Maybe, Just Maybe, Objective Reasoning is More Common than Previously Thought

I have been blessed with a large range of friends. On my Facebook page, I have friends who are Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, and even those who do not care about politics at all. I also have contacts with an assortment of religious beliefs, and friends from at least 20 different countries. Suffice to say, I often get to see arguments from different sides of the political/cultural/religious spectrum. Usually, my conservative friends only post links to conservative websites, and my liberal friends post links to more progressive articles, my atheist friends only share anti-religion ideas, and the religious friends fervently promote their religious beliefs. I feel that the major benefit of this is that I can legitimately see various arguments from different angles, and rationally evaluate which side makes the most sense.

Some of my conservative friends have surprised me though. Within the last 24 hours, three people who I never would have foreseen sharing anything that was not strictly conservative share some progressive links on the Facebook feeds. The first one was an older gentleman who shared a video from Bernie Sanders' Facebook page, expressing how health care in the United States is in shambles due to the free market health system. Although this man is definitely a conservative in his beliefs, I know he volunteers a lot of time working with poorer people, so this is one issue where it would make sense for him to change his stance a bit.

The second example can a few minutes after the first one, when an older white woman who consistently posts Republican ideas posted a link about a Black couple who were killed in one of the Carolina states, and how the police were trying to track down who the killers were. In my experience, Tragedies like this are usually addressed by the Democratic community and the Right usually either completely ignores it or starts to accuse the victims of wrongdoing without any evidence to back it up.

After these two posts, I was starting to get a small glimmer of hope for rationalization. The third one floored me. An avid Trump supporter posted a link to Snopes. Now, I have always appreciated Snopes, because they really do not take sides. They take gossip talked about both Democrats and Republicans, and then break down which parts are true and which parts are false. It didn't matter is the rumor was about Obama or George Bush, they would be fairly evenhanded about their evaluation process. But I know that a lot of conservatives label Snopes as being left-wing propaganda. So it surprised me when this Trump supporter posted a Snopes article about what Trump has truly accomplished and about what he has not accomplished. This article took all of the claims that Trump supporters have made about what Donald Trump has accomplished, and reports on how accurate these claims are. This was not a blind Trump supporting article, but simultaneously it did not unnecessarily bash him either.

I realize that these are just a small percentage of people on my Facebook, but it is encouraging to see people who are not simply following the script handed to them from their cultural or political or religious groups, but are instead thinking about and promoting what they feel is right. I see so many people blindly sharing information without considering if it makes sense or not before they click the share button, simply because the information sounds interesting or it is promoted by their political party. However, yesterday's Facebook feed shows promise of people being willing to step outside of their bubble and objectively consider ideas that are different.