Given the echo chambers that people live in, it is easy. Many factors are reducing the opportunity for civil discourse while at the same time increasing the amount of content for people in the bubble. Just look at your own media consumption, in the 1990s we were mostly limited to conservative AM talk radio and gun show related communication. You might have heard some non-msm material at the gun range. We didn’t have a private place to discuss online, so all communication was necessary in person and had to adhere to some boundaries of civility. Those conversations were necessarily going to have viewpoints from multiple sides and the extended length of the interaction prompted critical thinking about what was being said.

Today, I actively avoid talking politics even with people I’m pretty sure agree with me, just because my work life would be much more difficult being outed behind enemy lines. I’m sure there are liberal forums similar to this one, but I would be run out even if civil and rationally discussing topics. 30 years ago we would be discuss the topics at happy hour.

The echo chamber has deluded many into equating churchgoers or support of police as being a literal white supremacist who attends clan robes or a goose stepping nazi who wants to gas the Jews. We need to break that conditioning so Democrats call out those views on their own side as being cut from the cloth of genocidal ideology.