When people are powerless for a long period of time, all they learn is the "language" of power, and every issue is cast as a life-or-death struggle where you are either with them or against them. When such people are close to attaining power, actually achieving it is the only thing that matters to them. They often become just as dogmatic oppressors as the people they fought against. It takes time to learn higher-level "languages" like empathy, or justice, or reasoned argument, and typically these skills can only be learned in a situation where you have a certain baseline of personal power. And so you get see-saw effects where the groups on top change but nothing is ever more just about the society.

I can see this dynamic with certain Hacker News personalities who've been in powerless positions in the past and hence frame every comment as an us vs. them struggle, and it also explains the political history of numerous countries (eg. Russia, Rwanda, Israel/Palestine) in the modern era. It's a very common theme in arts & literature as well, eg. 1984, The Hunger Games, The Who ("Won't get fooled again"), South Park.

I've experienced this as conservative christian, and I only realized how black and white my world-view had become once I 'got out'.

I could be wrong though. I generally avoid these 'communities' for the reason the author describes.