Polarizing

Why is it so common for people to view things in a polarized manner? such as: "If you're not with me you're against me" "Democrat vs Republican" It pigeonholes the possible perspectives. (I request this topic stays away from gender issues as that is already in other topics. This is for the human psyche. And why large groups of people tend to polarize[not necessarily educated individuals] or the media will tend to push polarization in a topic.)

We have a strong need to categorize things. Like with animals. I think we extend categorizing to people because we definitely have a fear of each other. Cannibalism was and still is a thing. Maybe people are sort of afraid of being consumed in some way? Like their way of thinking will die if they don't cling to it. Besides the fact of dealing with a this or that issue is a whole lot simpler. Human beings are also lazy.

I guess in you case of categorizing: The term polarizing would be categorizing with only two categories. [Is Cannable] or [Is Not Cannable] but is the case of carnivore/herbivore we widely use [Is Carnivore] [Is Herbivore] [Is Omnivore] Why are some things polarized and other not?

I guess it speaks to the primal, animalistic need in us to know immediately if a person or a situation is safe for us. Like during cavemen days, I think? We automatically need to know if this food is safe or not, if this animal is stronger than me or not, or if this person/tribe is going to kill me/my tribe. Maybe our brains are just wired that way because of survival instincts -- pro-anti, with me-against me, etc. It would be really interesting to see an anthropological and psychological standpoint on this topic, though. :)