My view from the news chair: the worst of the mob is coming for us

October 17, 2026 — 4:00am

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.

Remove items from your saved list to add more.

No gift articles left

You've used all of your gift articles. 3 more will become available on the 1st of every month.

For most of the human story, people who looked a lot like us – but with more interesting hair – wandered around in the forests and savannahs rooting up wild crops and hunting meat.

In the relatively recent past, someone domesticated grains and animals and, with food thus secured, the first towns were born. And with them came something never seen before: a large mob of people.

Across cultures and continents, these new mobs generally did two things: they established chiefs or kings to lay down the law and organise defence or attack, and they peeled off a priestly class to conjure up gods and explain what they offered and required.

And that’s how it has been for the past 10,000 years.

In the 18th century – the day before yesterday, in the grand scheme of things – something else appeared. In Britain, in Europe, in the new American colonies, the first independent newspapers appeared.

Fuelled by sales, which brought advertisers, which brought more money, these newspapers gained power. Indeed, political philosopher Edmund Burke called them the “fourth estate” – sitting alongside the clergy, the nobility and the masses.

For thousands of years, human organisation stood on three legs, then added a fourth. And now three of those legs are crumbling. Which means all of us living now are in a deeply consequential moment in human history.

The first estate, the clergy, cuts little ice these days. As for the nobility, King Charles has a son who barely speaks to him and a brother under police investigation. Our constitutional monarchy delivers some underlying stability but for........

© Brisbane Times