I don't think it is a tangent at all, it just underlines the principle in even more stark ways than the other ones do: tribalism is a very powerful button to press and we're in an era now where you can be a 'tribe of one' with your mentality manipulated by extremely personalized targeting to steer you in a particular direction, no matter where you were born or what your original affiliations are.

It will take extreme mental fortitude and some degree of self isolation not to be pulled in. When I was 15 the peer pressure to start smoking, drinking and using drugs was absolutely off the charts. I stopped going to parties, basically. Until I was 13 or 14 or so it was ok and then from one moment to the next it stopped being fun. People don't like being confronted with their own idiocy and just having one reminder in a roomful of people that you're doing something stupid is apparently enough to become really aggressive against that person. Better if it isn't just you, so the first enlist some of your buddies.

That experience really helped me in many ways.

People in large groups are far more stupid than individuals, and the internet has tied people together into all kinds of weird large groups that reinforce their worst belief systems.