Mastodawn

silence7 Feb 24

How to stop a dictator | I spent months studying how authoritarians like Trump lose. The answer is shockingly simple.

https://slrpnk.net/post/34528122

How to stop a dictator | I spent months studying how authoritarians like Trump lose. The answer is shockingly simple. - SLRPNK

> For this reason, elected authoritarians who wish to consolidate control typically win not by flashy displays of might, but by convincing a critical mass of people that they’re just a normal politician — no threat to democracy at all. > > That means the survival of democracy depends, to an extent not fully appreciated, on perceptions and narratives. In three recent countries where a democracy survived an incumbent government bent on destroying it — Brazil, South Korea, and Poland — the belief among elites, the public, and the opposition that democracy was at stake played a critical role in motivating pushback.

TL;DR: “Making democratic threats legible,” i.e. spreading the word about how every action Trump takes is a threat to our democracy. It has been proven in several other countries run by authoritarian governments to be effective at stomping out fascism before it can take hold.

Saved you a click.

tomatolung Feb 24

I really appreciate the TLDR, as I like to know the point before I start reading the support of it. However “legible” is a horrible word for this as precise as it might be.

Once a threat becomes legible — primarily, by an elected authoritarian beginning to act in authoritarian ways once in office — people start prioritizing democracy in a way they didn’t beforehand.

Which I would rephrase as saying: 'When politicians act like dictators, document it, yell it out, and call them out."

And even that’s to long and not direct enough.

panda_abyss Feb 24

But that’s been met with “you have Trump derangement syndrome” or “that will never happen, you’re exaggerating” or 1000 variations for over a decade now.

Peekashoe Feb 24

If the horse won’t drink, you just keep leading it to water until it eventually gets thirsty.

Restaldt Feb 24

The horse will eventually drink as it must to survive.

You’re better off helping those that want to be helped

Peekashoe Feb 24

The metaphor meant that, as Trump continues to injure his own supporters, reminding them that he is behaving as a dictator may eventually stop them from resolving cognitive dissonance by being defensive and instead by blaming the culprit. Basically, every time you lead the horse to water is a new opportunity to drink, increasing in urgency over time.

But by all means, help those who want to be helped first.

“Water is a democrat hoax. They put weird spy tech in it! Real men inhale hydrogen sulfide for hydration. It’s Trump approved!”

phutatorius Feb 25

Or just drown the fucker.

partofthevoice Feb 24

Seems like they stopped shy of the good stuff:

Why is it so hard to convince your fellows (I.e., Trump supporters)?
Why is propaganda so effective and how is it currently being employed?
What tactics can be used that aren’t already?

🌞 Alexander Daychilde 🌞Feb 24

Worse, in the examples they give, the legislatures and/or judiciaries stood against the dictators.

Here, we have decades of propaganda fueled by the oligarchs that has removed the world view of a third of our population from reality, and it’s not just Trump - the Republican party is in on the deal, from Congress to SCOTUS.

It’s not the same battle. It’s not the same order of magnitude. It’s at least two orders of magnitude harder.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t fight; rather, we should fight all the harder.

But that’s why I’m not certain partition / civil war type solutions are off the table.

Phoenixz Feb 24

It’s also impossible, as this requires people to read and understand, something most Americans aren’t very good at. Most Americans believe what their news organizations tell them and since they’ve had a free pass to lie for decades now, lying is all they do.

DarkFuture Feb 24

So the populace has to be intelligent enough to grasp that their democracy is being threatened?

Yup. We’re fucked.

phutatorius Feb 25

Even shorter TL;DR: state the obvious.

DrDickHandler Feb 26

Fascim has already “took hold”.

WraithGear Feb 26

so the article is bull shit then. thanks for saving me the trouble

GalacticSushi Feb 26

Yeah we’ve been trying that for the past decade and are repeatedly told we’re overreacting.