We never used to talk politics at work. It was frowned upon in the same way talking about sex and almost anything not work or family related was. People don't have friends or family now so they make their coworkers their sole source of friends, family, venting, and support, and that's not productive.

I'm not saying don't be friendly to people you work with, but I know plenty of CEO founder types that actively use their company as a surrogate social life, at times to the mass detriment of the company. That doesn't work well because you're at work for work related reasons and that might not coincide with the kind of people you'd like to be closer with. You then also have to deal with the drama that goes on between friends some times at work, similar to why you don't typically date people from work because when drama happens it's now at work.

Then there's the bigger issue that many knowledge work jobs now are entirely made up and don't need to exist. You could fire half of Basecamp and I'm sure it'd be about the same if it's anything like companies here in the Bay.