I don't think you are rambling, Hookbill, after all there is perhaps a related factor that you cannot assume a common culture within a culture - if that makes sense.
When I did my A-Levels probably before most downers were born, we had to do a course on Classical Mythology because a basic knowledge of the classics was felt necessary to understanding references in a lot of earlier literature- they felt a knowledge of the bible was essential too but never managed to make classes compulsory!
Until comparitively recently a thorough knowledge of both the Bible and the Graeco-Roman mythology would be presumed in an educated person. I was unusual in my generation to have gone to Sunday school and I never had the opportunity to learn latin until I studied diachronic linguistics. The references that were common place have taken on a new obscurity.
There has always been things to fear but they were less explicit - fairy stories are often a way of teaching children to be scared without for want of a better expression telling the truth.
Now people are less innocent, we know exactly what the bogeyman will do to the child lost in the wood and this knowledge creates it's own frisson which is exploited by the press as can been seen when a pretty little girl goes missing as opposed to an older boy.
But there is also ignorance - and this I think is a cause of anxiety in modern Britain, we have the increased suspicion of the Muslim community, and a new wave of Eastern European immigration. Having lived overseas I am far from xenophobic but even in my very Shirelike corner of England it is very strange to be in the Library and surrounded by people speaking languages you can barely recognise let alone understand. It is easy to see how people less educated, less travelled and with a less international background could feel threatened indeed - especially since modern education does not seem conducive to creating a positive identity. But that maybe bias form having had a historical education that comprised almost entirely of the Industrial Revolution as if teaching us anything involving the British Empire might turn us into apologists for it... there is a big difference between knowing about history or religion and believing in it.
Now I am ranting....
