> It used to be you'd go to meetings/gatherings of like minded people to get hopped up and your engines revved up like that

I would go so far as to say going to meetings physically was also a counterbalance.

When you're around other people, even ones who share your beliefs, and say 'I think we should murder that guy!' then in most crowds someone is going to say 'Hey fellow, are you okay?'

It's when you exclusively socially exist in online spaces that the most extreme actions suddenly become encouraged.

Or as Josh Johnson recently quipped, "The internet is all gas no brakes."

> someone is going to say 'Hey fellow, are you okay?'

We might be thinking of different types of gatherings/meetings. Specifically, I was thinking of someone with a particular set of extremist ideals that get together for a monthly meeting with others with those same extremist ideals. Someone in that group would likely not say "are you okay" rather they'd say "hellzya brother!" or whatever they'd actually phrase it. These types of meetings are also known to have someone speak intentionally seeking to get a member to act as a lone wolf to actually carry out the comment you're hoping someone would tamper. Now, one doesn't need to go to meetings for that encouragement. They just open up whatever app/forum.

I was at a political rally a long time ago. One of the speakers said "let's hang all the people in <rich suburb>". As I remember it no one spoke out against him but neither did people cheer. Anyway I realized the rally was a bit too much for me and left. The speech was entirely inconsequential - no violence resulted nor was anyone arrested.

I'm telling this story because I think it's how things usually go, and I think you are quite mistaken.

> When you're around other people, even ones who share your beliefs, and say 'I think we should murder that guy!' then in most crowds someone is going to say 'Hey fellow, are you okay?'

There are crowds where that guy is not there, is not heard, or doesn't speak up at all.

In those crowds, people reach out for their pitchforks and outright murder people.

If you take a frank look at history, you will notice those are all too frequent. Even in this century.

Anything I say on the internet, someone will always have a compelling but sometimes wrong argument as to why im wrong. If you listen to them for confirmation you'd never be able to do anything, and im not exaggerating. I could probably say the earth is round here on HN and some astrophysics PhD would tell me I failed to consider the 4th dimension or something and it's actually unknown if we can call it round.

Where are these people going that they just see encouragement without resistance?

There doesn’t even need to be anyone saying no. When you’re standing with a crowd shouting “murder! murder!” it’s much harder to say “I’m not one of the bad guys” than when you’re online and you can say “well OK, there are a few bad apples in our group, but I’m not one of them!”