A brouhaha is a state of social agitation when a minor incident gets out of control, sometimes referred to as an uproar or hubbub. It is typically marked by controversy

Controversy

Controversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of opinion. The word was coined from the Latin controversia, as a composite of controversus – "turned in an opposite direction," from contra – "against" – and vertere – to turn, or versus , hence, "to turn...

 and fuss which can seem, afterwards, to have been pointless or irrational. For example, in New York City, a dispute between a clinic entitled Upper Breast Side (which gives advice to young mothers about breastfeeding and bras) and a condo association erupted into a legal battles and was described in the Boston Globe as a brouhaha. The Washington Post described an incident as a brouhaha in which a passenger, on board a jetliner, reclined the seat to the point where it bothered a second passenger, resulting in a fistfight, intervention by flight attendants, and the plane returning to the airport escorted by fighter jets. In another instance, politics surrounding the choice of bus lanes in Los Angeles

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

erupted in ineffective squabbling which ultimately did not help efforts to improve public transit in the metropolis.