Following my own advice...?

At the beginning of November I posted a commentary on Tumblr in response to a comment someone else made about Community and the group's relationship with Pierce. It went a little something like this:

"...a person who engages in social justice writing and/or critical thinking about race/gender/sexism/whathaveyou can’t associate with or be friends with people who have problematic views? I missed that meeting!

But seriously… if I surrounded myself in some bubble universe where I cut out all people with shitty ways of thinking, I’d have a very small pool of people left and I doubt I’d do much good in the world when sharing my thoughts, feelings, and beliefs. Preaching to choir can be super good for morale, but it’s not for everybody..."

On TV, Pierce's ignorance & slow pace of personal growth is funny; In real life, however, people like that make me want to stab myself in the eye w/a pencil.

And now I've found myself in a weird position - I am the friend of a friend of some REALLY problematic people. They've done and said some pretty racist shit and I've written publicly about how much their behavior has upset me... but I also live in a really small town where there are only so many bars and places to hang out and everybody knows everybody and unless I never leave the house, my life will intertwine with the lives of people whose behavior I vehemently disagree with. My internal dialogue has been going a mile a minute all fucking morning, trying to reconcile these dual positions: Do I not associate with problematic people as a matter of principle or do I find a way to be ok with associating with them and hope that I can do some good by just being me and possibly introducing them to alternate ways of thinking? I'm feeling conflicted, naturally.