Quotes About Authoritarianism

It's very clear that Vladimir Putin has decided that he will eliminate his opponents and anyone who stands up for democracy and freedom. And he does so with relative impunity.

I'm not a big fan of regulation: anyone who likes freedom of the press can't be.

The freedom of the city is not negotiable. We cannot negotiate with those who say, What's mine is mine and what's yours is negotiable.

Every dictator is an enemy of freedom, an opponent of law

The Council is wrong. Yet, observe that none of us will risk telling it so, for fear of the consequences.

This was a pure case of governing by intimidation, which is the essence of authoritarianism.

not meant to serve the political expedients of a class of governing masterminds and their fanatical followers.

to the party is more important than fidelity to the country. It holds these characteristics in common with other autocratic and communist parties throughout the world.

Asked what kind of government Germany should work toward, Pius answered, according to Leiber's notes: "Any government without Hitler.

Let me assure you that the humourless as a bunch don't just not know what's funny, they don't know what's serious. They have no common sense, either, and shouldn't be trusted with anything.

Stalin didn't write any memoirs. He was too secretive. He was afraid people might read them.

It had never occurred to us that the Kremlin's new anti-booze campaign would apply to journalists. Now, that's a human-rights violation.

Fascism is not in itself a new order of society. It is the future refusing to be born.

Show me where Stalin is buried and I'll show you a Communist Plot.

Votes, this essayist insisted, not signatures, were the correct way to express the public will—a

At least they were quiet, mostly because Moon told them if anybody woke Merit, he would personally beat them into unconsciousness.

Its continued illegality was proof that lying and/or stupidity was a cornerstone of government policy.

What we eventually run up against are the forces of humourlessness, and let me assure you that the humourless as a bunch don't just not know what's funny, they don't know what's serious. They have no common sense, either, and shouldn't be trusted with anything.

How they had the nerve to sanction other countries about their penal laws when they treated their own as guilty before there was even a trial, he did not know. Innocent till proven guilty?

There is little point in asking how 'democratic' the politics of Republican Rome were: Romans fought for, and about, liberty, not democracy.

A passion for politics stems usually from an insatiable need, either for power, or for friendship and adulation, or a combination of both.

The assault on language may be harder to define and describe than his attacks on institutions, but it is essential to his autocratic attempt, the ultimate objective of which is to obliterate politics.

The only constant will be more and more authoritarian solutions. In the social media age, we can scare you as never before. Which means politicians will have an easier time obtaining permission for censorship, surveillance, immigration bans, and other expanded powers.

Scare the crap out of people, and media companies get richer, while state agencies get more and more license for authoritarian crackdowns on the "folk devil" of the moment. A perfect partnership.