WELL, IT’S MOSTLY THAT THEY’RE STILL IN THE “ANGER” STAGE OVER HILLARY’S LOSS: The Shouters Win Town Hall Battles But Lose the War: Sure, you’re raising awareness. Afterward the public will dislike you and your message.

All three of the examples I’ve offered have something in common: they are demonstrations of power over a space. To state the obvious, people like feeling powerful. They are more likely to stay involved with a movement that gives them opportunities to feel powerful. Why did white supremacists organize a demonstration in Charlottesville? To look and feel powerful. Why did the counterprotesters organize en masse in response? To look and feel more powerful.

The more transgressive an action is, the more powerful it feels. Asking a question and then politely sitting down after the representative gives you a suitably mild answer is neither noticeable nor particularly empowering. Publicly arguing with the congressman, on the other hand, feels like noble battle. Shutting down a highway is more powerful still, especially if you can get away with it without getting arrested. And setting fires or breaking windows … well, you can practically hear the war-movie soundtrack running through your head. (In our minds, we always play the good guys.)

And yet, as I’ve already noted, these tactics backfire unless you’ve already got a critical mass of support. If you still need to build support, then resorting to them loses you more than you gain. The Dairy Queen where I watched the heckling did not seem to be the right venue. And there’s really never a good venue for vandalism.

Of course, the people who choose those tactics might argue that persuasion is the wrong goal, and it’s worth the cost in public opinion to make a powerful statement. But at the end of the day you can’t get much done in any society, least of all a democratic one, unless your neighbors are somewhat willing to go along. Moreover, the protesters may not even be making that sort of semi-rational cost-benefit analysis. A recent paper suggests that protesters often choose these tactics because they actually think they help mobilize voters to their side. It’s all too easy to confuse visibility with effectiveness.

I think it’s about feeling powerful, and important, and accumulating prestige within your group. And because the reward for those things is immediate and personal, it outweighs more-general concerns like winning elections. At least, it does in people with limited self-control, which is apparently a lot of people these days.