Apocalypse soon

I said something flippant about how the world as we know it is not going to last much longer. (I believe this, although I have no specific predictions.) A friend who is cheerfuller than I am argued a little and then said "but don't you think if you had kids, you'd think differently?" (She has kids.)

This is crazy talk! I certainly hope not! The strangest part of the question, to me, was the implication that I should consider a hypothetical scenario in which I were more likely to have a biased assessment based on wishful thinking, and then use that hypothetical biased assessment instead of my current one. What!? No! I try hard to keep my current level of bias and wishful thinking out of my assessments of things! Why would I add more, just to come up with a nicer outcome? (...oh. Just to come up with a nicer outcome. This is how religions are invented, people.)

Anyway I said "no, but I'd probably be a lot more upset about it" and then we talked about other cheerfuller things.

***

More recently, someone else was telling me that they try to never vote Democrat or Republican. If there's a Libertarian option, the go with that. (It's Montana, so there usually is). If there isn't, they pick Republican.

I said "that makes me think you never read the news and you have no idea what's going on in the world. Have you noticed what the Republicans are doing?"

He said "What about what the Democrats are doing?"

I said "What are the Democrats doing?"

He said "They're dividing us! With their... words and arguments!"

I said "That sounds like something you heard on Fox News. Maybe you should try some other sources."

He said "I'm just kidding. And I don't watch Fox News."

I don't know which part he was kidding about, but this conversation did not change my opinion about how the world as we know it is not going to last much longer. (It did make me glad there are Libertarian options for nearly every race here.)