The 5 Must-Avoid Topics to Keep Your Thanksgiving Dinner Civil
Anxious about heated arguments and awkward conversations this Thanksgiving? Come prepared with these topics that tend to rile up Americans.
NOTE: Readers are still voting on this list all the time, and the ranking changes frequently. Changes in the list ranking may not immediately be reflected in this blog.
Both the best and the scariest thing about the holidays is that it brings families together: families who live in different parts of the country, belong to different generations, and, most importantly, have very different ideas about politics. As the political landscape becomes more polarized, that time-honored tradition of avoiding passionate arguments at the Thanksgiving dinner table only gets more difficult. We hope to even the odds by offering you a look at the topics that our readers care most about — and therefore, the ones that are most likely to start an argument.
We took a look at the Top 5 items on our list of Political Issues You Care Most About (451K votes) and identified which demographics (including age, gender, and geographical region) feel strongest about each. While we can’t guarantee that your millennial kids from the East Coast won’t quarrel with your baby boomer aunt this Thanksgiving , we hope this info will make it easier for everyone at the table to find common ground.
Photo: Unsplash
#1: Enforcing the Constitution
The #1 topic on this list is actually titled “Require all three branches of government to obey the Constitution,” but we thought we’d refer to the issue by a slightly catchier name. The fact that this issue is a vague one could suggest many things: it could be that people are fed up with partisanship and see the Constitution as a way of restoring balance to government. It could be that people from different sides of the aisle see the Constitution as a stand in for their own beliefs.
Though the issue itself is open to interpretation, its dominance of this list is undebatable. It’s the #1 political topic among members of the millennial, Gen-X, and boomer generations. That means that you’re not likely to get much disagreement from others at the dinner table this year when you bring up the need to heed the Constitution: but the conversation might stop being pleasant once you start digging into which parts of our founding document in particular need to be obeyed.
More important to: Millennials, Gen-X, Baby Boomers
Less important to: Northeasterners
Photo: Unsplash
#2: Free Speech
Somewhat ironically, it seems that free speech might be one topic you want to suppress during Thanksgiving dinner conversations. The discourse over free speech is in many cases tied to the endlessly exhausting “cancel culture” debate. This topic is a slippery slope that can lead to arguments about everything from stand-up comedy to educational policy.
Though most people from either side of the aisle count free speech as one of their values, the first amendment right is more commonly invoked by political conservatives when it comes to the question of cancel culture, while more liberal-leaning people tend to view the issue in terms of LGBTQ, racial, religious, and gender equality. That explains why free speech is particularly important to Ranker voters in red states like Florida and Kentucky (though it’s also big in the historically blue Illinois).
More important to: People from Florida, Kentucky, Iowa, Kansas, and Illinois
Less important to: West Coasters
Photo: Flickr
#3: Immigration
You probably didn’t need us to tell you that immigration is a sensitive issue that could very well cause a family feud around your holiday dinner table. Still, it bears remembering that people feel passionately about political topics like a border wall and the DREAM act, and there’s relatively little chance that people on opposite sides of this issue will find common ground before it’s time to serve dessert.
That said, there are some demographics that don’t cite immigration as an important topic. Millennials and Gen-Xers are less likely to count it among their most important political topics, as are people on both the East and West Coasts. Take that with a grain of salt, though: some of these groups, including West Coasters and millennials, view the related topic of “border security” as critically important. The bottom line is that you’re courting catastrophe by bringing up issues of migration and citizenship.
More important to: Baby boomers, Midwesterners
Less important to: Millennials, Gen-X, East and West Coast dwellers
#4: Homelessness
Photo: Flickr
Homelessness is an issue that affects millions of Americans across all 50 states, but it’s of particularly direct importance to those living in urban areas. The fact that so many people feel homelessness is an important issue does indicate that the country largely agrees it’s a problem deserving of resources and attention. But again, it’s likely that people of different political persuasions have very different approaches to the issue of homelessness.
Interestingly, it seems that many of the places where homelessness matters most to our voters are places better known for their rural populations than their cities. Certainly Kansas, Kentucky, and the South more generally have plenty of urban hubs, but unlike New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, they aren’t places we immediately think of when we talk about the homelessness crisis. The topic is voted up far more in the Midwest and Southern regions than on the coasts, which could mean that it’s viewed as urgent among more conservative voters.
More important to: Southerners, Midwesterners,
Less important to: East and West Coast dwellers
Photo: Wikimedia
#5: Social Security & Medicare
If there is any item on this list that is safe to discuss at the dinner tale, it’s this one. Social Security and Medicare are both incredibly popular programs, and while conservative and liberal Americans may have different ideas about how to fix them, they generally tend to agree that the programs should be protected. What’s more, the programs and most proposals to reform them are technically complex, which means that unless you’re hosting more than one policy wonk this Thanksgiving, the conversation likely won’t progress past a brief exchange of broadly positive statements.
The issue is in the Top 5 of every US region except the South, an indication that the topic is slightly less important to red state voters. It’s #1 on the list of priorities for those in the Northeast, on the West Coast, and the Mountain West, the region that spans the central northern states of the US like Montana, Colorado, Nevada, and Kansas.
More important to: East and West Coast dwellers, Mountain Westerners,
Less important to: Southerners
