Wonderful analysis. I’ve read a couple articles of theirs a while ago and recall they were insightful from there point of view. I don’t recall getting negatively provoked. It’s my,choice to keep reading an article I like or don’t like, but the larger truth you are pointing at is what I agree with: listen to what they are saying without interpreting or pinning them to a “side.” We are multifaceted people and being forced into a side or forcing others into a “side” is what is toxic. It’s also particularly American, now more than previously. I believe they were in Britain, and people in multiparty democracies tend to hold a different pattern of seeing. Britain has at least four parties that are viable as I understand it. We have a paucity of parties, and one of them right now is very inflammatory (I won’t name which one), while the other one is lumpish and limpish, but with some good people and even some that appear strong (talking about those black Americans Democrats in the South that need to win). Tolerance isn’t just a virtue, it’s a way to keep your mind open to really hear what some else is trying to say (lord knows I try and fail, being full of those flaw things He mentions).
Thanks much for trying to make the world a more tolerant place (except for white supremacists who I don’t tolerate for their history of violence, beating and lynching and rapes across the South especially for that 125 years or so after the civil war).