warning: I’m going to go ahead and assume you’re left of center. If you’re not, do me a favor and write me a note explaining how you stumbled across my Google form!
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For the better part of a decade now, a very vocal subset of Americans have been talking about the urgent need for liberals to “disown” family members and friends who supported Trump in 2016, or 2020, or 2024. The logic for going scorched earth on one’s relations varies, but usually hinges on the mistaken assumptions that 1) the liberal in question is such a luminous figure in the lives of their conservative family or friend group their ultimatum will prompt those left behind to see reason, 2) that the liberal, in their infinite wisdom, has not only the capacity but the obligation to steer the moral development of those around them, and 3) that if the liberal sticks around, they will become “complicit” in some way in the transgressions of the now-ex-president.
Unfortunately, none of this really holds up to closer scrutiny. It’s hard to truly change another’s mind. The alternative — coercion — is ethically suspect. And the fear of contamination is probably unfounded: Unless your loved one is an active member of a hate group and/or cruelly wielding a position of great political power, I’m not sure there’s all that much to be “complicit” in, aside from some embarrassing Facebook posts. It’s easy to catastrophize — “My relative’s embarrassing Facebook posts will lead to X then to Y and then to the Hague!” — but life is lived in real time.
That’s not to say that people can’t cut ties with their disagreeable relatives. But a better way of thinking about maintaining (or fleeing) friendships across the political spectrum might be pleasure: Do you enjoy this person’s company, or not? If they aren’t denying your humanity, or actively spewing hate in your presence, maybe that’s enough. Alternatively, in the case of close family, it might be a metric of care: What do you owe this person, if anything? Even if they are denying your humanity, or actively spewing hate in your presence, you might still be obligated to help them. At no point should a superiority complex enter the equation — unless you want your conservative friend or family member to have a legitimate reason to break up with you.
When it comes to the specifics of your predicament, Stealth Mode, it seems like you have done as well as a person can to walk this fine line between profound frustration with the people in your life, and a deep commitment to keeping them there. If attempts to communicate about these issues have repeatedly failed you in the past, mutually agreeable avoidance is not a bad strategy. The problem, as you allude to here, is that current events are making it harder to put into practice, as the GOP churns out new wedge issues every day, and the pop “monoculture” has shattered seemingly beyond repair. All I can do is encourage you to keep going: Find a sport you and your family enjoy together, pick a TV franchise for your friends to stream each week (and gossip about in a group chat in between), take your mixed-MAGA circle to see the new Mission Impossible movie: The assholes will have really won when there is no joy left to be shared.
P.S. If you still feel drawn to the political fray, why not talk to other people’s disowned family members — by canvassing for your preferred candidates? Maybe they’ll return the favor and knock on your relative’s door.
A few more unsolicited suggestions:
Esther Perel helped to destigmatize therapy — but she recently told Vanity Fear she fears the proliferation “therapy-speak” is tearing us apart.
I enjoyed this perspective on the cognitive biases that make it feel like the world is undergoing some unprecedented moral decline.
Over at The Unpublishable, Jessica DeFino addresses a modern dilemma: How do you date while divesting from beauty culture?
Strong feelings about this week’s advice? Leave a comment below or find me @eleanorcummins.bsky.social.