I agree with your sentiments actually, but doesn’t it follow that a “rally” is for supporters, thus it should be rather safe to assume that a majority, if not all, attendees will be supporters? There are certainly other ways to find out what a candidate believes, from debates to videos to online research.

I think it’s a valid assumption to be made that a rally attendee is likely to be a supporter and doesn’t undermine an acceptance of curiosity.

There are a lot of “party line” politics and other issues that do undermine curiosity. I think something else that is undermined is nuance, which we’ve mostly lost in political discussions in the present.

If I attended a rally I would be expected to be seen as a supporter of that person, I don’t understand why I shouldn’t have such an expectation?

Maybe it is simply that difference- between a rally and a speech- that causes this. If a candidate was giving a monologue in a forum of attendees that isn’t considered a rally (say, some kind of organized event that hosts or has hosted multiple political speakers) then I don’t believe the attendees would be seen the same way.

Maybe the fact that we have rallies more often than we simply have forums of speech and discussion is really the true undermining factor of curiosity and nuance in American politics.