Have "likes" and "kudos" polarized our society?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Obviously I'm not the first one with this idea, but is this common social media format part of what's responsible for the divided in our society?

You join a social group, and get addicted to the stimuli of people liking your stuff. Then the more liberal or conservative or atheist or religious or whatever your little niche group is, the more likes you get, which socially engineers your opinions to line up that way also. Hence everybody ends up living in political or religious bubbles because of basically getting stuck in a loop of positive feedback.

The more I've thought about it, I think this is probably the number one reason that our society is so divided right now, people don't even want to venture outside of their normal comfort zone because there are no "likes" to be had for them out there.

Also I've noticed that on here one of the easiest ways to get kudos is attacking someone who co mes in with an opposing opinion.  I'm sure it's the same on every platform. This spills over to real life, you get conditioned to attack opposing opinions.

Are the machines programming us?

Thoughtful replies appreciated.

I thnk we're divided because most people seem to care more about reality-TV-style confrontation than IRL discussion. Argumentative as I can be online, I'm not like this IRL unless I feel that the issue demands intransigence -- and how often is that?

I rarely get kudos for having a go at someone here. Most of mine come when I'm pithy and good-hearted.

TBH, I think it's not "kudos" or likes that empower the cuntbags of the world, but rather the anonymity of the 'Net. I see folks regularly run their mouth in a forum who wouldn't say shit if they had a mouthful in real life. That anonymity is what, I think, builds both divides and echo-chambers.