Extreme binary ideations

The problem with making progress in gaining a more certain hold and depth in truths is that the tendency manifests to collapse the daemonic structure into a polarity; for example, the idea that gender is immutable and that current gender roles and norms are fixed absolutely or near-absolutely is met with the counter-idea that as I heard a feminist say recently, "gender is something we made up". No, gender is not something we "made up", but the falsity of that claim does not belie the fact that there is truth in the idea that gender is also a social and historical construct. The task of parsing something like gender and gender norms into more subtle and accurate ideations is hindered by the existential tendency to psychologically collapse a counter-position into a polarized state in order to make one's position against the alternative position more certain, stronger and momentarily effective.

When it comes to race, culture, gender, these ideations are especially prone to polarization. Polarization increases effectiveness in the short term by reducing the number of access points into the larger reality -- by reducing the number of access points one prevents the "impetus" of one's position, argument or sentiment from dispersing across more existential coordinates. This polarization is an example of applied utilitarianism, and is counter to progressing truthfully.

Then as if this weren't bad enough, we have the meta-polarity where people's "position, argument or sentiment" starts to identify itself against the other polarity-form of the opposing side, rather than against the actual reality of the opposing side... So not only are there falsely reduced-collapsed polarities but these polarities begin to discount the reality that resides in the other side, further legitimizing the false and cloaking truths. The method goes something like, at the unconscious level, "well I can just hyperbolize the other side and make my own position even more effective, and anyway they're hyperbolizing my view so if I don't follow suit I'll be left behind as less effective". It's a double-pincer sort of logical bind, commonly we call it ego.

Gender, race, culture, these are partly social-historical constructs and partly not social-historical constructs, which means that the "construction" comes from somewhere deeper in the reality beyond mere construction, and that deeper reality is also in part delimited and either affirmed or resisted (made more or less effective) in terms of the constructs that do exist. Either-or logic breaks down the approach to truth into a fragmentation of existential and phenomenological substances, severely limiting the development of being.