Online discourse rewards simple, maximalist positions, and yeah I think you're right that there are plenty of people for whom those positions are the only foundation they have. The pandemic was quite depressing imo in how it exposed the paper-thin nature of so many people's politics, at least on social media. Suddenly you had vocal Maoists realizing that, actually, restrictions on individual liberty are bad when they happen to them. Or people will be 100% ACAB until sex crimes are mentioned and then that all goes out the window. The ACAB Left were completely incoherent on the Lucy Letby case too, to give a more recent, concrete example. There's no consistency to any of it, and you'll go insane trying to make it make sense
Online discourse rewards simple, maximalist positions, and yeah I think you're right that there are plenty of people for whom those positions are the only foundation they have. The pandemic was quite depressing imo in how it exposed the paper-thin nature of so many people's politics, at least on social media. Suddenly you had vocal Maoists realizing that, actually, restrictions on individual liberty are bad when they happen to them. Or people will be 100% ACAB until sex crimes are mentioned and then that all goes out the window. The ACAB Left were completely incoherent on the Lucy Letby case too, to give a more recent, concrete example. There's no consistency to any of it, and you'll go insane trying to make it make sense