I know I'm supposed to bemoan the polarization of America and the increasing compartmentalization of our society, but I've never been quite sure why. Were I crafting a Craigslist ad to rent out a room in my house, I'd surely mention the place is inhabited by three professional progressives and a lefty engineer who's kept his amateur status. That might deter conservatives, but it'd also keep them from getting jumped at the dinner table.
Indeed, when liberalism and conservatism are shorthands for a lifestyle, you see how polarized this country is not. It wasn't long ago when the questions being debated in this country were whether blacks could enter your neighborhood, whether the American system of government was irredeemably sick and in need of replacement, and how cowardly or crafty it was to escape the draft. Now some of us think our neighbors watch shitty TV shows, eat too much/little red meat, and should listen to more soothing talk radio stations. We're polarized, sure, but we embrace the polarization so enthusiastically because it's so fundamentally harmless. Indeed, for all the concern over preferences expressed in Craigslist ads, it used to be that others were kept out of your neighborhood not by an addendum to a classified, but by law.
