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Political pluralism is nice when you are discussing things like tax levels or investment targets, but a lot of "us vs them" arises from discussions like "I just want to exist in the open without prosecution" vs "your very existence is a problem and needs to be prevented".

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I would argue that one of the most effective steps you can take in a situation like that is to establish pluralistic institutions where people get to know each other in person, as fellow human beings.

What does this change? 100 years ago people were writing angry letters to the American newspapers about women suffrage being an obvious sign of mental disease spreading in the society. You think people writing those letters were isolated from women and didn't know them?

I actually think it is quite possible that the people writing those letters, for the most part, didn't have any healthy relationships with women. Or healthy relationships with suffragettes, at least.

And I would argue that where religious motivations are involved, reason and empathy utterly fail. Dogma trumps all.

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