re: I figured out why reddit's r/politics is such a liberal echo chamber cesspool

Agreed, i see it slung from each side.
To me, it feels like both sides see those issues as dog whistles and rush to defend their side immediately. Both sides come in assuming the other side will be vitriolic, hyperbolic, wrong, and trolling and thinks that by being all of those things first, they somehow win. The other side sees that and rather than abandon the thread (as many do) they take offense to that ignorance and engage in the same tactics. All intelligent discourse is thrown out the window because everyone wants to be right and everyone wants to win. However, this isn't some game where you can hit the buzzer-beater, send your team home with the trophy, and f$&k the prom queen, this is the internet.

When threads devolve into such flame wars, neither side throwing bombs wins, everyone loses because they were denied a chance to educate themselves, to challenge their minds and their opinions with differing perspectives. That is what conversation was invented to do, to enable the sharing of viewpoints.