You are correct, the answer is narrative.
There is an underlying structure to this, it's framing, and it's delivery. A compelling narrative has these key elements: the "Protagonist", the "Antagonist", a virtue, the anti-virtue, a struggle, a why, a how, a journey, a raising of stakes, and a conclusion.
To create your "Antagonist" you have to subvert an element of your chosen target's characteristics. Taking things to hyperbole with repetition, almost to the point of pantomime. Remember "Big Red"? Do you think that was just some happenstance incident? She said some wild shit about straight white men, and less than a decade later your teachers are prescribing Travada to your tranny-fem-son because the local drag queen came to town and frankly it would be bigoted to stop his fem-penis from violating your kid.
To mold yourself as the "Protagonist" you need to uphold a virtue, real or manufactured. This virtue has to be the source of your struggle, this has to be structured in such a way as it cannot be undermined at cursory glance, it has to by-pass the observers initial instinct of the situation and provide them a meta-narrative of what is happening.
The "Why" is as simple as "why should I care" you need to outline the struggle, if failed will destroy the "Protagonist" in defense of the virtue and the virtue is always good, and the anti-virtue is always bad.
As the struggle continues, you manufacture the raising of stakes, creating a journey for the audience to participate in, which is where the "How" comes into view, you generate mini-quests for your audience to take, first they have to be internal, mental, psychological journeys to which you frame them in that seat "What if it was YOU, now wouldn't that be bad news?"
The most important part is to game the cycle of the struggle, The "Why", raising of stakes, and the "How" in order to short-circuit them past any form of conclusion until you have milked them for all they are worth, turn them into the new "Antagonist" and milk some more.
Conservatives do not do this, because a) it's scummy, b) they would rather keep what they have, than risk gaining something new, c) reactionary nature negates proactive approach.
You cannot win with a purely conservative mind-set, there is nothing to be gained in reactive response, in defensive attitudes, and by the time the conservatives fall for good there will be nothing left to conserve, this is where it becomes vital to become a constructive, proactive bearer of the torch. Sometimes you need to just build the fucking castle.