Indeed, these are the idiocracy born of "fweedom" you so advocate. When the iron fist of the central government loosens due to epidemics, the true nature of your beloved peasant scum is illuminated. Without effective central control and enforcement, men devolve into beasts. It is you, and your "fweedom" zealots, who fail to recognise reality; you are made blind and deaf that "though seeing [you] do not see, and hearing [you] do not hear or understand." Having made yourselves into gods to dictate to Heaven your whims as law, overcome by self-worship and narcissism, you "call evil good and good evil . . . turn darkness into light and light into darkness . . . turn bitter into sweet and sweet into bitter."

The reforms of Deng have clearly failed in creating sociocultural stability. Would these peasants have acted thus, had the CCP continued Mao's cultural revolution? That is the central question the politburo will be contemplating, once Xi's factional battle with his various enemies concludes. The next politburo standing committee, regardless of the victor of the current political infighting, will not be so forgiving and open as the current regime.