An interesting article about how current perception of left versus right could be a wrong way of describing polarization in the US and also in other countries.
As the article notes and I have also sensed it over the last few years that social groups are becoming smaller and smaller, each having a niche unifying ideology. It is called atomization, or the scattering of people — not into two opposing factions but into countless smaller tribes. The article reports the results of survey by Pew that [shows](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2026/06/10/beyond-red-vs-blue-the-political-typology/) that Americans are divided politically not in two but nine groups. As quoted below:
>Like groups of atoms, those subsets can form — and dissolve — at quicksilver pace, leaving people in ever-tinier bubbles, devoid of connection with one another and the larger social fabric. Even subgroups have subgroups, dividing amoeba-like into combative factions, creating a nation of us vs. them and them and them.
Some drivers of such extreme atomization include the American ideals of personal freedoms and individualism, and increasingly the internet, which offers everyone everything, no matter now niche and creates an overstimulated, distracted, and fragmented online world. Also, in a such atomized society, many popular influencers have audiences greater than those of traditional media outlets. Such niche social groups creates social bubbles (echo chambers), which reinforce and validate each others views, no matter how misinformed, hateful, and racist they are.
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An interesting article about how current perception of left versus right could be a wrong way of describing polarization in the US and also in other countries.
As the article notes and I have also sensed it over the last few years that social groups are becoming smaller and smaller, each having a niche unifying ideology. It is called atomization, or the scattering of people — not into two opposing factions but into countless smaller tribes. The article reports the results of survey by Pew that [shows](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2026/06/10/beyond-red-vs-blue-the-political-typology/) that Americans are divided politically not in two but nine groups. As quoted below:
>Like groups of atoms, those subsets can form — and dissolve — at quicksilver pace, leaving people in ever-tinier bubbles, devoid of connection with one another and the larger social fabric. Even subgroups have subgroups, dividing amoeba-like into combative factions, creating a nation of us vs. them and them and them.
Some drivers of such extreme atomization include the American ideals of personal freedoms and individualism, and increasingly the internet, which offers everyone everything, no matter now niche and creates an overstimulated, distracted, and fragmented online world. Also, in a such atomized society, many popular influencers have audiences greater than those of traditional media outlets. Such niche social groups creates social bubbles (echo chambers), which reinforce and validate each others views, no matter how misinformed, hateful, and racist they are.
https://preview.redd.it/6sufag3pmzih1.png?width=840&format=png&auto=webp&s=1d211425db542ff3749a4ab220ad5dfd7db1b5a0
The nine splits in the US political idealogies.
Atomization should be seen as a positive for Neoliberals. The alternative is collectivism.