My position now is that the entirety of the 2010s onward 'Culture War' was a manufactured fight by Epstein networks and co. In hindsight, none of it was organic and the blatant in your face-ness of it all should have been a bigger red flag. The hardest lesson for me to learn was that not using algorithmic media was not the same as avoiding being influenced by it.

As such I think anybody who makes their entire social/political life devoted solely to those issues (on either side) in 2026 to be a malicious actor, or one mind-controlled by malicious groups. The pattern very clearly is to weaponize deep (real!) personal wounds to short-circuit rational thinking, and sadly it is very effective.

I know "they want us divided" is cliche and a fairly cringe take nowadays, but there's a lot to it. The more important lesson in my opinion is being very careful about who or what your outrage empowers. It may not be immediately obvious, but with enough intellectual and emotional honesty it becomes clear fairly quickly.