I have ALWAYS HATED feeling like a pawn to these algorithms!! I have an extremely sensitive radar for detecting when I'm being controlled so intuitively have literally never clicked on an ad online. But as you say, there's more to it than ads, it's also about options presented when searching and the only way around it is to hunt deeper. Time consuming but I agree that polarization is downright dangerous - politically, culturally, economically, and socially.

You've done a great job explaining this @cryptogee, and as always I admire your agile and sophisticated thinking!