Hey all. Getting right to it:
Last November, a majority of my wife’s family voted trump. I immediately made known my disgust and that I had no interest in maintaining relationships with any of them. My wife is equally appalled, but family is important to her and she chooses to compartmentalise it for the sake of their relationships. That’s her call. Typically, her mother comes to stay at our house for an extended period as we live far away, and this year I tolerated her being here for the sake of my wife.
But now, thinking about the next visit and how bad things have gotten, I can’t even stand the thought of having her in my house, let alone being in the same room as her. I really don’t want her here at all, but I will again tolerate her for my wife’s sake. However I think it’s likely that I will make myself pretty scarce during that time.
So the ethics question is - given that I expressed my distaste after the election but still remained cordial, is it ok, ethically speaking, to become more resentful as the consequences of their actions become more apparent? Or, given that what has happened since is pretty much out of everyone’s hands, am I locked in to the level of hostility I showed immediately after?
I guess the distilled version is - a person does X, I express disapproval. Is it ethical to express MORE disapproval as additional unforeseen consequences of X become apparent?
Thanks for your thoughts!
Edit to Clarify - My mother in law is not MAGA and I don’t think she’s enjoying any of it. She thinks we can “just not talk about it” and everything will be fine. However she has become more racist and judgemental (anti-trans etc) in recent years. Hates Joe Biden and Kamal Harris but can’t or won’t say why. Thanks for the responses so far and I’ll try to respond, but I’m about to start work shortly.


I’m like you, my first obligation is always to my wife, that’s the promise I made. But it’s never tested my principles before. I’ve already decided I’m just going to be scarce during those times. There’s been a lot of good advice here, but I was actually more interested in what ethics scholars would say regarding me feeling angrier as time goes on. The targets of my anger haven’t done anything more to deserve additional anger, it’s the consequences of what they did that continue to make me angry…