After reading thousands of comments on the No Kings rallies, I can tell you this: the real divide in America isn’t left or right, it’s between the curious and the unquestioning.

Five things on my mind after reading people’s comments on the social media coverage of the No Kings Rally…

1. People live inside their own bubbles.

Many are genuinely shocked or angry when they see how many people disagree with their worldview. So much that they have to convince themselves those people are not even from here. They are simply not exposed to different perspectives, both because of the company they keep and because their algorithms are designed to prevent that. What they see online reinforces what they already believe until it feels like absolute truth.

I have been doing a quiet little experiment for the last five years across several pages I run. Each page reflects a completely different persona. One is extremely left leaning, one is extremely right leaning, one is my own page as an independent, one is a trad wife, and one focuses entirely on adorable animals and positive family content. What is fascinating is that if I only believed the worldview that came through any one of those accounts, I would live in complete misunderstanding of how the majority of the world actually thinks.

2. Curiosity is disappearing.

I do not align with either political party. As someone who loves this country deeply, it is discouraging to see how little curiosity exists anywhere. Real patriotism means being willing to listen, learn, and evolve. Extremism shuts that down completely. Learning is frowned upon. Changing your mind is seen as weakness.

It reminds me so much of my experience in organized religion. I was taught many things about people who were not part of it and those people who left it. When I myself left, I realized how inaccurate those beliefs were. I had been trained not to be curious about the other side, and because of that, I spent years judging people who were actually a lot like me. Just farther down the road. I was raised in deep US verses THEM, and I know with absolute clarity how hard it is to escape that mindset. When you are fully entrenched in it, you literally cannot see outside of it, and seeing anything with curiosity feels like weakness, when in truth it is a strength that most are absolutely incapable of showing.

3. Coward accounts are everywhere.

These are not usually fake accounts. They are created by real people who are not brave enough to show their own faces. You will see their main profiles filled with smiling family photos, vacations, and church gatherings, but behind the scenes they run secondary secret accounts used to post hate, mock others, or attack anyone who challenges their beliefs.

They hide behind words like patriot or Christian, twisting them into excuses for cruelty. I have removed many from my following this week. If you cannot stand by your words publicly, if you need a second identity to spread contempt, you do not belong in my community.

4. This is not a game.

Too many people treat politics like a team sport, cheering for their side to win. One side is shouting about victory and power, and everyone else is standing there thinking, are you kidding? There is no winning here. This is democracy we are talking about. It is supposed to be all of us.

What makes this even more concerning is that it mirrors a classic cult tactic. When one individual becomes the center of a movement and can do no wrong, followers begin adjusting their beliefs around that person’s actions. It stops being about truth or integrity and becomes about loyalty. The goal shifts from serving the country to protecting the image of one man.

There is a reason why so many people who are deeply religious feel comfortable in this movement. It feels familiar. It provides a clear structure of right and wrong, a cause to defend, and an authority to rally behind. Even when the man at the center of their faith would likely be in direct opposition to most of what they claim to believe, the comfort of certainty overrides the discomfort of questioning.

There is often an assumption that there is an equivalent dynamic on the other side, but that is not the case. People who are not extreme right do not have a single leader they follow without question. They may disagree on policy, culture, or candidates, but their beliefs are not built around blind devotion to one figure. That difference matters, because once loyalty replaces accountability, it becomes almost impossible to engage with curiosity, reason, or truth.

And if you still think the people at the No Kings rallies were bussed in from somewhere else, I invite you to look closer. Thirty five percent of Idahoans voted against this administration. They are not outsiders. They are our neighbors, our coworkers, and our family members. Pretending otherwise is a way of avoiding discomfort, but denial has never been a path to truth.

5. Idaho’s growth is not making it more liberal.

Many assume people moving here from other states are bringing progressive change, but the data shows the opposite. Most were registered Republicans when they arrived from other states. Even Fox News has confirmed this. If you scroll down, you’ll see ample resources if you’re still not believing it.

There are so many people commenting that it is outsiders causing the divide, but the numbers tell a different story. The migration is not shifting us toward the middle, it is pulling us further into the extremes.

And here is what all of this really shows me:

It is interesting for me because I have opinions that fall in both camps. But what I am seeing, the absolute ugliness, the cruelty, the dehumanization, is coming from both extremes. That tells me the problem is not “left or right”. It is that we have allowed the loudest, angriest people to take over the conversation, usually without a trace of critical thought. We need to silence the extremes, not each other. Because if we do not, there will not be anything left worth fighting for.

If we want this country to survive, the middle has to get louder.

If the Middle Stays Quiet, the Extremes Will Define Us

NATALIE

NAVIGATION

If the Middle Stays Quiet, the Extremes Will Define Us

Just Throw the Party

NATALIE

NAVIGATION