going off my vague and admittedly rusty memory, there were at least three major examples of this that I personally encountered:
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- The Marvel Civil War story arc in the comics
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- The Twilight Saga Edward Vs Jacob marketing for the movies (which admittedly was handled somewhat tongue-in-cheek. I seem to recall a fast food commercial taking it to what I hope was an intentionally absurd degree)
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- The MCU retread of Civil War from the comics, adapted to the silver screen
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*** 4) Edit: Injustice: gods among us (thanks to u/Kinglion for pointing that one out)***
Whether this was intentional or not is beyond the scope of this screed, but it is interesting to note how many real-world examples of this phenomenon occurred during and after these campaigns, gamergate, the ghostbusters fiasco, the trump/anti trump movements, etc.
maybe it's nothing, or maybe it's something. I honestly have no idea, but the timing is certainly interesting at the very least.
...that does seem to be the tipping point. I remember my mother calling him a Manchurian Candidate (learned a new word that day, lol), and I remember the campaigning for him being off-putting, though I always chalked it up to him being a Dem, and me coming from a pretty conservative family...
...and I remember the gaslighting at the time about him being elected having "nothing" to do with him being black, and thinking it was bullshit even then...
wow, thanks, you've given me a lot to think about... =)