Permanent Polarization

We so often hear laments nowadays about how polarized our politics have become and how difficult it is for left and right to agree on anything. Yet when half of the country holds as unquestionable dogma what the other half considers utter nonsense it's hard to see how polarization could ever be avoided.

Here, for example, are a couple dozen beliefs most progressives apparently hold that conservatives consider utterly foolish, immoral or insane. It's hard to see how agreement, or compromise, on most of them could ever be achieved - or even should be:

• Open borders are good national policy
• Our economy is thriving and there's nothing wrong with an ever-burgeoning national debt
• Fossil fuels and nuclear energy must be abolished
• Police forces should be defunded, criminals should not be prosecuted, and people who live in cities should just accept crime as part of the price of urban living.
• Men can menstruate and get pregnant
• Men should be allowed to compete in sports against women and access women's private spaces
• No one can say what a woman is
• It makes sense to use "they" and "them" when talking about a single individual
• Obesity is healthy
• The media can be trusted to be fair and accurate
• Racial reparations and student loan forgiveness are just and reasonable policies
• All whites, and only whites, are racist
• Valuing merit in any intellectual pursuit is white supremacy
• Surgically transing minors is good mental health practice and does not constitute child abuse
• Drag performances for minors are harmless
• Pornography in school libraries is acceptable
• Abortion should be legal at any point until, and even after, delivery.
• Masking kids and keeping them out of school for over a year during the pandemic was wise
• The Constitution is a "living document" and should be interpreted according to current social and ideological fashion
• There is no objective truth about morality
• No culture or way of life is any better than any other culture or way of life
• Human beings are no more special than any other intelligent mammal
• Religious influences should be excluded from the public square

These beliefs, and others that readers can probably think of, have become orthodoxy among progressive Democrats over the last decade or so. If there are any Democrats who doubt them they're certainly keeping their reservations to themselves which is one reason why our political polarization is very likely permanent.