Home ยป What Caused the Vancouver Riots?

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“Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence.” — Marshall McLuhan

I visited Toronto today with Jill and Naan-Bread and we discussed the (Vancouver) riots. My working theory about the cause of the riots, developed lackadaisically during that conversation, goes something like this:

  1. Violence is a reaction to depersonalization, or to a lack of identity, according to McLuhan*.
  2. “Hockey is Canada’s game.”
  3. “Vancouver is Canada’s team.”

Essentially — and I admit I could develop this more but I just got back from TO and it’s bedtime — the embarrassing nature of the loss (3-0), combined with the identity-stripping national letdown (points 2 and 3, above), the depersonalizing nature of crowds, the disinhibiting effects of alcohol, and maybe a kind of historo-psychic expectation harmonically adding to ripples from 1994, all helped caused the riot.

* McLuhan is the go-to guy for media, especially violence in media, and for violence caused by media doubly-so. I can’t say the sports media caused the riot though, because that would make this reasoning circular.

Written by Jack

June 19th, 2011 at 7:55 pm

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  1. [...] that a lack of identity is a potential precursor to violence (McLuhan). Some media reports are saying that the rioters are [...]

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