A element of real social change is a backlash, Linda Hirshman told me in 2019, once you get close to a tipping point. The established culture responds with a pendulum swing to the old ways of doing things. https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2019/10/reckoning-with-the-metoo-movement-an-interview-with-linda-hirshman/
@estherschindler: Dr. Andy Koch, a poli sci prof of mine in the 1990s, told us that in class, and to further demonstrate how universal it is, he showed us where Thebans had written/warned of it... and even further back and on the other side of the world, early dynasty members of the Chinese Emperor's Court did as well.
Humans are, if anything, predictable. Hence how folks keep getting run around by politicians, grifters, the media, etc.