It really changed the way I looked at and commented on things.

Reddit made me realize that going out of my way to thoughtfully argue a point is, in itself, pointless. I can spend an hour crafting a perfect response to something, and it will just get completely ignored. The only way you can get points (which are important in some cases, because they affect how likely your post is to be seen), or even have anyone see your post, is to be the first person in a thread to make some kinda clever one liner. I would spend time crafting a post, only for it to sit buried at 1 and receive no responses. Then, I'd turn around and see some pun get voted into the thousands and gilded multiple times. It was just frustrating to me.

I started trying to make comments that barely explained my point, but mostly just worked on top of an existent circle jerk that I knew people were going to vote up and discuss. At the same time, I would get really polarized on issues, because it was either that or have people ignore you. Nobody wanted to hear about your qualification, they wanted to hear you shout the message of their cause. It eventually wore off on me and I just moved on to meta subs, where at least some effort and moderation is appreciated.