Newly minted centrist or conservative hotline

If you need someone to talk to... I won't even charge $1.99 a minute!

Recently a friend told me that a friend of his had become very upset to learn that he (my friend) was reading an author with whom his friend disagreed. My friend, let’s call him X, had mentioned in conversation that he had read an author’s book. His friend, let’s call him Y, freaked out. Y had never read the author’s book, but had read her articles, and felt very threatened by them. So Y was upset that X had even read said author’s book.

Note: X did not say that he agreed with the author’s viewpoint. Only that he had read her book.

Y broke off contact with X for a period of time. X was distraught. He had only said that he was reading a book. Is that so bad?

Something similar happened to me. About two years ago I said to an old friend that I was reading Bari Weiss. The friend was shocked, even horrified that I would read Weiss. “Don’t believe anything she says about antisemitism!” my friend nearly screeched. This was before October 7. Since then, this friend has become a pro-Palestinian “As a Jew.” I said that I would read Bari’s book with a critical eye and that I was happy to read any articles he might send me. No articles were forthcoming.

This behavior seems to be a feature of cancel culture. If you think you don’t like someone or something, you should not engage with them critically. Rather, you should boycott them and demand that no one else even read their work. It’s been going on for quite some time now. None of us should have been surprised when various figures in the liberal media were suggesting that family members cut off contact with family members who voted for Trump.

In the time when all this has been going on, when people have moved into smaller and smaller enclaves of those with whom they agree, my world got bigger. If I remember the chronology:

1. My ex and my good friend introduce me to The Free Press at the same time. I start reading it.

2. I meet Mark Judge and read his book. We become friends, thinking that we are on opposite sides, and find that we have more in common than not.

3. October 7 happens and a lot of liberal and progressive people I know either turn against Israel and Jewish people who won’t denounce Israel, or don’t care.

4. I start to read Tablet.

5. I published I Stand With My Jewish friends, and suddenly have Jewish friends all over the world.

6. I read Gadi Taub’s Sorry, But There Is No Two State Solution. I link to it on Facebook and am attacked by people who used to be friends.

7. My Jewish friends in the US are to the left of me. I get closer to my friends in Israel.

8. Mark helps me publish in more places.

9. It’s all a blur, but I find myself writing for the conservative press, with a bunch of nice people who don’t freak out when I make an off color remark who become my friends.

10. The next part isn’t history yet.

So in the time when people were closing into smaller circles, my world got bigger. All by engaging in dialogue with people with whom I might not agree on everything, but we agree on some big things.

Now I have all of you as my worldwide family. We have political differences. We do not need to agree on everything to be friends and support each other. From childless cat ladies to Jewish mothers to conservative journalists to who knows who else you are, we can engage without silencing disagreement.

I have friends who are pro-Palestinian activists. I think they are misguided and might benefit from a tour of a country run by radical Islamists, but we are still friends.

People keep coming out to me as everything from centrist to conservative. You’d think we were coming out as gay in the days when it was dangerous to do so (I understand that it still is in some places.)

A friend told me recently that he can’t talk about these things with anyone but me.

All: If you need to talk, I’m here. I’ll send you my number. I won’t even charge you my usual rate!