How does it make you feel if a friend doesn't agree with you on a third party?

One of the most valuable things I learned as I matured into middle age was that each and every time I was upset by another person, the source of my displeasure lay within myself.

If the person you are talking about is known by you and your friend it is possible that your friend has different experience with that person. It is very common to have different views about same person. It might upset you because you don’t like him/her. May be your friend isn’t taking his side but trying to explain you from a different perspective.

I think I probably have more interaction with the person than my friend does but I still have to respect the fact that he made a lot of good points. It was just hard to swallow what he was saying because I dislike this person so much. But it does bother me that I haven’t been able to feel much empathy for this person when I feel like I should. Normally I’m a very empathetic person but I’ve just seen too many things about this person and I forget to be that way. As the evening goes on I’m realizing that I value my friend’s perspective and the fact that he is honest enough to share that with me. But like brussel sprouts it’s still pretty hard to swallow.

Did you try to explain your point of view to your friend? You can be right too for not liking that person as you said you have interacted more with him than your friend and might have had bad experiences which your friend didn’t.

We did talk and I shared some stuff and I think he saw my point too. The thing is I don’t want to be the person to sway any other person’s opinion of someone. I think everyone’s experiences are their own and that they need to form their own judgments of someone but I definitely talked about some things that bothered me about this person.

Imagine if the person you don’t like is like Trump. Maybe your friend is playing mental gymnastics about him or her the same way Trump supporters will not be moved by anything. Or you could be the Trump supporter and the person you don’t like is like Sanders or Clinton. More détails might help.

I think rather my friend has not seen all the actions that this person takes, all the lies that he tells.

Then that probably explains it. Your friend can’t make the right judgement without having all the info.

I’ve noticed that there are people who agree with someone just because they like them, or disagree with someone just because they don’t like them.

Take one of my coworkers. She always complains about the same two people she doesn’t like. She’s always blaming them for things and talking about how terrible they are at the job. Then, there are two other coworkers that she really likes. She’ll talk about all of the stuff they do to help and when they do something wrong, it’s never that person’s fault. They were at least “having a bad day.”

I don’t appreciate this at all. She’s not someone to give me true opinions because clearly her mind is slanted. I am totally open to unfavorable or disagreeing opinions. It helps me learn; it opens my eyes. It may not make me feel good, but if I can see truth in what the person is saying, then I know I must face it. Their intentions must be good, though. I’d rather have someone be honest with me than lie or give me “useless happy talk” to make me feel better.