This doesn't surprise me. Not even slightly. I guess I can relate some how. I mean, you say it yourself:
...it is necessary to have two kinds of faces when dealing with the world. The first is where you can express your own thoughts and emotions, which is really only reserved for immediate family or occasionally very close friends. The second face is the one everyone sees and the one you wear the majority of the time, where everything is okay,...
Maybe they are just fed up with all the bull shit. I know I am. And besides, a lot of people have lived a solitary life with meditation and what not. There is also much more information nowadays with the interweb and all that. So as people start to wake up all sorts of things can happen.