I suspect that that is largely promoted by the media. If you get a group of regular citizens together to talk, I believe we would listen to each other without all the hysteria.
Mr Soros play book divide and concur this has been his plan for years. Get into the school system and teach everyone that feeling out rank logic. BLM backed with Soros money. Antifa backed with Soros money. Gay parades funded with Soros money. Trying to split the country into as many groups as possible and have them fight against each other. It is no longer a Republican vs Democrat but a Trump vs anti Trump. Trump is trying to bring the people together under one group patriot. I think when the bad people in the government [JOD, FBI. CIA.] And the people in are exposed it will be a little easier to bring people together.
Nearly one-third of US voters believe we're on the verge of a Civil War according to Rasmussen poll. -- USA Today
I think a lot of times polls are brought out of wish full thinking. Like the polls on the election Hillary/Trump. I think if the whole truth comes out the anti Trump will get a shock and learn who their real enemy was.
The liberals are the more violent faction when there is no danger of opposition shooting back, but I think the conservative faction would win decidedly should conflict break out. It depends on the U.S. military, of course, and where the fall out, but if civilians go head-to-head with each other, gun-toting, Bible-clinging folks will win out. If you read about the Revolution, only about a third of the population were willing to fight, and some really nasty things went on that would be considered terrorism today.
With the Leftist current obsession of eliminating Free Speech (for everyone but themselves), and promoting censorship (against everyone but themselves), it's good to see at least one prepared to stand up to them: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-10-01/alex-jones-sues-paypal-infowars-ban-over-hate-intolerance ...now if only more would grow a backbone and sue Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc., be it for no other reason than to expose their shady agenda to the light.
A note from the Hoover Institution on this: https://www.hoover.org/research/where-are-todays-better-angels
The news media and social media. The internet is a cesspool of hate and misinformation. Oddly enough, real people in my life are pretty much as always... friendly, helpful, kind. It's the talking heads with their "spin" and hate spewed on social media (along with visual aids photo-chopped to suit the agenda) causing the divide.
I've gotten into the habit of looking at sources on social media because there's a significant number of posts that are just plain made up so that they can raise someone's hackles down the line.
The internet is the only way the real truth can come out. If we relied on MSM we would believe Hillary won the election and Trump is a Russian agent. The internet show us that when the MSM puts out its story we can go to the source and find out for ourselves and this is dangerous for them. This is why there are so many trolls on the internet trying to discredit it. Like the Q anon movement started on the internet now the main street media is doing everything to discredit it making ridiculous comparisons and hoping you will not read them because you will find the truth. Like when CNN said it is illegal for you to read wiki leaks you have to get it from us. All these stories lately of hate crimes pushed by the media it was only the social media that brought out the truth and then the MSM changed its story.
True, but there is false info on both sides of any argument. As @Al Amoling says, you must be aware of your sources.
I think most people on this forum know when they hear BS. So the choice is yours to be the filter of information and not some alt left or alt right fact checker.
Lincoln, Trump, and the Presidential War with the Press Some excerpts: "Those worried about the “unprecedented” partisanship and coarseness of public debate in the Trump era would feel right at home in the 1860's. ...when civil war erupted not long after he was inaugurated, Lincoln faced a news media environment that few leaders have confronted. “Public discourse was brutal in the Civil War,” says David Bulla, author of Lincoln Mediated: The President and the Press Through Nineteenth-Century Media. “No president has ever received as much vitriol in print as Lincoln.” As Harold Holzer chronicles in Lincoln and the Power of the Press, Lincoln used a combination of strong-arm and soft-power tactics to woo, cajole and influence the news media interests aligned with him and against him. Lincoln also had to deal with some very real “fake news” threats, from the New York World’s claim that the president planned to encourage interracial marriage, to the famous “Civil War gold hoax” in 1864 in which two New York reporters, in the hopes of profiting in the gold market, propagated the false story that Lincoln was drafting another 400,000 men into the Union Army. Like Trump, Lincoln kept close tabs on the media, including a file of “villainous articles.” He was even carrying news clippings praising his accomplishments in his pocket when he was assassinated. And much as Trump bypasses the press through the medium of Twitter, Lincoln also found ways to speak directly to the people, including through public letters (and private letters that he knew would be leaked). Still, Lincoln’s battles with the press were driven far more by the strategic concerns of winning a war and unifying a nation than by his personal political needs or grievances. “If anything,” says Bulla, “I think Lincoln would tell President Trump to stop being a president who craves media attention and to focus on achieving his policy initiatives.”