I wonder how much of an illusion it is that losers have extreme views and winners have moderate views. After all, it’s only the winners who have something to lose.
Some winners let on that they have extreme views, but don’t spell them out (eg. Peter Thiel). Probably many winners want stability, which is why they are moderate. But my guess is that extreme winners are in general extreme people, and that secretly many of them hold extreme views. Perhaps this is one reason why people are suspicious of the power of the very rich.
Both the far right and far left are often shamed for being made up of losers, but I’ve always found that unconvincing. They’re just the only people who can be that under their real names. There’s probably a lot more who are anonymous or silent.
A lot of moderate people aren’t really moderate, but too busy or tired to think about politics.
Rightists believe that left-of-centre politicians, all journalists, creatives etc. are basically socialists waging a semi-covert “cultural war” against traditional society, and they’re not completely wrong. Especially in a country like Finland they all basically know each other and agree with each other. Leftists believe that the average white man is actually quite sexist, racist, authoritarian, quasi-fascist, and they’re not completely wrong. I include myself in that (leftist) description. But it really is all in your point of view.
My favourite quote of late is the one about “the line between good and evil runs through the heart of every man”. Quite a lot of people can be made to say something rather extreme in some circumstances, especially on the Internet. Face-to-face, in mixed company, people are both more moderate and more accepting of different views.
