It's a slightly more nuanced argument, I think, than virtual and physical. The same paradox applied when the printing press was invented, and no doubt also when words were etched onto stone tablets. Both of them physical, yet technological, in nature. The driving, and dividing, force behind the means to disseminate information, whether that be in a hardcover book, a newspaper broadsheet, a political party's billboard, or a facebook post, remains holding a control on the narrative. Both the "working class" protestors and the "laptop class" peering from the surrounding office block windows, understand this, and are employing the same tactics. The protestors are live streaming too, portraying their version of events in an effort to wrestle back public sympathy. With (mandated) time on their hands through forced unemployment, retirement, or apathy toward the type of labour market they had found themselves in, many in the protesters camp are utilising technology in exactly the same fashion as their counterparts. Time, is the great leveller in this battle. That is why the Prime Ministers edict that the protesters "need to just go home!" is disingenuous. What she really wants is for them to "just get back to work!" and all her problems will evaporate. This time though, she has created her own undoing by declaring these mandates around work. Idle hands, and all that, any politician worth their salt knows the dangers that lie with that.
It's a slightly more nuanced argument, I think, than virtual and physical. The same paradox applied when the printing press was invented, and no doubt also when words were etched onto stone tablets. Both of them physical, yet technological, in nature. The driving, and dividing, force behind the means to disseminate information, whether that be in a hardcover book, a newspaper broadsheet, a political party's billboard, or a facebook post, remains holding a control on the narrative. Both the "working class" protestors and the "laptop class" peering from the surrounding office block windows, understand this, and are employing the same tactics. The protestors are live streaming too, portraying their version of events in an effort to wrestle back public sympathy. With (mandated) time on their hands through forced unemployment, retirement, or apathy toward the type of labour market they had found themselves in, many in the protesters camp are utilising technology in exactly the same fashion as their counterparts. Time, is the great leveller in this battle. That is why the Prime Ministers edict that the protesters "need to just go home!" is disingenuous. What she really wants is for them to "just get back to work!" and all her problems will evaporate. This time though, she has created her own undoing by declaring these mandates around work. Idle hands, and all that, any politician worth their salt knows the dangers that lie with that.