Perhaps this is what art is at this point. Crafting a piece that can get people outraged, get them to invest time and finger activity over an opinion that perhaps the author doesn't even care about. It's just to cause a stir in people. I think there are a lot of people who just listen to podcasts to tune out the emptiness of their day. Why does it matter if the auditory input is a podcast, or terrible music, or the drone of daily life? I don't think the author does. I think like you said, it's just to stir the pot to get eyes on an ad. That seems like a fun job.

Thank you. I wish newspapers would stop this deceptive practice or openly mark the "article" as an ad. It's far worse than clickbait titles to me since I can immediately spot the clickbait, but you won't realize the article is an ad until you've read the damn thing.