I was firmly against them but an opportunity showed itself early in my career and figured I could stick it out for 2 years to get a big name on my resume… and somehow it’s been ten years now. But it’s a company with a genuinely good culture and my career has grown constantly over those 10 years, so I’ve been happy. TBF, my employer before this was extremely toxic so in comparison it’s been amazing.

Just curious, do you mean specifically the job as in role, or do you think this about going back to a company as a whole?

I can name easily a dozen, maybe two dozen people at my company I personally know who left then came back, although generally to a different role. And I’ve seen most of them get promoted after coming back, even to high roles like Director or VP. I don’t know if that’s just because of a good company culture or if it’s because it’s a larger business (2-2.5k corporate employees).

My dad has always been on the right and he’s a Trump voter, but he’s mostly avoided going full MAGA-proud. We have always had a tense relationship when it comes to politics and at times had very little personal relationship. Now we just avoid political discussions or keep them very high level, and it’s manageable. I talk to him a lot less than I would if he didn’t have those views. His health is declining significantly at this point so I have decided it’s not worth trying to change his mind.

My mom is still with him and she’s leftist and we talk all the time.

My dad’s two sisters are deep into MAGA (they were proud attendees of Trump’s first inauguration). They’ve been far-right fundamentalist Christians most, if not all, of my life, so I already had a strained relationship with them before 2016. I haven’t even tried in over a decade now. I was recently diagnosed with a chronic disease that one of them also has and I kept thinking about reaching out but ultimately decided I don’t even want her in my life for that so I haven’t bothered.

You and I are on the same page. My only point was that there are unfortunately many people out there now who believe they have a “healthy” level of skepticism, but are actually misled, misinformed, and not educated enough to distinguish reality. And I named specific groups who frequently fit this pattern.

When skepticism is truly healthy, it’s great. But there are many people who are unable to identify what “healthy” means here. No where did I say or mean to imply that some skepticism is a bad thing.

Unfortunately this also gets abused by some people who believe they have a healthy level of skepticism, but actually are way off the deep end. Like anti-vaxxers, flat-Earthers, and other anti-science people.

So “healthy” in this context shouldn’t be defined by the individual.

Worth noting since “sugar-free” sometimes means “sugar substitute” in marketing parlance: some peanut butters use xylitol as a sweetener, and xylitol kills dogs.

So yeah, read the label. Some peanut butters have literally just peanuts as an ingredient and those are best!

This is the advice I was coming to give, with the addition of a specific possible group.

I know there’s a lot of the anti-religion sentiment on Lemmy (for many good reasons) but one community I’m familiar enough with to suggest are Quakers (AKA Friends). Quakerism is rooted in progressive values and even those who practice have a wide array of religious beliefs, many of whom lean agnostic or even atheist.

It’s one of the most LGBTQ+ friendly groups I’ve ever been a part of, and there is a Friends meeting in Columbus.

I hope OP is able to find a community that supports and loves him for who he is.

Lots of advice here but I haven’t seen anyone mention coding boot camps. There are free ones like FreeCodeCamp or lots of paid options. You can do these to learn or validate what you have been taught.

My company hires associate-level software engineers directly out of college programs and boot camps. They don’t expect people from these to know everything; you may not have ever even used the language that you will be expected to code in! But by completing a program you’re showing you understand the logic of programming and that is applicable knowledge.

Look for entry-level jobs and you’ll be fine. Even better, look for companies that intentionally hire from programs like yours. They’re more likely to have internal programs to help teach new-to-career folks.

I recently finished reading The Cult of Trump by Steven Hassan. It’s from 2019 and so depressing with how much has happened since then that’s not accounted for, but it was interesting insight into how people like that can accumulate a following. It might help answer your question.

My older sister had a boyfriend move in with her shortly after she moved out of my parents’ house. From the first time I met him I had bad vibes.

Fast forward maybe a year or so they were renting a house and adopted a dog together. His “job” was motorcycle racing, so my sister basically just covered all costs. When they broke up, they aligned on who would get what with parents as mediators. He kept the dog, she kept the TV, etc.

He moved out while she was at work and took the TV, but he forgot all his motorcycle gear in one of the closets. So he had to come back with his tail between his legs to get that after stealing from her. She got the dog back at that point.

General scumbag. My intuition had no reason but was right!