Let’s agree to stop ‘keeping the peace’ this holiday season

This article Let’s agree to stop ‘keeping the peace’ this holiday season was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

The holidays are a time for togetherness, when we’re supposed to gather with family, get along and nurture the ties that bind us.

But what if those relationships cause us harm? How do we nonviolently engage with right-wing family members who fling words like bullets aimed at immigrants, queers, women and the so-called lazy poor? How do we stand up for ourselves when those attacks turn on us? Often, when we speak out, suddenly we’re no longer family. We’re the enemy.

In a 2020 survey by the Nobel Peace Center, 60 percent of respondents stated they avoid difficult conversations with close relations due to discomfort — and 46 percent said they have lost friends or family due to such interactions.

I’m no stranger to this contradiction of family. I am a queer, humanist woman, consciously child-free and concerned about climate, who grew up in the alt-right. My family took a more dramatic turn when the first Black president was elected in 2008, which mobilized them into political action. My Aunt Marian eventually rose to the position of grassroots vice chairman of the Michigan Republican Party and cofounded the Michigan Conservative Coalition. She later became one of 16 “false electors” in Michigan who challenged Trump’s 2020 electoral loss, all of whom were recently pardoned by President Trump. 

I experienced attacks early and often in life, whenever I stepped out of my family’s norm. As the only outlier in a sea of aunts, uncles, cousins and family friends all pushing for an increasingly hostile country, I learned to stay quiet, to “keep the peace.” By not engaging, I kept myself safe and didn’t ruffle feathers. I didn’t make it worse, but I was wrong.

Why we must engage

Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg writes that violence requires quiet cooperation from both institutions and ordinary people. Additionally, my own work as an anthropologist studying paradigm shifts reveals that persuasion is a critical part of change. By not speaking, by trying to keep the peace, what I really did for my family was remove friction for prejudiced ideas that drove their right-wing political action.

When we don’t speak up or fear speaking, we retreat into insular circles that only affirm, and never challenge, our own views. This allows for dehumanization of the “other” — for ideas such as “women aren’t rational enough to vote” or “all Baby Boomers need to die” — to thrive and develop deep roots. 

As Martin Luther King Jr. said, people “fail to get along with each other because they fear each other. They fear each other because they don’t know each other. They don’t know each other because they have not properly communicated with each other.” In keeping the peace at family gatherings, we strengthen the insular circles that reinforce prejudice.

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How to turn a family gathering into a laboratory for political healing

This holiday season, let’s stop agreeing to disagree. Instead, let’s agree to center relationships, while refusing to “keep the peace” at the expense of generative conflict. 

I want to preface this by recognizing that, for many, the home in which we grew up is no longer safe. The holidays instead mean spending time with chosen family. Protesting via abstention is still a protest. By removing ourselves from a toxic environment, we make it that much harder for those whom we’ve left to hold their ideology whole. As political economist Albert Hirschman argued in “Exit, Voice, and Loyalty,” withdrawing from a dysfunctional group forces those who remain to confront the loss and re-rationalize their position. 

So please don’t feel that not attending some holiday event means that you aren’t doing the work. You are. You’ve taken care of yourself, your chosen family, and protested with absence.

Becoming the oyster’s sand

For those who will attend family events full of contrarian views, we must ask ourselves what we can do about the stranglehold that ideology holds on our family members (without exposing ourselves to trauma). First, we must accept that minds will not be changed at a single gathering. Rather, we act as friction, a reminder that not everyone thinks in terms of black and white, that there is more to the country and world than any single ideology. 

You are the sand in the oyster. A pearl may come, but not for a long time. Rather, you cause friction and slow momentum. Here are the steps to take to be the most effective sand possible.

1. Don’t go looking for a fight. Choosing not to “keep the peace” doesn’t mean entering every interaction with an intent to argue. While this seems basic, the constant flow of sensationalist news makes it difficult. Rather, think of yourself as the break for a runaway train. Though you may not have an encyclopedia of sociopolitical facts in your mind (I certainly don’t), you can offer a different perspective when the opportunity emerges. That is where the friction of your sand matters.

2. Ask questions. As Walt Whitman, perhaps apocryphally, said, “Be curious, not judgemental.” Questions cause self-reflection, and are a gentle but effective tactic for being the “sand.” I search for the root of my family’s actions because I refuse to dehumanize them, even when repulsed by their ideology. This leads to common ground and, ultimately, our shared humanity.

3. Center common ties. The scientist Thomas Kuhn coined the term and concept of a “paradigm shift” — meaning how things change and why. In his book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,” he wrote that, “Each group uses its own paradigm to argue in that paradigm’s defense.” We speak only from our viewpoint, and within that viewpoint, we often use language differently. This is the struggle every nonviolent communicator faces: the meaning of terminology slips in the face of dueling ideologies. “Dialogue has an important precondition — a belief that we all have something in common,” said Kjersti Fløgstad, executive director of the Nobel Peace Center. We must have something in common with our families, even if it’s only shared memories. 

I’ve found that the clearest common ground we all share is fear. Everyone is scared. My family’s tactics are fueled by fear, and I’m afraid of the country they’ve worked for. Right-wing ideology capitalizes on that fear. It keeps empathetic people overwhelmed and paralyzed from action, and it mobilizes the alt-right toward draconian laws that are sold as “protective.” This knowledge provides common ground for discourse. Paradigm shifts cannot take place without communication that uses shared language. 

4. Avoid speaking for parties who are not present. This is difficult when you think of yourself as an advocate and ally. We wish to see all groups free and protected. Still, there is a difference between standing against racism as an ally and speaking for Black Americans, for example. If a topic centers on a group not represented, do not speak for them, and try not to allow others to do so.

5. Do not yell. Though we’re not “keeping the peace” by pretending prejudice is acceptable, yelling is a form of force, and it automatically activates protective walls in others. In the article “Emotional Behavior with Verbal Violence: Problems and Solutions,” psychologists Pavel Koller and Petr Darida argue that verbal violence impairs peoples’ ability to observe or respond thoughtfully, pushing them into defensive postures. So, if at all possible, do not yell.

6. Remember that anger is a self-protective emotion. If you feel angry, it’s probably because your boundaries and well-being are being violated. Equally, if you suddenly find yourself subject to outburst, it’s likely you struck a nerve. When someone’s ideology feels threatened, they may yell. When that happens, it’s important to not respond in kind.

7. Don’t react to yelling. In my family, resistance always results in yelling. The hardest thing I’ve ever had to do was not react. Instead, try to view the yelling for what it is: an uncontrolled outburst with the aim of subduing the threat to ideology. But it’s difficult to sit through yelling directed at yourself. If you feel yourself reacting, there is another way to respond.

8. Walk away. As stated earlier, abstention as protest is age-old and well-tested. Most of us aren’t trained and hardened against familial rejection or violence. That doesn’t make you weak, that makes you human. If you are met with aggressive behavior, or feel yourself simmering over, walk away. Leave the actor to deal with the sandy friction you provided, and take time for you. 

Regardless of what you choose this holiday season, you will remain whole. Those of us who fall outside family expectations had to learn to validate and value ourselves early in life. With or without taking a stand, you are still you, valuable because of your very existence. If abstention from family events is the safest way for you to dissent, then work instead to gather your chosen family with intention and care. 

I recommend “The Art of Gathering” by Priya Parker for bringing people together in the name of developing and maintaining a meaningful community. Using her guidelines, my chosen family is redesigning “Friendsgiving” to center the concept of “home” instead of genocide, and being loud about both. Our togetherness gives us strength to not keep the peace elsewhere. Our chosen families provide a “secure base” that we can return to when shaken by personal or world events. I wish you and yours a happy holiday season.

This article Let’s agree to stop ‘keeping the peace’ this holiday season was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

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Source: https://wagingnonviolence.org/2025/11/lets-agree-to-stop-keeping-the-peace-this-holiday-season/