chapotraphouse

A few hours ago I read a ridiculous David Brooks article where he poked fun at the protests saying that modern decentralized movements are bad.

Then there’s the kind of movement we have in the age of the internet. Many of these protesters across the globe are suspicious of vertical lines of authority; they don’t want to be told what to do by self-appointed leaders. They prefer leaderless, decentralized, digitally coordinated crowds, in which participants get to improvise their own thing.

This horizontal, anarchic method enables masses of people to mobilize quickly, even if they don’t know one another. It is, however, built on the shaky assumption that if lots of people turn out, then somehow the movement will magically meet its goals. Unfortunately, an unorganized, decentralized movement is going to be good at disruption but not good at building a new reality.

archive.today • Opinion | The Protests Help Trump - The New York Times