No more Trump talk at dinner

I felt so much relief watching the presidential inauguration.

There are numerous reasons to finally exhale that I share with many others related to ensuring democracy in our country. 

One of my reasons for this relief though is purely selfish: no more talking about Trump at meal time.

At least in my circles of left-leaning friends and acquaintances, bashing Trump has become a ritual in casual conversation. Unlike other small talk staples though, I found many conversations have been lost to people trying to outdo each other by sharing the latest outrageous Trump tweet. Even when COVID-19 came, we just shifted to commiserating over Trump’s lack of leadership around fighting the pandemic. 

I regret how many hours have been wasted over the last four years talking about Trump in our precious, limited personal time with one another. 

Trump talk took time from sharing about how we view other political matters, what challenges we’re going through, and who we are as individuals.

Now that we don’t have to talk about Trump, we can...

Probe other political matters. Many people conflate talking about Trump with talking about “politics.” Trump has a lot of power, but we gave him way more power than he actually has and he distracted us from discussing the underlying social and economic issues that existed well before he became president. A few years ago, I started to request “no talking about Trump” at social gatherings I hosted. At one dinner, the guests ended up talking about their different experiences advocating for environmental justice for two hours without using the T-word once. I learned so much about climate change, more than I ever would have if I had just heard complaints about Trump’s views on the issue.

Hear others’ personal challenges. One of the great casualties of the Trump presidency are divisions among family members and friends who voted differently. I heard many of my Progressive friends brag about how they stopped talking to their loved ones who voted for Trump. In trying to convince the Trump voters of how they were wrong, there was no space for discussion. When I talked to those in my life who voted for Trump about their reasons why, I heard, “I’ve been working so hard to save and I feel like I’m barely making it as a small business owner” or, in the case of many in the Vietnamese refugee community I belong to, “I fled a communist country and I’m afraid of our country is becoming socialist.” By focusing on Trump, we didn’t leave any time to try to understand where other people were coming from.

Share our own stories. Talking about Trump is an effective way to avoid talking about ourselves, which can feel hard especially among strangers. The first time I proposed the “no Trump talk” was at a week-long retreat for a dozen women, most of whom didn’t know each other. After two nights of competing to share the most outrageous Trump news, I made a request that we not talk about Trump so that we could instead learn about each other. At first there was silence. Then some nods. They agreed. And we ended up laughing, crying, and feeling inspired by the personal stories we shared. We didn’t give Trump any more space at our dinner table or in our retreat.

It wasn’t always easy for me to make the “no Trump talk” request, especially when I was a guest, not the host. There were many events where I silently sat and resented the lost opportunity to connect. I can’t say that Trump took that away from me. Those around me readily gave their...our...time to him. 

Although I am relieved we don’t have Trump or his Twitter account as a default subject of small talk anymore, I do worry people will rush to find another common enemy to bond over. 

President Biden has talked about the need to heal our nation. Now with our reclaimed time, I hope that healing includes rediscovering how to fill our personal conversations with news, opinions, and stories from our own lives.