1. Who posts the mosts? The open structure of social media naturally leads to an environment where the more extreme voices dominate. As documented by the researcher Chris Bail and others, a very small percentage of platform users account for the majority of posts on political and moral topics. Moderate users tend to post very seldom on such topics.

2. This is me. Most users’ primary motivations for posting is to shape their online identity and to increase their status (evidenced by likes, responses, follows, etc.) It is a very different environment from in-person conversations. Consider your own case: are there certain things that you avoid posting, in order to carefully shape how others view you?

As Professor Bail puts it:

We use social media as a mirror to decipher our place in society but… it functions more like a prism that distorts our identities, empowers status-seeking extremists, and renders moderates all but invisible.

(By the way… wanting to increase status does not necessarily make you or others bad people! It is normal.)

3. Warrioring works. An easy and effective way for partisans to gain status is by posting caustic criticisms of people and ideas on the other side. The goal is not learning or mutual understanding, but rather, painting a maximally unflattering picture of opponents in order to excite and appeal to their own “tribe.”

4. When it’s all we see… The prevalence of polarizing posts on social media creates a false impression of how far apart left-leaning and right-leaning citizens in the US really are. This in turn has led to national polarization, which is making governance of our society nearly impossible. Here is a graph from the independent Pew Research showing how partisan feelings have evolved in recent years.