For Thanksgiving peace, skip the side of politics

Ah, Thanksgiving. The day we pause to reflect on the many things for which we are thankful, stuff ourselves with too much turkey and mashed potatoes, watch football and, if we’re smart, avoid talking politics.

Last week, the Washington Post’s Christopher Ingraham penned a piece about a new working paper by M. Keith Chen of UCLA and Ryne Rohla of Washington State University that shows many “politically divided” families are spending an average of 20 to 30 minutes less at Thanksgiving gatherings than in previous years.

Chen and Rohla wanted to know whether people had altered their behavior on Thanksgiving as a result of last year’s bitterly divisive presidential election, and whether Democrats spend less time at Thanksgiving gatherings in Republican households than in Democratic ones, and vice-versa. We won’t hold you in suspense, the answer for many is “yes.”

Chen and Rhola used smartphone data from more than 17 trillion location markers from 10 million smartphones in November 2016, and collected 2016 presidential voting data at the precinct level nationwide.

Compared to 2015, the researchers found that, overall, “families that were likely to have voted differently spent between 20 and 30 fewer minutes with each other.” Republicans-precinct travelers “shortened their visits by over 40 minutes,” the paper found.

Chen and Rohla also found the volume of political advertising in a precinct affected the numbers: “Thanksgiving dinners are further shortened by around 1.5 minutes for every thousand political advertisements aired in the traveler’s home media market,” their paper states.

The researchers’ bottom line was that partisan differences cost American families 62 million person-hours of Thanksgiving time — 56.8 percent from individuals living in Democratic precincts and 43.2 percent from Republican precincts.

So, yes, we’re still a very politically divided country. So, to keep the peace between Uncle Joe, who’s a staunch MAGA Trump supporter, and niece Mary, who’s still in shock that the acerbic billionaire won and is now an advocate for impeachment, you hosts out there might want to declare today a “politics-free” Thanksgiving — and be thankful that we live in a country that, among our numerous freedoms, allows us to elect our leaders, for better or worse.

Without question, the past 18 months have been tumultuous for America, and there are few encouraging signs the next 18 will be any calmer. Still, there is much we should be thankful for today, so let’s concentrate on those things as we gather with friends and relatives. Politics can wait a day.