I think we fight it in the way suggested, Stu.

>i>we need to avoid getting lost in arguing through facts and logic, and counter the populist messages of passion and anger with our own similar messages. We need to understand and use social media. We need to harness a different fear. Fear of another World War nearly stopped World War 2, but didn't. We need to avoid our own echo chambers. Trump and Putin supporters don't read the Guardian, so writing there is just reassuring our friends. We need to find a way to bridge from our closed groups to other closed groups, try to cross the ever widening social divides.

I have made a start and am trying to cross bridges on Facebook by attempting to put certain fallacies to rest. It is an uphill struggle, as we see over and over again on here, but if enough people try we may may just make a difference.

Every time you see the soundbites of hate like 'Immigrants are to blame' or 'Muslims are terrorists', put the perfectly valid and opposing view in a polite but passionate way. 'Big business is to blame' and 'Terrorists are criminals' are equally pithy and just as valid.

Stop supporting media that support the hate messages. I cancelled my Sky subscription earlier this year. I fully intend to maintain my boycott of anything to do with the Murdoch empire and most of the other media and urge others to do the same.

Be a pain in the arse on here and elsewhere both on the internet and in real life. Not sure how we go about that. Oh, hang on...

Cheers

:D tG