Yeah, with respect, I think you’re painting with a broad brush. Out of curiosity, are you old enough to remember a time before the internet? I can’t understate how complete the trance of reality was back then. It isn’t a coincidence that people used to fall in line with a different aesthetic for every decade—the media hypnotism was extreme and got us all to feel like these things were important. The second the internet provided exposure to any subculture you wanted regardless of what television was pushing, suddenly that conformity went out the window.

They taught the radicals that coming armed with flowers instead of guns was the right way to do it. The most famous leaders of the “resistance” taught non-violence to the point of self sacrifice as the only way to protest with honor. Anyone who went against that (Malcolm X) got pushed to the sidelines as a kook or a terrorist. There were no dissenting sources you could go to.

This approach has been passed down to younger generations as “the way it’s done”. Only recently has it been acceptable to seriously discuss violent resistance, and that is entirely a product of the internet making new input available combined with real fascism emerging.

For violent protest to work, you need numbers, and to get numbers, you have to convince a brainwashed populace that the ways we’ve been taught to resist are bullshit. That takes time and bridge building rather than blame. Leftists should be finding angry progressives and talking about the results that French protests can produce. Some of them will see the point.