Good discussion. There’s an interesting data point here that could help explain why the “perspective taking” thing was so unsuccessful, and provides support for your caricature explanation. It was a survey taken last year, which found (among other things) that self-identified Democrats think Republicans are a lot more indifferent toward racism than they actually are, and that self-identified Republicans think Democrats have far more anti-American sentiments than they actually do. Higher levels of education (for liberals) and greater consumption of the Fake News Media were correlated with greater polarization.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/republicans-and-democrats-dont-understand-each-other/592324/
(And we haven’t even gotten to President Trump or religion)