During the pandemic, large-scale violence became logistically difficult.
Military operations slowed, protests struggled to organize and international travel collapsed. The traditional mechanisms of conflict temporarily paused but conflict itself did not disappear.
It only migrated.
People argued constantly, online debates intensified, political discourse became more aggressive, information wars exploded and false narratives spread alongside legitimate analysis. The world discovered something unexpected and that was that when physical conflict becomes difficult, linguistic conflict expands to fill the space.
Words thrive in isolation. Swords do not.