Some time ago, someone somewhere remarked that #riotwombles may be more scary than #londonriots...
After all, hooligans rioting and looting is scary for the bystanders, but it doesn't threaten the established order as such. Governments have techniques for dealing with riots. Citizens self-organising clean-up rotas, on the other hand, does threaten the established order. If citizens can do that, what use local councils? What use governments in general, if a Twitter hashtag can do their job? That's the beginnings of a real threat to the established order (obviously it's not quite up to replacing all the functions of government yet). Maybe the new, replacement order will be better, maybe it will be worse, but it will not be the old order. That's scary for those in the old order in particular, but also to everyone, since change always carries risk to the population at large (maybe the new order will be worse).
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