Each unit of the force is trivial (rioters are a trivial part of the protests, campus activists are a trivial part of the student body, AOC is a trivial part of congress, moral clarity journalists a la Wesley Lowery are a trivial part of news mastheads, online "SJW" people are a trivial part of Twitter, etc). However, in aggregate it freaks out and motivates the authoritarians you are talking about. When they criticize any of the forces, they are simultaneously fearing the larger whole.