(1) I would just like to point out that the most striking feature that of all the social explosions of the past few years - and remarked upon by virutally every observer - is just how unexpected they were. What existed before, however one evaluated it, was taken as given and unchanging; just as most people read the situation that has emerged as a new given and equally unchyanging. It is the same mistake that was made in 1789, again in 1848, and again in 191`7. These revolutions, too, surprised almost everyone, and as soon as they happened almost everyone alive at the time thought -- wrongly - that they were over.
(Dialectical Investigations, p
(2) See that footnote in C1 that I and SA located for James. There hasn't been much variation, except under extreme and rare conditons, over time in this matter of "identifying with one's leaders." In fact, it's probably a rational response under most circumstances.
(3) There really haven't been all that many mass movements in the last 200 years. No propaganda campaign in U.S. history has quite equalled the effor over 40 years in all the mass media to hide just how fucking dangerous the movement that began with the Montgomery bus strike and trailed off in the defeat of ERA actually was. Whe people in the U.S. do do something, everyone, including leftists scared shtiless of being "vulgar," combine to hide the fact.
Carrol