August 2nd - Why sell our bank shares when they are making a profit?

Every now and then (most days actually!!) I'm reminded that the world really has gone mad.  Can someone explain to me the sense of the government spending our money to prop up a bank when it is failing only to sell our shares once the profits begin to roll in?  Surely 'our' share of the profits could be put into our cash-strapped NHS and other services?   I'd feel a little reassured if I found that the new investors were our pension funds but I guess many of the now high earning investments will be taken up by folk who are already pretty well off.
Back to trying to find a simple answer to the question of how we can 'change direction'.  I've decided that I'm going to look at whether we, in our every day lives, can bring about the change we need.  One interesting comment from a reader of my blog suggested I should just get on with my life and perhaps that is the answer. Of course I take all comments seriously so perhaps if I get on with living my life as I want to then all will be well.  Let's face it more and more people are beginning to question whether they really want to embrace the high consumption life-style which we are led to believe will bring us happiness.  More and more people are downsizing, growing their own food, supporting local markets, 'swishing', finding a more spiritual path, joining transition town groups, freecycling and recycling so perhaps 'people power' is the way forward.  
I just wonder what would happen if we all decided we weren't going to dance to the capitalists' tune any more and stop buying all the 'stuff' we don't really need.  A sort of silent revolution ... would recession deepen ... would social unrest spread ... would law and order break down?