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Guardian

Guardian

Why our ideas about protest and mob psychology are dangerously wrong | Dan Hancox

Guardian
Summary
Nutrition label

61% Informative

Suella Braverman described the Palestine solidarity demos as hate marches’ But she was taken aback when she said they were toxic’ to be part of a mob’ that the establishment designated it toxic to be a part of.

Gustave Le Bon’s seminal work, The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, is one of the bestselling nonfiction books of all time.

Le Bon was an eccentric, war-traumatised eugenicist and proto-fascist, terrified by the growing demands of the French masses.

Reicher uncovered what might be an unpalatable truth in his seminal study of the riot’ in St Paul’s , Bristol , in 1980 .

Far from erasing our sense of self, coming together with fellow football fans, music fans, or people with the same political or religious affiliations, is greatly affirming.

But it does nothing to strengthen the cause of anti-racism to apply the same baseless analysis to crowds we dislike.

VR Score

53

Informative language

46

Neutral language

20

Article tone

informal

Language

English

Language complexity

56

Offensive language

offensive

Hate speech

not hateful

Attention-grabbing headline

not detected

Known propaganda techniques

detected

Time-value

medium-lived

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