Don't Troll Me Bro!: meehaw: This article is really scary. It is indeed the way it sounds. Old people have Fox News on all day, every day. It's their lifeblood. It's making reality more and more elusive for these poor souls...my mother and step-father included.

My mother used to be a liberal. She was a feminist. She was anti-racist. She was a progressive leader for equality in my public school system.

Last year we had a conversation in which these words were said by her: " Well I don't believe that women should make as much as men!"

I've been losing that same battle with my parents. They had every intention of traveling a bunch when they retired. International stuff, not a weekend drive to door county. Now they react with horror every time I tell them I'm going to travel internationally for work or for fun. I mean like legitimately terrified their son is going to take a wrong turn in some major city, and realize I had gone into a "Muslim no go zone" too late and have my head cut off with a rusty crosscut saw or some shiat.

They are now spending their retirement sitting in the living room getting wound up with fear and anger instead of what they busted ass for 40 years to have the opportunity to do. Even cities like Toronto and Montreal are scary hellholes filled with danger at every turn for them now. I mean, seriously, those places are safer than most small towns in WI, and easy/cheap/fast to get to.

Every time I come back from somewhere I show pictures and tell them about the interesting conversations I had with people who live there. Reiterate that I never felt unsafe, and nobody living there ever felt the need to warn me about some area taken over by violent barbarians who kill on sight in the name of some god.