>> I feel like WYSIWYG politics is what most of us want, but probably doesn’t actually work.

> then WYSIWYG politics will emerge as a preferred choice.

I think the problem that Waterluvian's is getting at is precisely that WYSIWYG politics is taken as the preferred choice without understanding the implications that make it not actually work. For example, continuing to accept anything that remotely passes as protect-the-children politics without understanding that the consequences are worse than the benefits, even for the children themselves.

> If the quality of those two goes up, then WYSIWYG politics will emerge as a preferred choice.

If the quality of those two goes up, hopefully people start employing second-order thinking and beyond and realize that WYSIWYG politics may not be what it seems to be at the surface level.

Unfortunately, both low education for the general public and low quality of the public discourse exist by design.

The only possible way to remedy this is to maximize your own ability to exert power, possibly by becoming massively rich, and then hope it doesn't corrupt you enough along the way such that you can still enact good in the end.

>I only wish I knew of possible ways for us to get there :(

Entropy. Things will dissolve enough that eventually someone will make changes. It takes a long time though, this is likely a feature.

Ive noticed that when people say we need more education or we need to teach critical thinking or something like that often what they really mean is "It is obvious my position is the intelligent one and those who have a different position are ignorant and foolish and if they just knew more, or were smarter they'd obviously really then superiority of what I advocate for over whatever they believe now."

Which is just the saying as "I'm right you're wrong" without adding any value. Most politically contentious issues have at their root a difference of value or tradeoffs, and it is only by understanding that we can really have civil discourse and reduce the polarization. And to be clear if you believe that the difference in value is simply between evil and good, e.g. everyone who belongs to Party A loves puppies and wants to bring happiness and love where anyone who votes for candidate B wants to revive Rasputin and unleash the legions of hell. You are part of the problem. (And if you're immediate response to this is to point out how Bernie/Trunp/Tredau/Harambee actually does want to feed puppies to Morgoth you're part of the problem)

I think it’s more a consequence of the wealthy elites being one hundred percent comfortable with lying to get their way and not caring for the reaction from the rest of us. You know, sociopaths.