Well, sure, there are quantitative differences. But I'm not sure they add up to qualitative ones. Take the Great Fire of London in 1666. While the fire was sti

Well, sure, there are quantitative differences. But I'm not sure they add up to qualitative ones. Take the Great Fire of London in 1666. While the fire was still raging, huge mobs made up their minds as to who was guilty, and managed to have a go at Catholics, Jews, Dutch merchants too from memory. Some of this story is here : https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/great-fire-london-was-blamed-religious-terrorism-180960332/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/great-fire-london-was... this was all while the city was burning around them, and you'd think they had better things to do than mob justice. This seems like a direct analogy to conspiracy theories about the hurricane. Or the Ku Klux Klan. It wasn't a conspiracy theory as such, rather a proper conspiracy, but it relied (relies!) on people who believe this BS and are thoroughly convinced about racial supremacy etc. Again, all this came to be, and was hugely influential and widespread, well before the transistor, never mind a computer. Mib violence based on bullshit seems to have always existed, and if anything the violence was, on average, worse in the past.