People are ok with this. Now what?

I was a journalist before corporate media became primarily a tool of government appeasement. Back then, journalists had rules to follow. One of the rules: No one-sided stories. We had to try to get both sides of any issue.

If I dared to turn in a one-sided story, my editors would send it right back to me and demand I work harder to get the opponent’s view.

So my career was spent deliberately seeking out varying viewpoints. And that is how I approached my life. Although I have very strong political views, I have always made the effort to expose myself to other opinions. I want to see issues from every angle. I want to know what others think. I want to try to understand them and embrace that diversity of opinion critical to a functioning democracy.

Maybe not so much anymore, though. I can’t stomach what I see our government doing now. And I can’t embrace an opposite point of view that accepts what is happening.

A concentration camp in Florida? They’re good with that. Unidentified, masked men disappearing American citizens? No problem. Racial profiling? Yup.

They are not the least bit alarmed by any of the comparisons to Nazi Germany.

When I suggested those Facebook friends defriend me if they are okay with Alligator Auschwitz — a tent in the Everglades with steel cages and bunk beds that bears a too-close resemblance to camps in Nazi Germany — one of my so-called friends mocked me. Because even though I am gay and Jewish, he believed I was nevertheless overreacting to fascism and the police state that our government is building. Just like the one Hitler built.

The people who will be sent to the concentration camp in the Everglades without due process, some of whom are in this country legally, paying taxes and meeting obligations to remain here, will be placed in inhumane, torturous conditions. And if a hurricane hits, some of them may die.

Apparently, that Facebook friend is okay with all of this, as are so many Trump supporters. I recently stumbled upon an article from a science news website that tries to explain the Trump supporter’s brain. Apparently, MAGA is genetically wired to lack empathy and enjoy inflicting pain on others. Lovely.

Maybe that’s the way that Facebook friend thinks. Maybe he derives pleasure in seeing others hurt. Maybe he will be okay if they someday come after me.

So I defriended him.

I don’t want to shut myself off from diversity of opinion. But I honestly don’t know how to live and let live with people who are incapable of feeling empathy for others who are being treated in a manner that may very well be defined as torture.

How do you do it?