How does political polarization manifest itself socially or in our daily lives?

[Technocracy Timmy]

We hear a lot about how we're the most polarized politically since the civil war era, but how does this manifest itself in our daily lives or in the social arena? Are we more confrontational, depressed, segregated, etc. than we were at any other time in the last 100+ years? How is society demonstrating these high levels of polarization beyond the realm of politics? Do we just not talk to people we deem from the "other side" because if so how does that translate in the suburbs (which are generally the swing areas in most states)??

[TheSaint250]

I always talk to people of my political opposition.  Many are my good friends.  I scarcely did or do tell people that I once supported Trump since I fear that they will get the wrong idea.

So far, I haven't witnessed any close friends grow apart over politics.

[Confused Democrat]

Being a Trump supporter is an instant deal breaker for me when it comes to dating.

[President of the great nation of 🏳️‍⚧️]

"You've got a picture of Bush in your dressing room? You're a Republican?"

[TheLeftwardTide]

I live in an extremely liberal area, so most political discussions either turn into circlejerks or inter-factional debate about the Democratic Party.

I do know a few fiscal conservatives that I argue with from time to time, but usually we just put politics aside for our mutual benefit. I don't like arguing with them anyway, because their arguments are just cookie-cutter, unoriginal cliches, i.e. "can't afford single-payer", "muh Venezuela", "muh entitled lazy poor people".

Truth be told, I really hate the fact that everything has become political. Movies, video games, even food...make it stop!

[darklordoftech]

People trust their neighbors less than they once did. People think their neighbors are terrorists, pedophiles, etc. People don't make as much of an effort to get to know people and make friends as they used to.

[pbrower2a]

The polarization began before Donald Trump ran for President. It would still be here if Hillary Clinton were President.

Maybe the good thing about Donald Trump is that one has many good reasons for despising him if one is not a "yes-shrieker" from bad character to bad taste as well as his agenda.

Donald Trump is a mirror-image Marxist, the sort of person who sees the critique of capitalism at its work as the depiction of an ideal --  a world of subordination, conformity, inequality, and repression for the proles but unlimited indulgence for elites. Between him and a hard-core Marxist-Leninist is only one difference: that he endorses what Marx finds wrong in capitalism.

Would I date someone who claims to support Trump? Hell, no! Would I maintain a relationship once I found evidence of support for fervent support of the Trumpenstein monster? No.
I believe that I can make a solid conservative argument against him. First, I believe that the next really-successful Republican President will have more in common with Barack Obama in intelligence, preparation, deftness of communication, and overall morality than with Donald Judas Trump. Thus, a conservative Republican who can convince people that they must pay higher rents and taxes while working harder and longer for less if their world is better must reject cronyism and luxury. There has never been any great economic improvement that has not come without widespread sacrifice.

Second, the Right needs to get as tough on organized crime and white-collar crime as it gets (at least rhetorically) on street crime. Criminals themselves exploiters and abusers, parasites upon the rest of us. It may be mere coincidence, but the stock market took a big gain on the day that Bernie Madoff was arrested. 

Third, our economic elites need to recognize the working class for its contributions with fair pay and with the opportunity to find meaning in life other than in productive toil. Donald Trump could praise the vulgarity of masses of the white working class, as he is as vulgar as the stereotype of 'trailer trash'. (Please, liberals -- get phrases like that out of your lexicon. There's a wider array of people living in manufactured housing, which I consider the wave of the future in housing outside of the high-rise jungles of giant cities, than the old stereotype of people who listen to nothing but country music or can't get an overload of NASCAR racing on TV). I have done canvassing and census enumerating at such mass settlements of people in manufactured housing, and I have found a much wider diversity of people than you might have expected. I can see myself in such a place, and people who expect to hear country music will be surprised to hear a Shostakovich string quartet.

Fourth, recognize that more production of manufactured goods is unlikely to bring more happiness. Real progress implies living better on less, which means that a tablet that one can pick up at Wal*Mart for about $100 (less than the cost of two cartons of cancerettes) is far more useful and powerful than are more powerful and versatile than a fiendishly-expensive mainframe computer that was the norm in business as late as the 1960s. But the mainframe computer required a large number of people to program, feed data into, and maintain... and required huge amounts of electricity to operate and to keep the Data Processing Department from being as hot as a foundry. There were people who made very good incomes servicing the mainframe computers that are to modern data processing what horses and buggies and dirt roads were to the cars and early superhighways of the 1950s. But there is a trade-off between efficiency on the one side and jobs  and resource extraction on the other.
   

Would I date someone who admits that voting for Donald Trump is a mistake? Maybe.

[PoliticalShelter]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

That's because they actually have to meet people in other political parties.

[Santander]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, both parties were basically white. Now, one is basically white and the other is mostly not. The numbers you cite are not because of disagreements on statutory corporate tax rates.

[progressive85]

I made friends with someone last year who was an alt-right Trump supporter.  He was the nicest guy in town and when he spoke I just listened, without jumping on him and telling him I disagreed.

I think Americans should be exposed to different viewpoints on a daily basis.

[RINO Tom]

Thankfully, it rarely does in mine.  I'm friends with normal people, you see.  My two best friends have political views that I frankly consider ridiculous.

[Devout Centrist]

I think pillarized is a much better word to describe modern American politics than polarized. Pillarized was a term used to describe Dutch society in the early to mid 20th century. People were grouped into pillars, based on their profession, wealth, and their political preference and there was little interaction outside of one's own pillar. I think this idea can be applied to America in a similar way, with party preference, race, wealth, and geography forming the basic four categories.

You could set them up like this:

Black--Democratic--Working Class--Deep South
White--Republican--Lower Middle Class--Deep South
White--Democratic--Upper Middle Class--West Coast
Black--Democratic--Upper Middle Class--Beltway
White--Swing--Working Class--Northern Midwest

And so on. Religion could be added too, but that's not as prominent as it was in decades past.

[SoLongAtlas]

One example: Facebook and Twitter actualizing into real life. If someone deletes someone because they support say Trump or Hillary, and a person unfriends them both on FB/Twitter unfollow and does the same in real life. It's really petty but I have seen it happen many times.

[Deblano]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, both parties were basically white. Now, one is basically white and the other is mostly not. The numbers you cite are not because of disagreements on statutory corporate tax rates.

Santander makes a very good point here.

To stereotype a bit, the average Urban African American Democrat in Milwaukee and the average WASP White Collar Republican in Waukesha County see two very different worlds.

[Deblano]

I made friends with someone last year who was an alt-right Trump supporter.  He was the nicest guy in town and when he spoke I just listened, without jumping on him and telling him I disagreed.

I think Americans should be exposed to different viewpoints on a daily basis.

I'm also friends with a Trump supporting Paleoconservative myself IRL. We still are able to joke around and discuss politics despite being two different beliefs.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

I made friends with someone last year who was an alt-right Trump supporter.  He was the nicest guy in town and when he spoke I just listened, without jumping on him and telling him I disagreed.

I think Americans should be exposed to different viewpoints on a daily basis.

I'm also friends with a Trump supporting Paleoconservative myself IRL. We still are able to joke around and discuss politics despite being two different beliefs.

Befriending white nationalists simply makes you an enabler.

[SNJ1985]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, the two major parties were big tents comprising both conservatives and liberals.

Nowadays, they have clear ideological leanings.

[Santander]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, both parties were basically white. Now, one is basically white and the other is mostly not. The numbers you cite are not because of disagreements on statutory corporate tax rates.

A great way to test this further is to ask White Republicans if they'd rather their child date a White Democrat or a Black Republican. Or ask Black Democrats if they'd rather their child date a White Democrat or a Black Republican, etc.

Those results would be fascinating to see.

It would be interesting, but it would be difficult to get honest answers, especially from whites.

[Devout Centrist]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, both parties were basically white. Now, one is basically white and the other is mostly not. The numbers you cite are not because of disagreements on statutory corporate tax rates.

No, Democrats are still over 50% white

[RINO Tom]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, the two major parties were big tents comprising both conservatives and liberals.

Nowadays, they have clear ideological leanings.

While technically true, this grows more exaggerated every year.

[Fuzzy Says: "Abolish NPR!"]

I'm an Obama 2012/Trump 2016 voter, and a moderate independent who's a registered Republican.

At work, I'm with a very diverse crew, most of them black.  I don't discuss politics with folks at the office because if I were to say I was a Trump voter, at least some of them would get the wrong idea.  I live in an area of Florida that is somewhat racially polarized; the integration of the schools in the 1960s didn't go down easily here, and the politics of the local community is very much about race, however unspoken.  My white co-workers now are apolitical Republicans, but I had worked with a guy who listened to Limbaugh all day, called me a RINO, and once referred to my Mom and Dad (now deceased) who were lifelong Democrats as my "leftist parents".  This guy once hounded a guy who supported a large family on only his income for applying for Food Stamps, and referred to me as a moocher because my son, who I've adopted through the Foster Care system and is Medicaid eligible.

At church (I'm an Evangelical Pentecostal Christian), I also have avoided political discussions.  Many of the black folks at my church are of Jamaican descent, and are not overtly political.  Many of them are from metropolitan areas in the Northeast, so their outlook is more modern.   The white folks at my church probably view me as a case of temporary insanity for voting for Obama in 2012.  (I told one of my brethren that I was voting for John Kerry in 2004 and he looked at me as if I needed Mental Health hospitalization.)  I also don't want to get into deep discussions.  I was talking to one of my closer friends in church, and he's a great guy, but he seriously believes that Obama was seeking to build re-education camps for people in closed military bases.  To tell him he's delusional would have caused me to lose a friend without serving a useful purpose.  

This is the world we live in.  I try to disagree agreeably, but not everyone gets the message.

[Fuzzy Says: "Abolish NPR!"]

In 1960 about 5% of Americans said they would be upset if their child married someone of the opposite political party.

In 2010 that percentage was 40%.

In 1960, both parties were basically white. Now, one is basically white and the other is mostly not. The numbers you cite are not because of disagreements on statutory corporate tax rates.

A great way to test this further is to ask White Republicans if they'd rather their child date a White Democrat or a Black Republican. Or ask Black Democrats if they'd rather their child date a White Democrat or a Black Republican, etc.

Those results would be fascinating to see.

I don't care what race or political party the future spouses of my young son (12 years old) and my granddaughters are. 

What I do care about is that (A) they become committed Christians, and (B) they will only date and marry persons who are committed Christians.  Scripture instructs persons to "Be not unequally yoked to an unbeliever".  It is a recipe for discord when you go into a marriage with a partner and you cannot agree as to who God is and what He says.

[Cory]

A guy who listened to Limbaugh all day, called me a RINO, and once referred to my Mom and Dad (now deceased) who were lifelong Democrats as my "leftist parents".  This guy once hounded a guy who supported a large family on only his income for applying for Food Stamps, and referred to me as a moocher because my son, who I've adopted through the Foster Care system and is Medicaid eligible.

These types are the worst. They typically bring politics up all the time and are very aggressive in presenting their (almost always delusional) views. Then they turn around and get extremely defensive/angry when anyone disagrees with them. You almost have to walk on eggshells just to avoid some kind of meltdown from them.

[Fuzzy Says: "Abolish NPR!"]

A guy who listened to Limbaugh all day, called me a RINO, and once referred to my Mom and Dad (now deceased) who were lifelong Democrats as my "leftist parents".  This guy once hounded a guy who supported a large family on only his income for applying for Food Stamps, and referred to me as a moocher because my son, who I've adopted through the Foster Care system and is Medicaid eligible.

These types are the worst. They typically bring politics up all the time and are very aggressive in presenting their (almost always delusional) views. Then they turn around and get extremely defensive/angry when anyone disagrees with them. You almost have to walk on eggshells just to avoid some kind of meltdown from them.

He's one of those folks that view all Democrats as scum. 

I grew up a Democrat and was a Democratic activist as a young man.  I've moved to the right on social issues, but I'm a labor union man and I support single payer healthcare, so I'm not a down-the-line conservative.  I don't think all Democrats hate America, but this guy does. 

This guy is really a classic Social Darwinist.  He believes he'll win any dog-eat-dog contest by sheer will and conditioning.