There’s a vast valley between the mountains of the right and the left. The two sides could meet there, and you’ll oftentimes find people on the right standing around in our proverbial valley calling up to those on Mt. Leftist to come down to discuss, debate, or make peace.

Every now and again, someone will come down from the leftist mountain and engage with those on the right. Sometimes they do in fact make peace, sometimes they are even converted and reside on the right. No matter what the outcome of the leftist in the valley is, those on the high and mighty leftist mountain will treat that person as an outcast.

One of the laws of the left is that you’re not allowed to engage those on the right with civility. There can be no peace, no understanding, and no problem-solving. The residents of Mt. Leftist gain nothing from it. The religious-like fervor of their belief system must remain pure and untouched. Any introduction of outside ideals and the product they are selling rots like a decaying time-lapse Apple.

So any leftists who dare enter the valley, or say anything that may make it seem that conversing with the right may be a solid idea, then they must be punished harshly and swiftly.

We saw that happen with former member of The Young Turks, Dave Rubin, who not only engaged with the right but eventually was won over by it. He is now one of the most hated people by the left, specifically by social justice warriors. It doesn’t help that Rubin is gay, and denounces much of the social justice ideology. Rubin is not supposed to exist.

We saw that happen with YouTuber Laci Green who was once considered one of the biggest social justice warriors in the game. One day, Green decided to talk with those on the right, and as she told Steven Crowder during an interview with him, the blowback she received was incredibly nasty.

Anger was even piled onto HBO host of Real Time, Bill Maher when he had Ben Shapiro on for a one on one conversation about their stances and beliefs. Maher indeed suffered backlash from even looking kindly in Shapiro’s general direction from the left, and it was perfectly summarized in an article from the Daily Beast by Marlow Stern which began “I’m not exactly sure what’s gotten into Bill Maher.”

The answer to Stern’s question is “maturity,” but he continues, salt pouring from every oraphace:

Over the past year-plus, the supposed liberal firebrand has seen eye to eye with the likes of bigoted performance artist Milo Yiannopoulos, Breitbart editor-in-chief Alex Marlow, New York Times hate-read specialist Bari Weiss, and NRA shill Colion Noir, bonding over issues ranging from transphobia and Islamophobia to guns and those pesky “PC” college kids. Armed with softball questions and weak insights, he’s allowed these rank opportunists to exploit his HBO platform for personal gain, casting them as thought leaders instead of the Trump-era trolls that they are.

Maher’s willingness to engage with people like Colion Noir is just too much for the left to handle. Maher humanized someone from the NRA, and for the left, that’s a grave sin. People from the NRA are supposed to be evil, with cloven hooves and blood stained hands. They’re not supposed to intelligent, articulate, and friendly. They’re especially not allowed to be black!

But Maher, Green, and Rubin actively engaged with the right as equals and that is a crime most severe. However, Mark Duplass is a different story. One day, Duplass decided to recommend to his Twitter followers that if they are to follow anyone from the right, it’s Shapiro.

“Fellow liberals,” began Duplass’s tweet. “If you are interested at all in “crossing the aisle” you should consider following Ben Shapiro. I don’t agree with him on much but he’s a genuine person who once helped me for no other reason than to be nice. He doesn’t bend the truth. His intentions are good.”

What followed was one of the most disgusting displays of hysteria against a leftist by leftists ever seen. Here are just a few. 

The blacklash Duplass faced was so intense that the actor not only deleted his tweet, he did a complete 180 and told everyone that he had made a mistake, and never wished to promote all the isms and phobias that the left likes to accuse the right of.

pic.twitter.com/DT9th08KGF

— Mark Duplass (@MarkDuplass) July 19, 2018

The ferocity of the left against Duplass for stepping out of line is so intense that Duplass, a man who typically engages civilly with the right, not only deleted the offending tweet, he tossed out his kind words about Shapiro who had helped him previously.

To be sure, Shapiro is none of the things he was accused of, and isn’t any of the labels listed off by Duplass. Shapiro does have points of intolerance, but none of these points are unfair, or without explanation. They certainly don’t originate from hatred.

But the leftists who lost their minds over this would never know that. They’ve never stopped to listen to Shapiro. They won’t, because the tribal mentality of the left says they can’t. Doing so is against the rules. Duplass broke the rules and is currently attempting to avoid punishment, the worst of which may cost him his career.

Let me be clear. Duplass’s entire livelihood, a lifetime of building himself up to the position he is now, may be undone because of the intolerance of the left against one, single tweet. This is as tragic as it is ridiculous.

The ignorant hatred that pervades our society is fueled by the fact that we lack knowledge of each other. Be it Republican or Democrat, Christian and LGBT, white and black, men and women, etc, etc, the proverbial valley in between in our country widens just a bit more every time someone who has the opportunity to talk peacefully with someone else, attempts to do so, and is punished for it.

This country will never fix its problems if we can’t talk to one another. There will always be unnecessary victims, and people in power who don’t deserve it because ignorance drove them there.

Those in the higher halls of the left are so guarded against discourse because many of the left’s positions are made up of easily destructible talking points. Ignorance is both the foundation and the glue that keeps their mountain standing, and if discourse were to openly happen, then ignorance would dissipate and the mountain would come tumbling down.

Rest assured, it’s not righteous fury that the left displays against the right, it’s fear. The cartoonish and sensational reactions by those in power whenever the right gains a victory, or a leftist begins to wander too far from the flock is due to the fact that without that ignorance, they lose power. They need you afraid, hateful, and dependent on them. They want you to believe the the people on the other mountain really are coming for you, and that they really want people to die horribly. They want you to believe that the right is nothing but a racist ideology who love their guns more than children, and don’t care about the poor.

Talk to many a right leaning American for more than a few minutes and you’ll find out that’s not the case at all. Talk to them for more than 30 and you might actually start to see they care about the people you’re told they hate. Talk to them for a few hours and you might start to see their points about certain subjects. Make friends with them, and over time you might find yourself siding with them on certain issues.

And therein lies the danger. You gained knowledge, and their grip on you loosened.

It’s tragic that Duplass walked back his comment because he really could have inspired people to gain knowledge by listening to Shapiro. To see the other side and hear what they have to say. Shapiro, however, is too articulate and convincing. He was too dangerous. For that simple tweet, Duplass had to be mobbed and made apologetic.