I quite liked the poem by Les Murray, but the post raised a few other thoughts.
Firstly, there are forms (or aspects) of crowd behaviour/psychology that I consider are wrong - things like riots, pogroms, peer pressure, gossip, etc.
In terms of public protest, I recall being overwhelmed and scared by the noise and anger of a (peaceful - unlike at least one) Việt Nam War protest march in the city (which I wrote about somewhere, I think).
However, coming together for collective action can create good outcomes - including outcomes such as the eight hour day and other historical achievements, and, more recently, as I wrote about in “On public pressure affecting responses to active mass atrocity events [Note: Content Warning - mention of and links to articles violence and atrocities against victims of a wide range of ages. Reader discretion is advised]” https://politicalmusingsofkayleen.blogspot.com/2024/02/on-public-pressure-affecting-responses.html
So crowds can be both good and bad. Nuance is the word of the day in this, as in so many other matters.
Also, as a side note, the word “mob” is now largely used in Australia to refer to Indigenous groups, I have so deliberately chosen not to use that word in the above.
Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider:
- there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”;
- I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
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Remember: we generally need to be more human being rather than human doing, to mind our Mӕgan, and to acknowledge that all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering” (just as binary gendered [men’s and women’s] sporting teams are either both given the gender descriptor, or neither).Copyright © Kayleen White 2007-2024 NO AI
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