My folks are chill. My mom and her friends are passionately cool. My dad DGAF. He’s cool, but he’s also a charter boat captain which means lots of sportsmen so he has to be able to ignore/get along with anyone. He just gives a noncommittal grunt and steers the conversation back to fishing.

My father in law is okay. Ex cop so opposite of ACAB. Spouts Fox News bullshit, but he sat out the last election because he has like 8 granddaughters and at least one gay grandson. He’s a good guy as long as you don’t talk about anything political. He accepted my kid when they identified as trans for a bit. (Jury’s still out. Don’t care, they just don’t seem committed to anything right now.)

His brothers, though, what fucking assholes. I have to tolerate them for my wife’s sake because she can’t deal with family strife but I actually had to sit in a public restaurant with one of them making buck teeth and shouting “Ching Chang Chong” when saying something insulting about Asians, then “oh but now I’m racist.” Right you are, motherfucker. Disgusting. Humiliating.

My ability to even mildly rebuke them is limited by my need to keep the peace for my wife. But if I could I’d just tell them to let me know when they are done acting that way, and I’d get a drink at the bar.

IIRC, the Americans with Disabilities Act was a product of protest. People across the country one day blocked buses and intersections, and now we have curb cuts, automatic buttons at doors, handle bars in public shitters, etc. (any corrections welcome, it was a podcast I listened to 2 years ago, I’m not American)

I wonder if your 80 nana benefits from any of those on a regular basis?

“When will there be straight pride month?”

No.

My parents, yes absolutely. They are responsible for me growing up to be a tolerant, left-leaning person in a mostly conservative rural area. Being boomers, they might not be up to date with all the current LGBT terms or things like that, but they definitely have/had an open mind and don’t judge people.

My paternal grandparents (born in the 1910s and 1920s) were very religious. My dad had to suffer a very strict upbringing under them. He was not allowed to read comics, watch TV, read sci-fi novels etc (though he did all of these things in secret). I only knew them as a child when they were already in their 80s and they were nice to me, but from what I’ve heard from my dad not necessarily nice people, and definitely not tolerant.

My maternal grandma (never knew my grandpa) rarely ever talked about politics or society or anything. She was a very down-to-earth person. That said, she definitely held some bigoted views in the form of prejudice against foreigners. She had major reservations when some Turkish people moved in next door. She eventually became friends with them though, so she managed to overcome her prejudice. I’d say she was a nice person.

My dad ain’t nice but he can be tolerant, my mum can be nice but her extremely narrow worldview does not let her be tolerant, and my grandma is neither nice nor tolerant. Never met really met my other grandparents to comment.

They never challenged their conservative upbringing, and never faced progressive values until well into their adulthood, since social issues move at a glacial pace where I’m at. I don’t blame them for having those values at some point, but they should strive to change (well, my parents at least).

My parents are still very Mormon, which means being openly bigoted is bad manners. That said, I don’t think I ever visit without my dad saying something about climate change being a hoax, illegals voting in California, wildfires being part of some AntiFa conspiracy, etc. Can’t tell whether he sincerely believes this nonsense or is just trying to get a reaction. I try not to engage other than asking where he learned about it and how he’s tried to fact check it. These discussions are not productive, and I don’t visit unless it’s a major holiday or someone’s birthday.

Can I ask why you can’t let them talk their nonsense? I know you don’t think you can change them so if you choose to hang out with them, why can’t you just let them be them? I’m not telling you that you should hang out with them, just that joining in on their discussion is a zero sum game.

I chose not to interact with family any longer and haven’t spoken to any of them in years. Not out of anger or spite but simply because none of us were getting anything positive from the relationship.

Yepp, pretty typical. I have family that calls themselves progressive and say similar shit to yours.

I pretty much resorted to considering them all dead.

It’s pretty funny when they wonder why I don’t come around anymore. “It’s because of you, you bigoted racist piece of garbage fuck.”

Check out Christian Welzel’s work on how values have changed over time. The world is becoming more secular and more democratic. Secular in this context means that religion plays less and less of a role in every day life. Democratic in this context means that they believe everyone should be able to pursue their interests and we should have a system that increases all of our capabilities to pursue our interests.

An implication of adopting democratic values is that you understand that your identity is not defined by “white”, “able-bodied”, or whatever, but by the fact that we are aware. By doing this, you’re not giving special treatment to your in-group (whichever it may be), but you’re considering all of humanity (and all aware beings) as equals and as a group that you belong to. Cosmopolitanism is an example of this stance.

Something else that is happening is that the world is becoming more reflexive. Check out Anthony Giddens’ texts on this.

But, to answer your question directly, yes, grandparents and parents are generally less welcoming and less tolerant.

Mom is cool, super accepting. My dad is a weirdo trumper. My MIL is also accepting of many but is a bit racist and not yet accepting of trans folks.

All the grands were worse. The surviving one isn’t overtly so but is passive aggressive about it, so better than my dad at least.

My dad couldn’t be cooler. My grandmother and all her friends are very chill too. My grandfather is sometimes grumpy and weird about stuff, but shuts up or changes his mind about it pretty quickly. My mother, and probably that whole part of the family, is pretty conservative-right. Not very nice.

Mom, yes. Dad, no.

Dad’s a bigot that doesn’t understand why he can’t use “those kind of words” these days so he rants about it in private.

HOWEVER…he would never say it to their face, he’s at least THAT self-aware. And for the most part, he wouldn’t hassle them (or anyone).

While his personal beliefs are most certainly bigoted. He’s anti-LGBTQ+, anti-indigenous (we’re in Canada), anti-immigrant (he himself IS a fucking immigrant…smh)

But his biggest trait is simply live and let live. He doesn’t agree with them, but he has no interest in forcing that disagreement upon them.

He basically believes in everyone minding their own damn business regardless of what they may personally believe.

None of them are obviously bigoted but all of them are complacent at the very least and some of them are certainly internally bigoted and it seeps out

My Grandad is quite progressive. My Dad on the other hand is. Not. Most of that side of the family is quite progressive.

My mothers side is a mixed bag Mum is progressive, omi definitely isn’t and the aunts and uncles are all over the spectrum.

I think we all have some things that we either don’t talk about to maintain relationships. Of course usually thats respected by both sides.

Do they care that you call them out? Do you dislike doing it? If neither happens it can be useful for people to realize they’re not necessarily holding a position that “everyone does”. It’s useful to be taken out of your bubble I think, and to see “regular people” can have different positions, and maybe try and understand why they do. It might change someone’s mind.

If course if they or you get worked up by the discussion and no one is getting anything out of it, no one is even ‘agree to disagree’ and it’s just causing everyone stress… Then you need to clearly lay out that you don’t like those sorts of comments.

If they ignore you, then you need to decide how much you want the relationship. You could say “I’m serious about these comments. If you don’t want to stop then you need to decide how much you want to see or interact with me. Because I am willing to just avoid these discussions, but I will not keep hearing these comments, and will stop coming.”