[hattmall]

How does having less friends actually benefit you though? It just seems dumb, because presumably you were friends for some reason.

I don't see how cutting them out creates a positive. It's like "Javy thinks men can become women", now I have one less person to play disc golf with.

What's the point of that? People can have different opinions, it's not their only character trait.

[petersellers]

I don't have friends for the sake of "having friends". I choose the people I want to hang out with because I enjoy their company and like/respect them. Being around them makes me happy.

Similarly, people I dislike (rude or mean people, for example) make me unhappy when I'm around them. Cutting them out of my life is a net benefit there too, because I'm happier without them.

[kerkeslager]

It seems to me that when some of your friends want to imprison, institutionalize, or straight-up murder some of your other friends, not taking a side and standing up for the latter group of friends is being a shitty friend.

And maybe "How does this benefit me?" isn't the right question to be asking in this situation.

"Moderates" always like to speak in vague terms as if it's not literal murder being proposed by one side. I literally know a guy who is accumulating firearms, has bumper stickers that say "kill your local pedophile", and thinks all trans people are pedophiles. This is not a person I am going to be friends with just because we play the same kind of guitar music.

[theshackleford]

> how does having less friends benefit you?

Quality over quantity for a start.

> people can have different opinions

Not every opinion deserves the same level of tolerance, respect or acceptance. If someone I know starts goose-stepping I’m not going to write it off a “just a difference in opinion.”

[kerkeslager]

The other comment I made here was flagged, though it very clearly doesn't have anything in violation of the rules. It's clear that people here are using flagging to try to censor opinions they don't like.