Whatever happened to the rules about "polite mixed company?"

When I was growing up and getting worldly enough to be able to converse about such things, it was drummed into me that one didn't discuss sensitive subjects like politics, sex or religion in polite mixed company. This was to avoid any potential conflicts with those whose opinions might differ and therefore avoid any arguments and resulting hard feelings.

But recently, I've been noticing an interesting but disquieting behavioral trend. I've been noticing the differences in conversation "manners" and how they seem to differ between those of political conservatives compared to those of liberals. Before I get too far into this, perhaps I should mention that several liberal friends of mine have told me over the years that they think I'm more of a moderate. Perhaps that will allow me a little wiggleroom here in terms of what I'm about to say.

With all the political intensity of the past several years, I've been witness to many a conversation about politics and world affairs. Very few of these started out to be such or were held at events or venues that could be considered political. And very few of these conversations were amongst people who were known to have similar political leanings - in fact, either quite the opposite was true or the potential for such was high. Yet most of these conversations have shared a common characteristic; they were initiated by individuals of the liberal persuasion making a rather loud and often very out-of-context political statement.

What is interesting about this is that in all of these occasions, these potentially-inflammatory comments were made with no regard for the possibility that anyone in earshot could have a differing opinion or could feel outright offended by what was said.

So, my question is this; what ever happened to avoiding such sensitive topics in gatherings where there could be resulting tensions, hard feelings and whatnot? When did our society become so divided politically that we ceased focusing on the things that bind us to a common culture, or brought us together as friends in the first place, or our common interests in the activities of a club or group and so on? When instead did cramming one's political opinions down everyone else's throats in the vicinity become a more noble goal?

Whatever happened to keeping our opinions to ourselves unless we're asked for them first? And what's wrong with if we do have to oblige and actually give an opinion, doing so in more hushed tones and finish by saying, "but this really isn't the time or place to discuss politics, so why don't we change the subject?"

Perhaps in the interests of conflict resolution we should revisit the rules of polite society and avoid the conflict before it ever starts by just keeping our opinions on sensitive topics to ourselves unless we're in a venue where open political debate is truly welcome. Perhaps in this way, we all could instead focus on those things that bind us together.