I'm speaking metaphorically, but then so does polite society, sociologists, when describing how a next generation may have antibodies against X, where X is not a literal virus, but a vector that spreads like one, and may be correspondingly countered. If you hear Category Theory between the lines, you're growing new ears maybe.
Take propaganda, in the broadest sense, which includes PR and advertising, rhetoric more expansively. In American English (Amerish -- a MER ish, Fowler), "propaganda" is almost always used in a derogatory sense, to impart a negative spin. Perhaps we're hearing remnants of Protestantism decrying the continued propagation of a more Catholic catechism. There's always "high church versus high church".
We also call these rhetorically polemical clashes "wars" (e.g. the Math Wars) as in "culture wars" but we hope to manage and contain them around an ideal of non-violence. The martial arts usually circle a sense of peace and equanimity as core to the warrior mentality. A true warrior is not "looking to start a fight" but lets not forget about sparring i.e. helping others get better.
Today I watched a lot of reels, Facebook's answer to TikTok, and become more aware of this Auditor movement, wherein civil rights activists engage in some "suspicious" activity that's nevertheless within their rights, or defensibly so. There mere act of recording is often the triggering "offense".
If an authority figure tries to challenge them, they turn into expert lawyers, some more successfully than others. They remind police personnel to recall their own training, and make professionalism the value at stake. A professional activist inspires professional responses.
Against a backdrop of police brutality and movements such as Occupy (in the civil rights lineage), it's not surprising that new antibodies might form, giving rise to new breeds or professions. This is what evolution goads us into.
What's made a big difference is the smartphone and live streaming, in combination or isolation. Cops are increasingly wearing body cams, but then so are ordinary civilians. Citizens march around in fashionable uniforms, or dressed casually, with Go Pro helmets and/or other recording gear.
They look and act a lot like cops, disciplined to not use unnecessary violence. Except a lot of police escalate and lean towards violence rather quickly, which is where that police brutality may kick in. Mind over brain, brain over brawn, is how they teach us in school.
