Getting along with a possibly passive-aggressive coworker because of different political beliefs [closed]

Question

I'm just about to celebrate my first month in a new job in an IT startup. I love my new office, and I love my new job. And lately I think I'm getting along with my new office mates. There's this sweet girl about my age who added me on Facebook and in the Messenger group chat of all of us ten-some members, where we exchange jokes, banter, and ask around when we would sit down together for lunch.

There's only one hitch: our political views are completely different.

Now I steer clear of political discussions especially at the office. I have tweaked my privacy settings to show nothing of my political persuasions, and I lurk on the political Facebook threads instead of commenting on them. But I am under no illusion that nobody at work will find out in the long run. She tends to be passionate in her views, launching into a brief rant why she thinks some policy or some political candidate sucks or is good. I can't say our coworkers think the same as she does, but I have a feeling she is keen on gathering her inner circle based on how similar the political stands we believe in, and she would probably exclude and bully those who doesn't think the same way as she does.

The Facebook chat she included me in is eerily silent for one day now. But I don't know for sure if what I think is what is happening--that they formed another chat group without me. After all, its the holidays, and we're chilling with our families, and most don't bother their office mates until we meet again in the office. Also, I can't see her on Facebook. No way of telling if she blocked me or just deactivated her profile since I can't view her profile as public (Facebook told me to login first) I can't dare ask my other office mates about it. If they are truly excluding me, I can't give the impression that I know while I don't know what to do about it. That's a position of weakness.

If it were any other person, I wouldn't care. But she is a few months older than I in the office. I don't like tripping over her ego because of the obvious traps in the workplace.

Now I am quite timid, I occasionally banter and buy food when I feel up to it while she brings her baked goods. I truly want to give her the benefit of the doubt that she would be great to get along with. I don't want to set myself up to be bullied, attacked, back-stabbed, or whatever. I mean, I have tons of friends outside work and from my last jobs who has the same political views as she does, and we tend to argue over them. But we have great friendships and great team chemistry up to today.

So how do I get her to:

1. Make her think I agree with her political views;
2. Make her not care about my political views if she knows, instead focusing on her own, or;
3. Prevent her from doing any bullying, passive-aggressive treatement, or etc. simply because we think differently?

Also, for more insight into my situation, I would like to tell several more things:

• We're both in IT, she manages our API, while I do front-end;
• She is in a secret relationship with one of our software QA guys, or so my fellow front-end developer told me;
• That fellow developer probably thinks I suck at my job, but he likes it when I ask questions about the frameworks we use and why he lays down certain coding conventions;
• That same guy and I have been hanging out recently, on account that there was this rush project that another developer left on the eve of the deadline;
• That guy and the girl almost got into an argument about a controversial politician, and I sided with him;
• Everyone in the office, including the girl, was shipping me and that guy because we have similar tastes in movies, we code in the same platform, we are both reserved in our dealings with others, and he speaks more often to me than to them;
• She probably hates it when I hammer my keyboard while I'm in 'the zone," dancing and writhing like a pianist while coding (I'll apologize when we meet again);
• Last time she and I spoke it was about the cake she brought and some suggestions about bedspacing, since we both live far away from work. It was also right before the holiday break.

Thank you, thank you.

Answer 1

It sounds like you wanna get close to her, but you also want to do so from a position of strength. It doesn't look like a true friendship to me. Some of my best friends disagree with me completely on a number of issues, and I respect them for holding and debating their opinion; but of course your colleague (or you) may not see things this way.

I'd advise you to steer well clear of politics and focus on the job. Your mistake wasn't siding with the other guy at that debate they were having, it was expressing an opinion at all. Their mistake was debating politics in the office in the first place. If people try to strike up conversation on that topic, say ‘I don't think that's an appropriate subject for the workplace’, and stick to it. Make her respect you as a professional first and as a friend second.

‘Prevent her from doing any bullying, passive-aggressive treatment, or etc. simply because we think differently?’ You have no control over this whatsoever. You can only act once that behavior has been established. You're scared she might be giving you the silent treatment and have you ostracized from the group, but you have no evidence for that either. Just make sure you don't preempt the passive-aggressive treatment (it's easy to get caught up emotionally). Even if the others have moved on to another messaging group, keep using the original for work-related stuff if that's what you were using it for in the first place. Work is work, friends is friends.