Can you elaborate on when you said "it's entirely possible for a progressive to befriend a conservative"? Because most of the conservatives i know are either ignorantly complicit or actively hateful participants in the opression of minorities or they think capitalism is sooo good and love billionaires. Or, commonly, believe both. Like i get that you can befriend people with whilst having different political opinions (bcz some political takes are like whether you think this type of energy is more effective than that type or what a city's local government should spend money when the options are different things that all help the city in different ways) but alot of the time politics and morals overlap and i think the differences between progressive and conservative political takes are often moral differences. And like idk but considering how vast those moral differences are I don't understand how you'd have such an opinion unless your definitions of progressive and conservative are heavily different from mine or you believe people can be genuinely good friends while disagreeing on some pretty major moral issues.
So there is this lady in the apartment across the way. She's mormon, moderately conservative you might say. She knows I'm trans, she's never given me shit about it. I don't actually know what she thinks of trans people because its never come up.
Now there is also a lesbian couple who live in the apartment next door. Generally progressive. Keep to themselves mostly.
I would like you to guess a few things. When my autistic daughter is having a meltdown in front of the apartment, who is sends noise complaints, and who is asks if I need help bringing up the groceries so I can handle my daughter? When I was sick with kidney problems, who helped by bringing food? When my daughter figured out how to open the child lock and got out, guess which one helped look, and guess who called child protective services and tried to chew us out for being terrible parents for, I don't know, failing to triple lock our apartment?
Now I want you to guess which of my two neighbors is my friend.
And that's just practical day to day considerations. I've known many moderate conservatives that, with just 3-5 years of being their friend, suddenly become progressive, outspoken advocates for queer rights, pushing for socially progressive policy, joining in protests.
On the other hand, I've known plenty of progressives who were horrible biggoted dick bags who are so entrenched in their positions that they wont even listen to you when you try to explain why their behavior is a problem.
There are plenty of moderate conservatives that are trying to be good people and have good intentions but just don't get it yet. People who will become strong progressives with a much firmer base than many fair weather progressives, but only if someone gives them a chance. And it takes more than one conversation. You actually have to be their friend, understand where they are coming from, explain to them in terms they will understand.
This is also probably the single most effective form of activism there is. Because you make a friend and help them come around, and then there is one less conservative and one more progressive. And then they talk to their family and friends, and inside a decade you have ten less conservatives and ten more progressives, and so on and so forth. This is a critical part of grassroot political efforts.
The simple fact is progressives are a small minority by definition. If we do not actively recruit people to our way of thinking we will never, ever accomplish our goals. Which means it is critical for us to interact with people who do not yet agree with us. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is impossible to be a good progressive if you are unwilling to consider the possibility of being friends with at least some moderate conservatives.
Now obviously you don't need to take abuse, you don't need to tolerate overt bigotry and hatred. I could give you a list dozens of names long of people I cut out of my life because they were toxic, prejudice people. But that's not everyone.
The idea that the world is cleanly split into black and white, progressive vs conservative, is incorrect on a basic level and catastrophically short sighted on an activist level.
