[patrickaljord]

Shaming people for their opinions is a terrible tactic in a democracy. In a dictatorship it works amazing, just shame them, jail them if they persist or make them disappear if they're really stubborn. The problem with shaming people for their opinions in a democracy is that they will keep them secret all the way to the voting booth and take their revenge for the shaming there, and then everyone is surprised when candidates holding those ideas win. Maybe, if they were allowed to share their opinions publicly without being ostracized they wouldn't feel so strongly about them and they could easily be debated and proven wrong. What you're creating by shaming them is a huge hostility and a feeling of unfairness, and it just makes their will to their opinions stronger. Just some thoughts.

Another point, most of our grandparents were by today's standards homophobes, racists and misogynists, should we be shaming them too? How about people living in isolated parts of the country or other countries where these opinions are still popular? When I was growing up as a kid in Syria, I remember talking to people who were totally into islamism, if it weren't for my tolerant parents, I could be holding the same beliefs today. Here's another reason for not shaming people for their opinions, most of our opinions we hold for accidental geographical or parental reasons. Shaming people for where they were born or who they grew up with has a name for it, what could it be? Discrimination.

[notconservative]

I can say from first hand experience that this has happened. I know several closeted conservatives at my workplace and we all know that you shouldn't share your political leanings with anyone. Luckily there is some internal diversity of opinions. So, we can confront each other without consequences on things like immigration, labor issues, free trade, and social programs.

But, there are naturally areas where we all agree: guns, some other economic stuff, etc. So those opinions go completely unchallenged, where it'd be healthier to have liberal people to test those opinions.