This is only possible if people, at scale, were voting based on merit, rather than tribalism.
Nowadays either side could run a literal vegetable and get near half the vote.
This botched view can only lead to the herd mentality of "if you're not like us, you're wrong", which in the US or South Korea has slowly turned to "if you're note like us, you're dangerous".
Democracy needs a personal implication into complex concepts that can't be answered with yes or no and many people lack the will to understand those concepts. Whoever comes forward and says "I'll handle this complex issue this way" will be the new messiah.
This now seems like the downside of bringing huge knowledge to the masses with the internet. Now that everyone knows everything, they don't want anything to do with it.
Maybe it's also linked to a current trend that you're supposed to have an opinion about everything happening. If you say that you're with the "magenta" party, everybody knows "your opinion" without the need of forging one yourself.
The writing style can be challenging at times, but it will answer some of your questions.
And if you don't want to play along with the 'winner-takes-all' dynamic, then by consequence you'll lose anyway.
Politics as the heart of deliberative democracy seems already like a long lost ideal, or maybe that is too romantic a thought and it never really was like this to begin with? Maybe I am just getting old.