I think part of the problem is the circumstances of two people meeting on social media. It's like one of those break-the-ice prompts for new coworkers, but inst

I think part of the problem is the circumstances of two people meeting on social media. It's like one of those break-the-ice prompts for new coworkers, but instead of lighthearted nonsense, the card says "the gays are evil, discuss!". In the real world, two very different people might meet and start to build a history and a good deal of rapport and trust with each other before ever getting anywhere close to a divisive issue. When they do eventually get there, without a mob watching, without the fear of every word going in the permanent record, the conversation would likely be far less of a dumpster fire, and minds might actually be changed. As it is, a lot of the discourse you see online is indescribably bad, and I think a lot of it is down to throwing two strangers into a conversation that they would never naturally arrive at upon first meeting.