General election 2019: Are politics dividing your relationships?

And now we have more platforms than ever before to voice our opinions on. Because while in the pre-digital age, a drunken argument at the pub about opposing political views would have been the end of the discussion, the sobriety and permanence of social media means we keep reading and re-reading comments, plus anyone else can chime in and inflame the situation at any point. Political statements on social media platforms ramped up significantly post-Brexit.

Anna Frankowska, originally from Poland, saw this play out first-hand on her social media feed. Although disappointed by the referendum outcome, she was more disappointed by her former colleague and close friend Martha’s* thoughts. “We got on really well socialising a lot when we worked as investment bankers together, but politics never came up,” Anna says. “It was only after the Brexit vote when she started posting things aboutthat I became concerned. I couldn’t help feeling hurt.

And in the three years since, political venting has continued apace. That fact in itself is significant – we shouldn’t underestimate the role that frequency has in all this digital political antagonism. Since 2015, in the UK we’ve had two general elections, local elections, a referendum, two new PMs and now another general election with two polarised leaders. It’s no wonder we’re feeling fractious and need to vent about the state of the world.

So when we’re debating online – with an added level of separation from the person we’re engaging with – a healthy respect for the ‘other side’ and their perspective is in very short supply. Instead, “There’s this prevailing narrative of paranoia of each other,” says Bergamini. When we see biased newspaper headlines and political extremes, we’ve been primed to be on the defensive immediately – and thus it feels like such a trigger when a friend posts saying, ‘I don’t agree with your views at all.

“I left a pretty moderate comment on something my uncle posted on Facebook in praise of Boris Johnson last week. One of my friends saw it and launched into this aggressive tirade against my uncle, having never met him,” says Hannah Evans*, 26, a teacher from London. “I don’t share his political views, but he’s a lovely man and it was mortifying to watch.” Social media algorithms also help to make our beliefs even more entrenched.

“In the past, you used to have to be incredibly dedicated to a party to outwardly show your allegiance to them, wearing a rosette or a sticker. Now it’s as easy as adding a filter to your profile picture”

Hope not.

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