The world was a lot smaller 75 years ago. But now it's a massive echo chamber. Resonance is causing crazy flare ups of niche parts of social discourse. You can consider SJW movements an example of that, as well as the far-right or incel movements. Large niche populations identifying as new self-identified groups. Social change, or self-reinforcing propaganda (social contagion) manifesting in novel ways after 25% of your life spent in front of a computer?
And because people are disconnected, the real world actions are implicitly given less weight because most actors have spent near a majority of their lives on a machine simulated interaction with someone else instead of with subtler cues that you would get in a true "village"
Not trying to wax poetic, I just really think things are getting weird because of the new hyper-dynamism.
Also, the average Joe doesn't care about this. People won't stop using Instagram. All of these stories are nothing but masturbation for intellectuals. Thus this "uproar" is fabricated. It's not based on what people feel, but on what the media elites want them to feel.