Holiday Manners-What Would TheDomina Do?

From our dear lalaland: what to do when you gather with your family, most of whom have very different politics from you, and someone starts going into a religious spiel? This happened to me, and I just kind of stared at the floor until it was over. It was Christmas, but we went from The Christmas Story to people should accept God or go to H.

Tough situation! I've been in that situation before(with a Mother-in-Law who is righter and more vocal than Rush Limbaugh) as well. With your specific situation, you could have tried to throw in a segue about how most religions view the holiday season as one for being thankful for what you have and being kind and generous to others and then throw out what you're thankful for, type of thing to redirect the conversation.

In general family-type situations when religion or politics come up, I find that how you react should depend on who is doing the spouting. If it is your close friend or family and you feel comfortable giving your opinion of things, you should do so, politely, of course and then if they continue to spout excuse yourself from the conversation. If it is someone you don't know that well, or your significant other's family whom you are trying to impress, you should probably hold your tongue, or say very little and then excuse yourself. In any event it is unwise and impolite to get into a full-out argument over it at the holidays (and VERY impolite of them to keep haranguing you over it).