But both sides have large numbers of people who are still thinking “if only those idiots would see the light then of course we could Solve Everything!!” And who are willing to go to (political) war to force the "idiots" to do what they obviously should.

Within each side, there is hiding a position that genuinely cares about other people. But on both sides, the way it is pursued is very often to just try to run over the other side.