In years past, my go-to word in describing our political condition was “polarization.” I used it endlessly and still do on occasion.

But as time has moved on, and the divide has only grown in depth and toxicity, polarization no longer seems to fully capture the magnitude of what has overtaken us.

In its place, I have largely turned to the word “tribal” as a more accurate depiction. American politics and broader culture at the quarter-point of this century are marked by a tribalism not all that different from the feudal clans of medieval Europe, the African tribes that continue to hold back much of that continent, and the ethnic nationalism that led to the Balkan brutality of the 1990s.

For many, too many, of our countrymen, their affiliation with team red or team blue is definitional and all-encompassing.

There are innumerable causes of this contagion. The practice of curating our media sources as we would a playlist is high on that list. Though, for my money, the largest contributor to this grand fracture goes by a single word: Algorithm.

On a conceptual level, algorithms need not be divisive or problematic. The dictionary defines an algorithm as “a procedure for solving a mathematical problem (as of finding the greatest common divisor) in a finite number of steps that frequently involves repetition of an operation.”

That sounds harmless enough, if over the head of most of us lacking degrees in advanced mathematics.

In practical terms, algorithms are a key component of the internet. Per the website, Nerd News for Normal People (got to love it), “When you type a query into a search engine, the algorithm analyzes billions of web pages to find the most relevant results for you. Similarly, social media algorithms determine which posts you see on your feed based on factors like your interests and interactions.”

It is that latter piece that is so divisive, having technologically sorted us into warring camps. The algorithm serves to show us more and more of what we react to, either in shared agreement or shared hatred.

So many live in social media bubbles with “friends” or “followers” overwhelmingly of like mind. The algorithm reinforces that and dials it up to maximum volume. In the process, one’s viewpoint is constantly bolstered and intensified, and only rarely challenged.

The result has been to make social media a tool of tribal identity. Those who find solidarity with MAGA become ever more animated in that loyalty. On the flip side, those who get out of bed every morning thinking that MAGA is destroying the country find nothing but concurrence and amplification.

By providing a constant dose of what binds one to his or her tribe, the algorithm accelerates the country’s core split. Critical analysis and independent thought fall victim.

Let’s illustrate with a few recent issues. On the subject of undocumented immigrants, deportations and ICE roundups, one side is fed a steady supply of stories of persons here illegally committing violent crimes, abusing public dollars and acting aggressively toward law enforcement. While their opposites receive a comparably one-sided litany of families separated, danger back in the individual’s home country and masked ICE officers acting with belligerence.

Suffice to say that life is more complex and neither side is receiving anything approaching a full and balanced picture.

Or take the ouster and arrest of Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro. Those predisposed to like the current administration hear only of the President’s boldness and the joy of many Venezuelans, both at home and in south Florida, at Maduro’s involuntary exit. Those committed to oppose the administration are exposed solely to questions of presidential authority and doubts as to what comes next.

Or with respect to the current upheaval in Minnesota, one mass of social media users gets an unending drumbeat of immigrant fraud schemes and harassment of ICE officers while their mirror images receive a torrent of stories about a dead Colorado woman, the nobility of resisters and the fear in communities under siege.

Due to the almighty algorithm, social media today brings to mind the old high school football cheer, “Hit ‘em again, hit ‘em again, harder, harder.”

That made for a fun expression of teenage aggression and allegiance. But it hardly answers the call of a contentious age that demands adult thinking beyond our self-imposed boxes. Where reason, rationality, and consideration of other viewpoints are needed, we are instead served doses after doses of tribal dopamine and demonization.

Algorithms are really nothing more than computer code. That programming across platforms now favors division and tribal cohesion. Such code could just as easily give preference to the sharing of conflicting viewpoints and the exchange across hardened political lines.

Were it only so.

Eric Sondermann is a Colorado-based independent political commentator. He writes regularly for Colorado Politics and The Gazette. Reach him at EWS@EricSondermann.com; follow him at @EricSondermann