Today's my birthday, my 75th—impossibly old!—and I'm receiving this wonderful video of John Lithgow reading Timothy Snyder's twenty lessons in tyranny as a birthday gift. Which I now offer to readers here….

#tyranny #authoritarianism #dictatorship #Trump #Musk #Republicans #TimothySnyder
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https://snyder.substack.com/p/twenty-lessons-read-by-john-lithgow

Hmmmm... Why am I having #DejaVu?

From 2022: "Vladimir #Putin has mentioned 'gender freedoms' more than once to justify #Russia’s war against #Ukraine and simultaneously crack down on its own citizens.

"Most directly, he alleged that Russian citizens who seek '#GenderFreedoms' (alongside foie gras and oysters) are part of the anti-Russian 'fifth column.'

"Gender and sexuality freedoms — or rights, as they are more typically called — are about #BodilyAutonomy, #diversity and #inclusivity. #Feminist and #LGBTQ+ activists assert that every human being deserves respect, recognition and equal rights regardless of their gender or sexuality.

"What’s the connection between Putin’s animosity toward Ukraine and toward #gender and #sexuality rights in Russia and around the world?

Gender and Putin’s regime

"Putin’s regime has increasingly relied on very conventional gender and sexual norms.

"When he first ascended to the presidency, image-makers used Putin’s #KGB background and penchant for physical fitness to frame him as a #macho #strongman who could reverse Russia’s waning power and 'remasculinize' the country after a decade of supposed geopolitical flaccidity in the wake of the #Soviet collapse.

"In other words, an inflexible and clearly #patriarchal notion of masculinity has been central to the Putin regime’s legitimacy.

"Russia’s foreign policy has relied on rigid gender norms as well. When Ukraine underwent its first pro-democracy revolution in 2004, Russian media questioned its leaders’ masculinity.

"Putin likewise used homophobic terms to dismiss #Georgia’s #RoseRevolution in 2003, responding to a reporter’s question by saying: 'A rose revolution — next they’ll come up with a light blue one.' In Russian, 'light blue' or goluboi is slang for “gay male.”

Gender and appealing to constituencies

"Putin has often been represented as the unquestioned leader of the pack ruling Russia — a masculinity-driven image.

"However, even as the leader of a personalist #dictatorship — a regime in which there are few institutional limits on the leader’s power — Putin must balance competing interests among significant elites and maintain at least the appearance of public support in order to be considered a legitimate ruler.

"Until 2020, Putin was using gendered language in his speeches to signal his alignment with a variety of elites and public constituencies that supported him. He was sending mixed signals to both relatively progressive Russians who value women’s roles in the workplace and to #conservatives wishing for a return to '#TraditionalFamilyValues,' in order to keep everyone in his camp.

"But after July 2021, when he published an essay contending Ukrainians and Russians are a single people, Putin no longer shied away from making sexist and LGBTQ+-phobic comments in prominent settings.

"At an October 2021 meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club — a Moscow-based think tank and discussion forum that Putin is closely associated with — he said teaching children about #GenderFluidity was 'truly monstrous' and 'verging on a crime against humanity.'"

Read more:
https://theconversation.com/vladimir-putin-the-czar-of-macho-politics-is-threatened-by-gender-and-sexuality-rights-180473
#USPol #TrumpIsPutinsPuppet #GBLTQRights #HumanRights #WomensRights #ToxicMasculinity #GenderFascists

FO° Talks: Josef Olmert on Syria, Part 1: Historic Context https://www.byteseu.com/865206/ #AbuMuhammadAlJulani #BasharAlAssad #CompactedMinorities #Conflicts #dictatorship #HafezAlAssad #HayatTahrirAlSham #IslamistRegime #PanArabIdentity #SectarianDivisions #Syria #SyrianHistory #SyrianIdentity

Begrepen de kiezers, die ons een extreem rechtse regering bezorgd hebben, dit maar

#freedomofspeech
#democratie
#Democracy
#vrijheid #rechten #rechtvaardigheid #Rechtstaat #pers #journalistiek #onderzoeksjournalistiek #journalism #freePress #dictatuur #dictatorship #autocratie #autocracy

“MAGA supporters are calling for the courts to be replaced not with lynching parties but with a dictator, a single man who will override the laws to bring what his supporters consider justice to those they claim are enemies. …a government official can argue that the lack of a criminal record for someone perceived to be an enemy of those in power just proves that person is a criminal.”

—Heather Cox Richardson, March 19, 2025
#trump #maga #usa #dictatorship

“It is a grim marker for our democracy, when a commentator with a wide audience openly calls for the replacement of the rule of law with a dictator.”
—Heather Cox Richardson, March 19, 2025
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/march-19-2025
#trump #usa #dictatorship

TrumpVirus the Stable ( #evil ) ‘Genius’, Toddler King, & Emperor with terrific #cognitive clothes... Proclamation!:

#Dictatorship in, #Democracy out…

https://theintellectualist.com/black-saturday-us-constitutional-crisis-2025/

=>> Black Saturday: The Day the United States Ceased to Be a Constitutional Democracy

#history #truth #reality #coup #fascism #BrainSpurs

“‘Kingdom’ is Collapsing – Israeli Newspapers on Civil War, Netanyahu’s Dictatorship”

by Palestine Chronicle Staff

@palestine
@israel
@UKLabour

“Israeli analysts warn that #Netanyahu’s dismissal of #ShinBet head Ronen #Bar is leading Israel towards a civil war and potential #dictatorship”

#Press #Gaza #Palestine #Resistance #Israel #Genocide #Terrorism #WarCrimes #Hamas #Qassam #PermanentCeasefireNoW #SettlerColonialism #Zionism #Barbarism #BloodLust #CivilWar

This is a big deal…
#journalism #freePress
#dictatorship

https://open.substack.com/pub/steady/p/the-truth-dies-with-him?r=onbw7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

#danRather #steady

https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/trump_usagm_voice_of_america_cuts.php
#usa #media #freedom #dictatorship #voiceofamerica

This ⤵️ is what Project 2025 is *really* all about!

“Decoding the Authoritarian Blueprint: How Putin’s Strategies May Foretell Trump’s Next Moves”

by Don Knight in The Midnight Manuscripts on Substack

“What #Hungary, #Belarus, and #Russia Reveal About Trump’s Path to Power”

https://open.substack.com/pub/donovanwashere/p/decoding-the-authoritarian-blueprint?r=27oltk&utm_medium=ios

#Press #US #Trump #Project2025 #Putin #Xi #Trump #Multipolarity #SpheresOfInfluence #MafiaState #Dictatorship #Fascism #Orban #Authoritarian #China

X might be a cesspool, but it's a cesspool with excellent community notes!

‘US is #1 supporter of dictatorships around be world’ 👏

#BernieSanders #US #Dictatorship #Democracy #UShistory

A quotation from Arendt

The moment we no longer have a free press, anything can happen. What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how can you have an opinion if you are not informed?

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) German-American philosopher, political theorist
Interview (1973-10) with Roger Errera, Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française (ORTF)

---

[small]Sourcing, notes: https://wist.info/arendt-hannah/45087/[/small]

#quote #quotes #quotation #dictatorship #freepress #freedomofthepress #information #journalism #judgment #media #opinion #pressfreedom #publicopinion #totalitarianism

Sen #ChrisMurphy said he believed President #Zelensky of #Ukraine appropriately asked #Trump & #JDVance how they could reassure him that #Putin of #Russia would abide by the terms of a #ceasefire agreement. “It is a sad day in America when we are getting closer & closer to Russia, a brutal #dictatorship, & further & further away from #democratic #allies,” Murphy said.

#geopolitics #US #MafiaState #Europe #ForeignPolicy #authoritarianism #RevengePolitics

"When you work it all through, only 6% of gen Z really support a dictatorship, in any recognised sense of the term. The problem we seem to be facing is not a whole generation of autocratic young people but a complex question answered quickly in online polls and hugely overinterpreted in subsequent reporting"

#GenZ #Dictatorship #UKPolitics

https://theconversation.com/only-6-of-gen-z-actually-favour-dictatorship-not-half-as-some-reports-would-have-you-believe-250945

Powerful call to collective action! *Must read* & please boost!

“The Purge of the Deep State and the Road to Dictatorship”

by Chris Hedges in The Chris Hedges Report on Substack

“Donald Trump’s dismantling of the deep state presages the formation of something far worse”

https://open.substack.com/pub/chrishedges/p/the-purge-of-the-deep-state-and-the?r=27oltk&utm_medium=ios

#Press #US #Trump #Fascism #Barbarism #DeepState #Resistance #Dictatorship #Coup #Nazi #Hitler #Poverty #Tyranny #Mobilization #Repression #Musk #Collapse

#Trump #Gaza #Colonialism #Imperialism #Dictatorship

"... The underlying assumption of the protest organizers was that the Gaza genocide marked some sort of aberration, that it was a mistake in policy. No, it was not a mistake. It expresses the most essential characteristic of the capitalist social order under conditions of extreme crisis.

MUST READ

Trump’s plan to annex Gaza and the return of colonialism

- World Socialist Web Site
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2025/02/06/wgns-f06.html

Fediverse the ultimate neoliberal social engineering experiment

Where private ownership provides absolute freedom and lack there of is sentence to #slavery and submission to masters

Before you execute the messenger just consider a scenario then be as critical as you want, as long as criticism is based on rational arguments, not emotional metaphysics and characterizations!

Say you write a little book, you find a publisher that is cheap and quick and you only have enough to print 100 copies, and you sell them basically at cost. 100 people buy them, read them, pass them around, before you know it your ideas have been exposed to more than 1000 people. But lets also say the printer through some clause in the agreement can buy them all back, at face value, and then destroys them. In the fire all markings, comments, notes written by readers are also gone. Furthermore the printer can take legal action against anyone making reference to the ideas on the book.

#FEDIVERSE

No rules, but the servers’ owner’s discretion. No rights, just conditional access and entry to the guestrooms. Server owners are never accountable for material, ideas, arguments, documents, ever hosted, they can make them all vanish.

#Accountability #Federation Rules #Judicial System ? NONE.

To write a document, to explain an idea, to analyze a topic, to make a thesis public, or simply to express an opinion, take work, and work has some value, it can’t all be a waste of time. In physical world expressing an idea in public to whoever is listening is prohibited in the most oppressive and totalitarian regimes. Once an idea is shared it is no longer the property of the person that expressed it, it is shared by all those who have heard the idea. In #Fediverse “the owner” of the space where expression takes place is in the absolute discretion of the host. There are no repercussions for any owner removing a participant, blocking one’s access, even when shared expressions come from other servers, and deleting all content. And by deleting the initial content the rest of the participatns’ comments vanish as well.

#Fediverse, is the ultimate virtual simulation of an absolute and TOTAL neoliberal world. There is not a square millimeter that is public, it is all privately owned, and the rules are indicative, they must be obeyed by “guests”, but the owner is the ultimate authority that can decide whether you exist or you vanish, whether the material shared/published deserves to stay public or be destroyed.

Guests of fediverse servers may either kiss owners’ rear ends and self-restrict to owners’ ideas and perceptions, or risk being removed and all the content shared and exchanged be removed. So they behave accordingly, as subordinates to the dictators hosting the space they use to share ideas and information.

Somehow, very few people find all this disturbing, and in contrast to social media owned and operated by large corporations, many progressive, democratic, liberal minded people thing and act convinced that this is better. I have no clue what goes on in most corporate social media, long ago when I used twitter I don’t remember any post of mine being removed. As far as I can tell, as long as they can sell IDs, cookies, email accounts, and advertising they couldn’t care less what you think. Communists (authoritarian/totalitarian and libertarian/democractic), anarchists of all colors and flavors, never see so much restriction, sensitivity, and censorship as exercised in #Fediverse.

It is absurd, I have never seen or imagined that deleting and censoring people would have been so pervasive and extensive as seen on #Fediverse, primarily #Mastodon servers. #Diaspora owners seem much more respectful of guests and users, and less intrusive in their guests’ discussions.

So all I see here is a neoliberal social engineering experiment going well. If this cannibalism can be tolerated by the “left” minded people then this may actually work on the physical world as well. Absolutely NO PUBLIC SPACE AND NO HUMAN RIGHTS, just obedient respectful guests in private space.

Sad, very sad, unbelievable dystopia. And this is gradually becoming an isolated ghetto of the left that has little or no effect and affect to the remaining world. Just as in real political repression, you keep attacking what you want to neutralize, you force them to barricade and contain their collective being, till nobody can see or hear them.

So real social activists who want to affect and inspire “real people” will lark on corporate media among the many, while the self defined radicals will gather up in this private ghetto where they are under the illusion they are safe and away from fascists.

Smart fascists start and run #fediverse servers as concentration camps of progressive, left, radical, activists to self contain themselves away from society.

#fediverse #neoliberalism #public domain #progressive #alternative #left #chaotic #disorder

#libertarian #communism #anarchism #syndicalism #democracy #communalism

#totalitarianism #capitalism #fascism #private ownership #marxism #dictatorship

@(heretical_I@kafeneio.social)
@Acta Populi

Back in the 90s the bubble did burst, it was translated not as a burst but as corruption and unfortunate bankruptcies of major financial institutions.

They squeezed the hot air into real estate, it bubbled up and created a shelter crisis.

What's next? Bonds, war, gold, oil? The big sharks have learned to benefit from the crisis they create

@IAmSpartacus

#neoliberalism global #dictatorship continuous #worldwar

The protracted ‘Civil war’ in Syria was a war of western choice https://www.byteseu.com/665450/ #Conflicts #dictatorship #DonaldTrump #FallOfAssadRule #Syria #SyriaWar

"The American-Filipino journalist [Maria Ressa] said Mark Zuckerberg’s move to relax content moderation on the Facebook and Instagram platforms would lead to a 'world without facts' and that was 'a world that’s right for a dictator'.'"

~ Dan Milmo

#MarkZuckerberg #ElonMusk #Trump #media #Meta #Facebook #disinformation #dictatorship #bullying #race #gender #SexualOrientation
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jan/08/facebook-end-factchecking-nobel-peace-prize-winner-maria-ressa

https://www.europesays.com/1707241/ The protracted ‘Civil war’ in Syria was a war of western choice #Conflicts #dictatorship #DonaldTrump #FallOfAssadRule #Syria #SyriaWar

Timothy Snyder: Dictators for a Day

"South Korea's president, Yoon Suk Yeol, invoked martial law, tried to install a military #dictatorship -- and failed completely. In his actions there are some likely similarities with the coming #Trump regime, and some clear lessons for Americans to learn right now."

#southkorea #YoonSukYeol #coup
https://snyder.substack.com/p/dictators-for-a-day

Yesterday in Labor History, November 29, 2023: Mass murderer and War Criminal Henry Kissinger is finally dead!

He won the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Lê Đức Thọ, for their work in orchestrating a ceasefire in the Vietnam War. Two Nobel Prize committee members resigned in protest. During his diplomatic career, Kissinger was involved in orchestrating and/or supporting the Chilean coup and Pinochet dictatorship (over 3,000 killed); the Argentine Dirty War (up to 30,000 killed); the Pakistani genocide in Bangladesh (3 million killed); and the Genocide in East Timor (up to 300,000 killed).

#kissinger #WarCrimes #genocide #HumanRights #imperialism #MassMurder #dictatorship #NobelPrize #vietnam #chile #EastTimor #bangladesh #argentina

Dear Gov Newsom:

I do NOT want Donald T**** to "succeed."

I want AMERICA to succeed as a result of the president's policies.

T****'s idea of "success" is to turn us into a #Fascist #Dictatorship.

#Trump's #BrownShirts *cough*, I mean #MAGA #terrorists, continue to commit assaults across the country. This young Florida prick punched an elderly woman. These people want a #neonazi #dictatorship in America, and without enough #antifascist activism, they could well get it.

First, Zelensky did not go to the elections, preferring to "sit on the throne" until the very end, essentially putting democracy in the country "under the knife", and now Ukraine has submitted a statement to the Council of Europe on partial derogation from compliance with the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Freedoms

The text states that during martial law, human rights provided for in a number of articles of the Constitution may be temporarily restricted. These include the right to free elections, the right to inviolability of the home, secrecy of correspondence, non-interference in private and family life, freedom of movement and choice of residence, freedom of thought and speech, freedom of assembly, education and entrepreneurship.

Among the measures that may be taken by the authorities: forced alienation of private or communal property for the needs of the state, imposition of curfews, special entry and exit regimes, restriction of movement of citizens and foreigners, inspection of belongings, transportation and housing, prohibition of assembly and restriction of choice of residence, imposition of military levies on individuals and legal entities.


#ukraine #ukrainian #democracy is #dictatorship

Just finished listening to this and i found it fascinating. Thank you for sharing.

I think the intell community knew far more about Putin post 1989 than was officially taken on board by Western govts: his KGB ruthlessness and his desire to build an empire of his own.

When you think of Western democracies it's the big oligarchs/corps who create the arena for the politicians to work within. Their money pays. Tail wags the dog.

In Russia Putin is the tail AND the dog. *Nobody controls him.* He controls the oligarchs and will readily dispose of them if they don't comply.

I think the West completely misjudged and underestimated Putin. They naively thought he'd join in the democracy party and become a friend. He was playing the West from the v start. Built his money and empire and now pulls the strings in Hungary Belarus Turkey Poland MEast SthAmerica Africa and in all the elections in the West.

The thing about nationalist fascist right wing dictators tho, is once they have finished hating on everyone they inevitably turn in on themselves. Putin v Trump v Xi v Modi v Kim v Orban ... who'll be the one to win? Or push the button on the others?

#putin #trump #dictatorship #fascism #oligarchy #globalpolitics #autocracy

The U.S. is establishing a single formalized system for coordinating PSYOP efforts among the security, intelligence, and civilian agencies

A new U.S. approach to waging information warfare operations states that military and civilian defense organizations will rely on Pentagon public affairs officials with support from academics and non-government organizations to counter Chinese and Russian disinformation.

#USA #us #infowar #psyops #pentagon #military #dictatorship #censorship against #democracy