Collection: Resist Rebel Revolt

Format: Article
Length: 5,000 Words | 22 Min
Author: Melissa Nadia Viviana
Date: September 16, 2025

Tags: Authoritarian Governments, Free Speech, Coups, History, AI

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What a week!

There are years in which nothing happens, and there are days, like yesterday, into which a whole lifetime is compressed. - Adriaan Schade van Westrum

We’re at an inflection point in the Trump Administration, in which they’re attempting to behave like autocrats that crack down on free speech.

And since we don’t have Historians and Lawyers in our pocket (Heather Cox Richardson and Joyce Vance notwithstanding), I wanted to give people a relevant snapshot of what’s happening at this moment via a conversation with AI.

Hear me out. One thing to keep in mind: the Trump Administration, on the surface, has a lot of idiots. Trump is the most useful idiot of them all.

But this also serves to keep us thinking they don’t know what they’re doing… while they insidiously do something worse.

So the purpose of this conversation with AI was to understand all of the misdirects of an administration that might come off as stupid, but is actually being truly clever.

The focus is on the free speech backlash surrounding Charlie Kirk’s death, but I took a detour onto tariffs to show you exactly what I mean.

And I brought it around to effective types of resistance, as well as the legal ramifications of a government interference of free speech.

Please know that I acknowledge these are stolen ideas.

Human historians, philosophers, & journalists did the hard work of studying authoritarian governments, & documenting their tactics exhaustively.

In 15 minutes, AI gave me access to years and years of their hard work without any attribution! I acknowledge that completely.

That being said, read only a few paragraphs and you’ll see that history is extremely fucking relevant to this precise moment we’re facing now.

Therefore, I’m publishing it even though I know that AI is unpopular—because I think it’s that important.

I hope, despite your reservations, that some of us can use it today in this real-life crisis.

This dialogue with AI can be broadly divided into 3 categories:

1. What the Trump Admin is trying to do: the Playbook of Authoritarians

2. What we can do to counter it: the Playbook of Resistance

3. How his authoritarian actions play out in an American legal system

Let’s dive in:

ME: I want to talk about why an authoritarian government would be trying to destabilize a country or populous?

Is stability something that dictators want to have? Are they looking for long-term power?

Or do they crave short-term chaos? Would it be possible to control people by crashing the economy or causing mass fear?

AI: Let me walk you through the different ways dictators think about stability and control, because it's more nuanced than it might first appear.

Most successful dictators actually want a very specific type of stability—what we might call "controlled stability." They want the economy functioning well enough to prevent mass uprisings, the military loyal and well-paid, and basic services running smoothly enough that people aren't desperate.

Think of how China's leadership focuses heavily on economic growth to maintain legitimacy.

But here's the key insight: dictators want stability for their regime, not necessarily for democratic institutions or civil society.

They often deliberately destabilize the very institutions that could challenge them. Such as: independent courts, free press, opposition parties, civil society organizations—while maintaining stability in areas that keep them in power.

When Chaos Becomes a Tool

There are definitely situations where authoritarian leaders use controlled chaos as a strategy. This typically happens in three scenarios:

First, during the initial seizure of power. Creating crisis and instability can justify emergency measures and the suspension of normal democratic processes. Think about how the Reichstag Fire in 1933 Germany was used to justify sweeping emergency powers.

Second, when facing serious challenges to their rule, a dictator might create external conflicts (kirk’s death)

or internal crises to rally people around the flag (what he stood for)

and distract from domestic problems (Epstein).

This gives people something else to worry about besides the government's failures.

(In other words, Epstein is completely out of Trump’s base’s mind because they’ve rallied behind Kirk’s death and getting liberals fired for laughing at it).

The third scenario, is a method of social control through what scholars call "manufactured uncertainty."

By keeping people slightly off-balance—not knowing what new policy might come next, which officials might be purged, or what new restrictions might be imposed—citizens become more focused on day-to-day survival than on organizing resistance.

The Economics of Authoritarian Control

Regarding economic manipulation, this is indeed a powerful tool, but it's typically used more surgically than through complete economic collapse. A smart dictator doesn't want their entire economy to crash because that threatens their own power base. Instead, they might:

Control who gets economic opportunities (creating a class of people dependent on the regime)

Use selective economic punishment against opposition areas or groups

Manipulate information about economic conditions

Create economic crises that they can then "solve" to appear competent

Complete economic collapse is usually a sign of a failing dictatorship, not a successful strategy.

Me: So, in other words, if you used tariffs to deliberately crash the economy with the plan to give specific bailouts to industries—then you could control which industries survived, and also make them dependent on your regime.

AI: By creating an economic crisis first, an authoritarian leader creates a situation where survival becomes the primary concern for businesses, industries, and workers.

Then, by selectively providing relief, they transform themselves from the cause of the problem into the savior. (Arkansas farmers come to mind).

This strategy works on multiple levels simultaneously. At the industry level, companies that receive bailouts become financially dependent on continued government favor. They're much less likely to oppose policies or support opposition movements when their very existence depends on staying in the regime's good graces.

At the individual level, workers in those industries understand that their jobs depend not just on market forces, but on political loyalty.

Similarly, think about how economic sanctions or trade wars can be used domestically.

A leader might impose policies that harm certain industries, then provide selective relief. The businesses that survive learn a clear lesson about the importance of political alignment.

What makes this approach so powerful is that it creates what economists call "rent-seeking behavior" on a massive scale.

Instead of competing in markets, businesses learn to compete for political favor. This fundamentally changes the relationship between economic and political power.

Once industries become dependent on government bailouts and favorable treatment, they become invested in maintaining the system that created that dependency.

They're not just afraid of opposing the regime; they actively have incentives to support it. (Corporations that capitulate become further invested in the regime).

A business owner whose company was saved by government intervention has a powerful reason to publicly support the leader who "rescued" them.

This creates what we might call a "dependency cascade." As more industries become dependent on political favor, the entire business community becomes less likely to support opposition movements or democratic reforms.

They've been transformed from potential centers of independent power into extensions of the authoritarian system.

The Information Control Dimension

There's also a crucial information component to this strategy. When a regime controls which businesses survive, they also influence which media outlets, think tanks, and information sources have resources.

The independence of journalism becomes much harder to sustain when advertising revenue depends on businesses that depend on government favor.

Think about how this creates a self-reinforcing cycle:

Economic dependency leads to information control

Which makes it harder for people to understand what's happening

Which makes resistance more difficult to organize.

Me: Can you talk about how authoritarians crack down on free speech?

AI: Here's the first key insight: successful authoritarians rarely begin by announcing "We're abolishing free speech!" Instead, they use what we might call the "boiling frog" approach.

Just as a frog won't jump out of water that's heated gradually, populations often don't recognize the danger when speech restrictions are introduced slowly and with seemingly reasonable justifications.

The process typically starts with restrictions that many people actually support.

Think about how this might work: an authoritarian leader might begin by cracking down on hate speech, or restricting speech that could incite violence, or limiting what they call "misinformation."

These early restrictions often have genuine public support because they seem to target genuinely harmful content.

But here's the crucial mechanism: once the legal and institutional framework for restricting speech exists, it becomes much easier to expand those restrictions. The same laws that were initially used to stop genuinely harmful speech can later be redefined to target political opposition, journalism, or any form of dissent.

The Legal Architecture of Censorship

Let me walk you through how authoritarians build the legal framework that allows them to control speech.

First, they create broad, vaguely defined laws about what constitutes "dangerous" speech. Terms like "extremism," "terrorism," "public order," or "national security" are particularly useful because they can be interpreted very broadly.

A law against "extremist content" might initially target genuine violent groups, but it can later be used against anyone whose political views the government dislikes.

The key insight here is that vague laws are actually more powerful tools of control than specific ones. If a law specifically prohibits, say, calling for violence against government officials, then people know exactly what they can't say.

But if a law prohibits "extremist content that threatens social stability," then people don't know where the line is, so they self-censor much more broadly to avoid accidentally crossing it.

This uncertainty creates what scholars call a "chilling effect." When people don't know exactly what speech might get them in trouble, they tend to avoid saying anything that might be remotely controversial. The regime achieves broad censorship without having to actually prosecute very many people.

Controlling the Information Infrastructure

Now let's examine how authoritarians gain control over the platforms and institutions that enable speech. This is like controlling the pipes through which information flows, rather than trying to catch every drop of water.

Think about all the different ways information reaches people: traditional media like newspapers and television, social media platforms, internet service providers, book publishers, university presses—even printing companies.

An authoritarian regime systematically works to gain influence or control over as many of these channels as possible.

This often begins with economic pressure rather than direct government takeover. Media companies need advertising revenue to survive, and businesses need government permits and contracts to operate.

When the government signals that companies supporting independent media might face regulatory problems or lose government contracts, many businesses quietly stop advertising in opposition publications.

The Technology of Modern Censorship

Modern authoritarians have tools for controlling speech that previous generations of dictators could only dream of—via digital technologies.

Internet censorship can be incredibly sophisticated. Governments can block specific websites, slow down internet speeds for certain content, or use algorithms to suppress the visibility of particular viewpoints without completely blocking them.

(Such as Musk immediately manipulating Grok to change info about Tyler Robinson)

Think about how different this is from old-fashioned censorship where you either published something or you didn't.

Now, content can be made effectively invisible without being technically banned.

Social media platforms can be pressured to remove content, shadow-ban certain users, or adjust their algorithms to reduce the spread of particular viewpoints.

The platform can claim they're just enforcing their terms of service, while the government can claim they're not directly censoring anyone.

(Remember that for when Trump makes a deal for a U.S. company to buy Tik Tok later this month. But it’s already happening with Musk & Zuck).

Surveillance technology also enables a new kind of speech control. When people know their communications might be monitored, they change how they communicate. The mere knowledge that surveillance is possible creates self-censorship, even if most people are never actually surveilled.

The Psychology of Self-Censorship

This brings us to one of the most insidious aspects of authoritarian speech control: getting people to censor themselves. This is far more efficient than having to monitor and punish everyone who says something problematic.

Self-censorship works through a combination of uncertainty and visible examples.

People see a few high-profile cases of individuals being punished for their speech, and they imagine that the same could happen to them.

(The journalists, teachers, and professors getting fired this week were made examples of).

Without knowing precisely what the rules are or how consistently they're enforced, others see this and err on the side of caution.

Imagine you're a teacher who hears that a colleague in another school was fired for making comments that were deemed "politically inappropriate." You might not know exactly what they said or whether there were other factors involved in their firing. But you'll probably be more careful about what you say in class or post on social media, just to be safe.

This creates a spiral effect. As more people self-censor, the range of acceptable public discourse narrows. Ideas that were once commonly discussed become taboo not because they're explicitly banned, but because no one wants to risk being the person who crosses an invisible line.

Targeting the Messengers

Authoritarian regimes also systematically target the people and institutions that facilitate free speech. This includes not just journalists and activists, but also lawyers who defend free speech cases, judges who rule in favor of speech rights, academics who study censorship, and even ordinary citizens who share information.

The strategy here is to make supporting free speech personally costly. When lawyers who take free speech cases find themselves facing frivolous lawsuits or professional sanctions, fewer lawyers will be willing to take such cases. When journalists who investigate government corruption face harassment or prosecution, fewer journalists will pursue such stories.

Me: But you’re describing an innocent scenario, in which the government can pretend they’re doing something good for the people.

What if that innocence actually comes off as genuinely hypocritical? That they’re cracking down for something they actually do all the time.

Then it just comes off as “We get to do this unrestricted thing, while we take that right away from you."

(As is the case when the Republicans call for a full out war, but claim we should get fired from our jobs for mere laughter or lack of sadness).

AI: You've identified something crucial. Hypocrisy is actually a deliberate strategy that serves multiple purposes for authoritarian regimes.

The Power of Visible Double Standards

When you say “They get to do this unrestricted thing, while they take that right away from us," you're describing what political scientists call "performative hypocrisy" or "demonstrative inequality."

The key insight is that the hypocrisy isn't a bug in the system, it's a feature.

The regime wants people to see the double standard because it sends a very specific message about power.

Think about it this way: when a government blatantly applies different rules to itself than to its citizens, it's making a statement about hierarchy and control.

It's saying "We are above the rules that bind you, and we want you to know it."

This serves to reinforce the power relationship in a way that consistent rule applications actually wouldn't.

Consider how this works psychologically. If a government simply banned certain types of speech for everyone, including themselves, people might see it as misguided policy but still fundamentally fair.

But when the government says "You can't spread misinformation" while obviously spreading misinformation themselves, or "You can't engage in corruption" while being obviously corrupt themselves, they're sending a different message entirely. They're saying "The rules exist to control you, not us."

Visible hypocrisy doesn't just demonstrate power - it's designed to demoralize and humiliate the population.

When people are forced to live under rules that their rulers openly flout, it creates a sense of powerlessness and cynicism that actually serves the regime's interests.

Think about the psychological impact of being told you can't do something while watching the people who are telling you this do exactly that thing, openly and without consequences.

It creates what researchers call "learned helplessness." People begin to internalize the idea that fairness and justice don't really exist, that power is the only thing that matters, and that resistance is futile because the system is rigged anyway.

Now here's another layer that makes this strategy particularly sophisticated.

When a regime engages in obvious hypocrisy, it forces everyone in society to make a choice about how to respond. This choice becomes a kind of loyalty test.

People who continue to publicly support the regime despite its obvious hypocrisy are demonstrating their loyalty in a very clear way. They're essentially saying "I will support you even when you're obviously violating the principles you claim to uphold."

This is actually much stronger evidence of loyalty than supporting a regime that appears to be acting consistently with its stated values.

(I took this to mean that when MAGA is being asked to persecute us on hypocritical principles—this act of ignoring the regime’s hypocrisy actually shows the regime how much loyalty they have).

AI: Think about how this works for people in positions of authority - judges, police officers, teachers, bureaucrats. When they're asked to enforce rules that the regime itself openly violates, they're being forced to choose between their professional integrity and their political loyalty.

Those who choose loyalty become complicit in the system and therefore more invested in its continuation. Meanwhile, those who refuse to participate or who point out the hypocrisy identify themselves as potential threats to the regime.

The visible double standard actually serves as a sorting mechanism that helps the regime identify who is sufficiently loyal—and who needs to be watched or removed.

The Corruption of Language and Meaning

This brings us to another crucial aspect of how visible hypocrisy functions as a tool of control.

When a regime consistently says one thing while doing another, it begins to erode the very concept of truth and shared meaning. Words become tools of power rather than vehicles for communication.

Consider how this might work with specific examples. When a government talks constantly about "law and order" while obviously operating outside the law, or speaks about "national security" while clearly acting in ways that make the nation less secure, they're not trying to convince people that their words are true.

They're demonstrating that they have the power to make words mean whatever they want them to mean.

This creates what Hannah Arendt called the destruction of the distinction between truth and falsehood.

Once people lose faith in the possibility of shared truth, political discourse becomes impossible.

You can't have democratic debate when words have no stable meaning and everyone assumes everyone else is lying.

Think about how disorienting this must be for ordinary citizens. If you can't trust that words mean what they appear to mean, how do you make sense of political events?

How do you decide who to support or what policies to favor? This ambiguity serves the regime's interests because:

Confused and disoriented people are less likely to organize effective opposition.

Why Traditional Responses Often Fail

Now let's think about why this strategy is so effective against traditional forms of opposition. Most democratic opposition strategies are designed to combat governments that at least pretend to care about consistency and legitimacy.

They rely on things like exposing hypocrisy, fact-checking, appeals to shared values, and legal challenges based on the government's own stated principles.

But what happens when the government doesn't care if you expose their hypocrisy? What happens when they want you to see it?

Traditional opposition strategies can actually backfire because they end up reinforcing the regime's demonstration of power.

When critics point out obvious contradictions and nothing happens as a result, it just further proves that the regime is above accountability.

(Keep this in mind as you see everybody online pointing out the hypocrisy of Republican officials also having violent rhetoric. We’re actually showing the world that they are above accountability).

This is why you sometimes see authoritarian regimes almost goading their opponents into pointing out their hypocrisy.

They know that the more obvious the double standard becomes, and the more futile opposition efforts appear, the more demoralized and fragmented their opposition will become.

Me: I just want to pause to say: HOLY SHIT. DID JD VANCE PUT THE SAME FUCKING QUESTION INTO AI THIS WEEK?

They’re using an exact *known* playbook.

But, please, continue.

AI: Breaking the Cycle

Understanding this dynamic also helps us think about what kinds of resistance strategies might be more effective against regimes that rely on visible hypocrisy.

Instead of simply pointing out contradictions, effective opposition might need to focus on rebuilding institutions, creating alternative sources of meaning and community, and demonstrating through action rather than argument that different ways of organizing society are possible.

The key insight is that you can't defeat performative hypocrisy with logical arguments because the hypocrisy isn't accidental—it's the point.

Instead, you need strategies that address the underlying psychological and social dynamics that make this form of control effective.

(I then pivoted to talk about the threshold of people the Trump Admin is attacking this week. Do they consider people who laughed at Kirk’s death a minority or a majority? That’s important for reasons you’ll see below.)

AI: This is a crucial concept that helps us understand why they often target seemingly harmless or minority behaviors rather than going after the biggest perceived threats.

The Mathematics of Social Control

Let's start with the mathematical reality you've identified. Think of social control as requiring a certain ratio between enforcers and targets. If you have a police force that represents, say, 2% of the population, and you try to simultaneously suppress 40% of the population, the mathematics simply don't work.

You don't have enough enforcers, enough prison space, enough courts, or enough administrative capacity to process that many people.

But here's the deeper insight: even if you had the raw capacity—attempting to suppress 40% of the population would likely trigger a kind of resistance tipping point that threatens the regime.

When that many people feel directly threatened, you're no longer dealing with isolated individuals who can be picked off one by one.

You're dealing with a critical mass that can organize effective resistance.

This is why successful authoritarians almost always follow what we might call the "salami slicing" strategy. They target thin slices of the population one at a time, rather than trying to take large chunks all at once. Each slice is small enough to be manageable and doesn't trigger mass resistance because most people don't feel personally threatened.

The Strategic Logic of Targeting Minorities

Your observation about targeting "something very few people are doing" reveals a sophisticated understanding of how social control actually works. Authoritarian systems typically begin by targeting groups that meet several criteria: they're small enough to be manageable, unpopular enough that the majority won't defend them, and symbolically important enough that suppressing them sends a broader message about the regime's power and values.

Think about how this played out historically. The Nazis didn't begin by targeting all political opposition simultaneously. They started with communists, then moved to socialists, then to trade unionists, then to various other groups.

Each group was small enough to be suppressed without triggering mass resistance, and each group had limited sympathy from the broader population.

This creates what we might call a "normalization cascade." Each successful suppression of a minority group establishes a new baseline for what kinds of government action are acceptable.

The population gradually becomes accustomed to seeing certain types of people arrested, silenced, or excluded from society. This psychological conditioning makes it easier to expand the targeting to slightly larger or more mainstream groups later.

Question AI can’t answer, but we need to answer: are the people who have no sympathy for Kirk part of the majority or the minority? Is our feeling normal, widespread, or niche? Are we 40% of the population? Or 4% of the population? Because that matters.

AI goes on to say:

Once you understand why authoritarians start with minority views, you can see how they gradually expand their control toward the center of society.

The process often moves from targeting people based on what they do, to targeting people based on what they say, to targeting people based on what they think, and finally to targeting people based on who they are or who they associate with. Each stage represents an escalation in the scope and arbitrariness of control.

Consider how this might work in practice.

1. A regime might start by targeting people who commit actual acts of violence

2. Then it expands to target people who advocate for violence

3. Then it expands to target people who express sympathy for those who advocate for violence

4. Then it expands to target people who fail to sufficiently condemn those who express sympathy for those who advocate for violence

Each step seems like a small, logical extension of the previous step, but the cumulative effect is to create a system where almost anyone can be targeted for almost any reason.

(If AI was capable of objective criticism, it might observe that they tried to do all four steps in a single week)

This gradual expansion serves several strategic purposes. It allows the regime to test how much the population will tolerate at each stage. It helps normalize increasingly arbitrary enforcement. It gradually builds the bureaucratic and legal infrastructure needed for broader suppression. And it creates precedents that can be used to justify further expansion.

The Infrastructure of Surveillance and Enforcement

There's also a practical dimension to why authoritarians start small and expand gradually: they need time to build the infrastructure necessary for broader control. Suppressing large portions of the population requires extensive surveillance networks, large enforcement bureaucracies, expanded legal frameworks, and significant financial resources.

Think of this infrastructure as being like a muscle that needs to be gradually strengthened. A regime that tried to immediately implement massive surveillance and suppression would likely find that its systems couldn't handle the load.

But a regime that starts with small-scale targeting can gradually build up its capacity while learning from experience and refining its methods.

This infrastructure building also serves a psychological function for the enforcers themselves. Police officers, judges, prosecutors, and bureaucrats need time to become accustomed to increasingly arbitrary and harsh enforcement. Starting with targets that seem clearly legitimate helps normalize the enforcement process, making it easier to gradually expand to more questionable targets later.

The Coalition Maintenance Challenge

Another reason they target minority views first is that they need to maintain a governing coalition that supports their actions. If they immediately targeted large portions of the population, they would risk alienating key supporters who might themselves become targets.

By starting with minorities that none of these groups identify with, the regime can maintain broad coalition support while gradually conditioning each group to accept more extensive control. The key is ensuring that each group always feels like the targeting is directed at someone else, not at them.

To the regime's supporters and enforcers, the message is: "We are taking action to defend our values and maintain order. Your loyalty to us is justified and necessary." This helps maintain the coalition that keeps the regime in power.

But this strategy contains the seeds of its own potential failure. As the targeting expands, it eventually begins to affect members of the supporting coalition. When business leaders, middle-class voters, religious conservatives, security forces, or bureaucrats begin to feel personally threatened, the coalition can fracture very quickly.

This is often how authoritarian systems ultimately collapse—not through popular uprising, but through elite defection when the regime's supporters realize they're no longer safe.

The Modern Twist: Information Warfare and Social Fragmentation

In today's context, there's an additional dimension to this strategy. Modern authoritarian movements often use information warfare to artificially fragment the population into smaller, isolated groups that can be targeted more easily.

Consider how social media algorithms and targeted messaging can be used to create the impression that society is more divided than it actually is.

By amplifying extreme voices and suppressing moderate ones. By promoting conspiracy theories and undermining trust in shared institutions. Authoritarian movements use these tactics to make previously unified populations appear fragmented and polarized.

If you can convince 60% of the population that the other 40% are dangerous extremists, then suppressing that 40% becomes much more feasible.

The majority won't resist because they've been convinced that the minority represents a genuine threat to their safety and values.

Me to you: Now if you’re feeling overwhelmed, don’t worry. I was too. But keep in mind, Claude AI has no idea that it’s talking about our present moment. In fact, multiple times it asked me to “Imagine I lived in such a country…” lol

Claude is describing Russia and China: countries that have had authoritarian rule for hundreds of years.

But a country doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It exists in a precedent of culture, institutions, and upbringing.

If I’ve lived in a free country my entire life, I’m not going to behave as a person who has lived in an authoritarian regime for their entire life.

So what works for Putin won’t necessarily work for Trump. (Not that he won’t stop trying).

So now that we know some of the basic Playbook for how Authoritarian Regimes crack down on free speech, I pivoted to begin digging into the way the Trump admin might use this crisis to escalate another one.

I asked Claude to distinguish both what the resistance to this may look like. And also to the legal ramifications of attempting something like this in a legal system like ours.

However, since Claude is very long-winded, I decided to put these into separate articles so that you could digest them piece by piece.

Join me for part 2 & 3 of the Authoritarian Playbook—and some solutions we can use against it—tomorrow.

Subscribe to get them in your inbox!

P.S. If you’re new here, this is the first article I’ve done with the help of AI. I am a writer of 20 years and have my own thoughts and feelings.

BUT we are in crisis mode and if I rely on myself, I might miss a critical window. I have nearly 15 books on fascism & propaganda on my bookshelf right now. But it would take me 6 months to read them all.

I acknowledge that using the shortcut of AI is cheating.

But you know what? You can bet your ass JD Vance sits up at 3AM researching authoritarian techniques with AI, so he can walk into the Oval Office and impress Trump with all of his clever suggestions.

In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if Project 2025 was completely constructed with the help of AI spelling out Putin and Xi’s authoritarian playbooks.

So I humbly suggest that if they use it as research against us, so should we!

So, until next time…