When the topic gets ruined by the worst 5% of its advocates. Veganism becomes "you're a murderer." Crypto becomes "have fun staying poor." Effective Altruism becomes "letting people die today is good actually." The reasonable majority gets drowned out by the loudest extremists and now nobody can have normal conversations about anything. The flanks capture the discourse.

Wild that "Lean In" became "Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss" became "actually maybe rest is radical" became "tradwife softgirl era" in about eight years.

Sanity is expensive, and extremism pays dividends. We talk a lot about polarization as if it were a disease that infected society, but we’re missing a key data point: Polarization is a growth hack, and it works. It delivers results.

Westenberg.

How to Stay Sane in a World That Rewards Insanity

Is There Still a Return on Being Reasonable?