This poll has given conservatives a real sad. 

“Liberals are so intolerant!” they scream, because their plague-spreading, gun-toting, schoolchild-killing, antisemitic, racial- and ethnic-minority-hating, misogynistic, democracy-destroying ideology is totes no big deal. I mean, why shouldn’t I be required, in the name of “tolerance,” to go out with someone who dehumanizes my Latino brothers and sisters, and worships a guy who says they’re all drug dealers, criminals, and rapists? Ladies, so what if that guy is a forced-birther who wants to insert his unwelcome judgment when making decisions between you and your doctor. And really, who cares if they want to take away a gay couple’s right to marry? Intolerance, it seems, is a one-way street! 

We tolerate their intolerance, or everyone has a sad. 

Of course, conservatives don’t feel similarly. We’re not trying to take away their rights. Legislate their morality. Destroy democracy. But as always, they’re the victim. 

Ah yes, spiraling out of control. Pass the smelling salts, please! If the parties were divided over things like tax brackets and other economic policies, that would be one thing. But Republicans have literally built a machine to stoke culture war divisions, and then they cry when they divide the country. 

This is a better reading: 

The dating question has really triggered conservatives, as they clearly chafe at their shrunken dating pool. 

“Terrifying”? Not to me. But I’m not an incel deplorable who turns off potential mates with the odiousness of my politics. I will say, as someone who was on dating apps within the last few years, that the number of “Trump supporters, swipe left” (left being “nope”) is huge. And I didn’t see this just in my liberal corner of the world, but even in redder parts of the country. 

The conservative American Enterprise Institute actually commissioned a poll on the topic which confirmed that dynamic. (Turns out, abortion is the biggest dealbreaker for liberals.) This CNN story told tearful stories of conservatives shut out of the dating scene because of their bigoted politics. This is a fun look at the phenomenon by Andi Zeisler of Bitch Media, “The question keeping Trump-loving men up at night: Why won’t women date us?” Politico gave voice to aggrieved and dateless young conservative staffers in D.C. Conservatives responded with conservative-only dating apps. 

Fundamentally, conservatives lose nothing when Democrats are in power. They may get more money! More benefits! But unless they’re wealthy, they don’t lose anything, and even for the wealthy, the most they lose is money—which they, by definition, already have in excess. 

So yes, it’s no surprise that liberals, fighting an existential battle for their rights and our very own democracy, would have little use for those who seek to burn it all down. That is no less “intolerant” than a Jewish person refusing to date a Proud Boy. There are dangerous people and dangerous ideologies, and it’s okay to shut them out of polite society. 

If Ari Fleischer wants to go back to the days of trans-ideological comity, then he should work harder to purge his party of the dangerous anti-democracy forces that have taken control.  

Until then, the story here is simple: “Young people don’t like assholes.”