It's the age of the Neotoddler protestor

Young men riot in Sunderland (Drik/Getty Images)

"Across the West, protests are getting larger, more frequent and more disruptive. Over the weekend, the UK saw nationwide anti-immigration riots in which mosques and other buildings were set aflame. A few days before that, Just Stop Oil activists sprayed orange paint in the world’s second-busiest airport, Heathrow. The week before, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the US Congress, pro-Palestine activists rioted in Columbus Square, vandalising memorials and releasing a swarm of maggots and worms in his Washington hotel.
    "These are just the latest examples of a growing trend of shock-activism that combines political protest and public nuisance. Ostensibly, they are carried out by distinct groups motivated by a particular cause, such as immigration, the environment, or Palestine. In reality, however, all are animated by the same, self-destructive ideology: neotoddlerism....
    
"[T]he ease with which theatrical behaviour goes viral online has convinced many that a better world doesn’t require years of patient work, only a sufficient quantity of theatrics. Many activists — on both the Left and Right — now hope to bring about their ideal world in the same way a spoiled brat acquires a toy they’ve been denied: by being as loud and hysterical as possible. This is neotoddlerism: the view that utopia can be achieved by acting like a three-year-old....

"Instead of trying to produce the best arguments, neotoddlers try to produce the most shocking video clips, which typically involve vandalism, desecration, or some other kind of public meltdown. Thus, they outrage others by embracing their own outrage and lashing out at the world. ...

"Not only do neotoddlers lack impulse-control, they also mistake their lack of impulse-control for morality, and mistake the impulse-control of others for callousness. 'Where is the outrage?' they commonly yell, demanding everyone be as irrational as them. For the neotoddler, impatience is a virtue. ...

"They therefore don’t have the means to create, only to disrupt.
    "And so they disrupt, with the goal of spreading awareness. Yet ... for all the issues they protest about — from immigration to climate change — the problem is not a lack of awareness; it’s a lack of solutions. We don’t need to be told that war, injustice, and pollution are bad, because we learned these lessons in primary school. What we need are realistic plans of action — but the neotoddlers have none. A 'ceasefire now!' would quickly be broken by Hamas. To 'just stop oil!' would be to cause Western civilisation to regress technologically into an age of famine, war and superstition. On immigration, the Government can’t just 'get them out'. ...

"But if nuisance-protests are counterproductive, why are they spreading? Because protests are usually motivated more by emotion than reason. Take the recent Southport riots. These have been driven not by any rational plan but by the frustrations of Right-wingers and ordinary working-class people about their concerns over immigration not being taken seriously by politicians. These frustrations, stoked by fake news, have led them to engage in infantile — and dangerous — actions like vandalising mosques and setting fire to police cars, which will hurt their cause more than help it. But it does make them feel good for the moment, and they live mostly for the moment.
    "As for Left-wing neotoddlers, their motivations tend to be more complex (but no less childish) than those of their Right-wing counterparts, because, instead of being impoverished and alienated, they tend to be privileged and popular. For instance ... Gaza campus protests were largely confined to the most expensive and elite colleges. And Just Stop Oil members are themselves quick to admit that their movement is 'privileged' and living in a white middle-class 'student bubble.' ...

"Unsurprisingly, the harm neotoddlers cause to liberal democracies has endeared them to foreign dictators. The Ayatollah developed a soft spot for the Ivy League campus protesters, cheerleading them on X, and even writing them a letter of support. It also recently transpired that Iran has been funding and directing activists across the US, and that they even masterminded an anti-Israel protest at McGill University in Canada. Closer to home [in the UK], the misinformation that caused the Southport riots was amplified by a fake news website linked to the Russian government. ...

"There is a way out. The solution to neotoddlers is the same as the one to regular spoiled brats: to ignore their outbursts and deny them attention. If someone sets fire to a car or makes a mess with orange paint, it shouldn’t make global or even national news. The media will stop reporting on these stories when we stop engaging with them. ... So we should learn to react more slowly to news, to pay attention to what we pay attention to, and to give more of our attention to behaviours we wish to encourage rather than those we disapprove of. It’s not just the neotoddlers who need to be less impulsive, we do too. ...

"Every child begins life throwing tantrums. And every good parent learns to ignore them, because they know that acknowledging attention-seeking behaviours validates them, and prevents their kids from outgrowing them. If we wish to stop seeing good causes ruined by bad actors, we must stop rewarding immaturity. If we wish to usher in an age of post-toddlerism, we must stop making neotoddlers famous."

~ Gurwinder Bhogal from his article 'The scourge of Neotoddler protestors: The Left and Right now rely on shock activism'