It’s a pretty classic tactic in the history of conflict. By pushing your opponent into a tight position, you force him to strike first, thus giving you complete justification in your disproportionate response.
Police can and will provoke non-violent protests to violence. In a few cases (see the UK's "spycops" scandal) police infiltrators will organise protests so they can arrest dissidents.
Yes when executed by a single coherent entity.
This is not it, unless you believe there is a powerful cabal controlling twitter, facebook, robinhood, discord etc.
They are all doing it independtly to limit the legal and/or financial risks for themselves. Getting people to "strike first" is not the intent, saving $ is the intent here.
Only intent here is ass covering.
There is no intent on the part of the GAFAs to force the lower class into a revolution to get a pretext to squash them or any bigger "art of the war" plan behind those decisions than money.
Assuming no bad intentions doesn’t change the outcome of their actions.
Some interesting reading:
Professor Walter Scheidel examines the history of peace and economic inequality over the past 10,000 years - https://news.stanford.edu/2017/01/24/stanford-historian-unco...
Revolution and the Rebirth of Inequality - https://www.jstor.org/stable/2777764?seq=1
Mike Duncan is an entertainer, not a professional historian.