> I don't see why someone "deserves to be fired" for their political views, no matter how racist, as long as they don't let their views impact the performance of their duties.

I agree if by "political views" you mean things like monetary policy or foreign policy. But I personally couldn't ask women to work with people who think they shouldn't be in the workplace, or LGBT people to work with people who think they're irredeemable abominations, or people of color to work with people who think they're inferior because of their race. To me, these views disqualify you from being a productive member of society and I don't really classify them as political views. For example, I don't think anti-semitism is a political view, I think it's just hatred and bigotry. Further, I'm mildly offended when I see people equating "bigotry against conservatives" with "bigotry against historically oppressed groups", because those oppressed groups have suffered intense physical harm. Conservatives really have not. Another reason this whole thing is a false equivalence.

> people are driven from moderate positions to the opposite extremist positions, because the people harassing them are just so unreasonable, and moderate leftists like yourself have zero sympathy for them. This is one way radicalization can happen.

Mostly I agree, but I don't think that in general "the people who are harassing them" are being unreasonable. I think culture in the US is largely sexist, racist, and homophobic and we've gotten used to it as we've grown up in it. It's not hard to find someone saying something offensive. I do think it's a shame that otherwise good people are caught up in stuff like this. But I think it's worse that women, LGBT people, and people of color have had to live in this culture.

> But I personally couldn't ask women to work with people who think they shouldn't be in the workplace, or LGBT people to work with people who think they're irredeemable abominations, or people of color to work with people who think they're inferior because of their race.

I understand the distaste, but as long as they don't actually harass, abuse or otherwise mistreat them, what's the real problem here? That you don't like their thoughts? Are we policing people's thoughts now?

> I don't really classify them as political views.

Fine, cultural views, philosophical views, the game doesn't matter because you change the words. If you were working with someone from another culture, say, Saudi Arabia, you'd make allowances for cultural differences. Right and left really are different cultural perspectives, and your position is that we should make no allowances here simply because we were all raised geographically close to each other, despite our cultural differences. Or you're saying we can make some allowances, but not others, but then I would ask, why those allowances specifically?

> It's not hard to find someone saying something offensive. I do think it's a shame that otherwise good people are caught up in stuff like this.

But why the focus only on good people? My point is that harassing even the bad people just drives them further into a badder circle that will take them in and shelter them, because they see themselves as victimized. Whether they're right or wrong is immaterial, because it ultimately leads to more polarization, not understanding and reconciliation.

I think you're focusing too much on "bigotry against conservatives" as some kind of wrong in and of itself, the way you view bigotry against the historically oppressed, but that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that bigotry of any kind probably yields just more bigotry, and eliminating bigotry can only be achieved by exposure and intermingling among people with differences. If you're continually driving away people who initially hate you, they will simply continue to hate you, instead of coming to see you as a person.