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Tyranny from greed
Extremism rises when the system in place is failing citizens and is corrupted. Bad living conditions are in contrast with riches of few, people stop seeing it for its glamour and lean towards seeing it as a class injustice. Tensions rise, desperation turns into blame, reason to violence. Rise of extremism is natural reaction to something. >

A breakdown of 70+ years of continuous global progress, due to a string of crises that affect every continent simultaneously, and no clear way out is a very dangerous time for our species. There have been dark periods in the past, but there generally was widespread belief that they would be resolved (either via religious dogma or via an escape from the mundane life cycle via nirvana/enlightenment). The 2020s are fertile ground for con men and doomsday cults of all varieties, even if the prior problems had begun to emerge in individual countries like the USA and Brazil in the 2010s. >


no clear way out is a very dangerous time for our species

Eh, i don't think humans are going away anytime soon, we're a tenacious lot, sure the vast majority of us will die off in the coming climate crisis and we'll be propelled back into a pre-industrial society, but unless something extreme happens like an asteroid strike or a gamma-ray burst cooks us alive i don't see us going anywhere.
In the words of George Carlin "The planet is fine, the people are fucked." >

The planet, as in the rock we live on might be fine. Fucking sucks for all the species we’re taking to the grave with us though. >


Fucking sucks for all the species we’re taking to the grave with us though.

Again, eh, this is not the first mass extinction on this planet, nor will it be the last, hundreds of species go extinct every year with or without our intervention, we just happen to be one of the ones most able to adapt to our environment. >

Small comfort for those species we’re exterminating though. I don’t think we should be quite so blasé about the Holocene Mass Extinction personally >

Well there's lots of people that aren't blasé about it, they're mostly busy being beaten to a pulp by police in climate protests or carried away and locked up because they were blocking a pipeline or a coal mine.
This, all of this, is entirely self inflicted, it is a natural consequence of our actions, if you want to try doing something about it i commend you, not a lot of people are willing to sacrifice their lives for random strangers and animals. >

Right but I’m talking about your comment being blasé, not other people. >

That's because i have already entered the "acceptance" stage of this whole circus, kinda like this guy. >

Isn’t “speed” part of the appeal of tyranny though? Being able to make whatever decision you want without consideration for the wants or needs of others? >

A ~~decent tyrant~~ benevolent dictatorship is probably better than most democracies.
But power seems to corrupt. >

I assume you mean benevolent dictatorship or similar.  No such thing as a decent tyrant.
There actually have a been a couple of those throughout the ages. >


There actually have a been a couple of those throughout the ages. 

What are some to read about? >

lee kwan yew - singapore
ataturk - turkey/turkiye
kagame - rwanda (jury is out) >

It started by allowing corporations to buy politicians. >

Politicians should only be able to buy a extremely broad index funds.
Or invest their money in the countries equivalent of a future fund. >

They’re called government bonds, and there are a few varieties. But if we’re going to allow investing by politicians, that should be the only place they’re allowed to invest
Something something peanut farm >

Nah, bonds are guaranteed returns right? That gives them no incentive to to grow the economy.
Bonds become more attractive in bear markets in fact.
It is also unfair to put them out of stock investment entirely. >

It’s not unfair to put them out of stock investment. Politics is a choice. Choosing to go into it should come with necessary sacrifices.
And as I said, there are a variety of different bonds, but the general idea is they reflect the health of the US government and country as a whole, not just of Wall Street >

What about spouses, children, parents, friends? >

Except parents, it is a choice to have any of those, yes. >

Cute. You know I meant restrictions on investment trading. >

I unironically have no issue with strict prohibitions on investments by politicians and their families. I think that's a justified and proportionate sacrifice for these people to have to make in order for the powers of office to be wielded safely.
Similarly, politicians should also be forbidden from working for or being paid by private organisations for a long time after they leave office. Ten years minimum might be appropriate. I know that's extreme, but I think it's justified by how dangerous corruption of the political class is. It is absolutely imperative that legislators and senior bureaucrats have no allegiance to any power and no interest in any goal other than the well-being of the citizens they serve. >

I suppose we would need to define who is restricted and require signed agreements from the impact radius to run for office. >

He is not wrong. We are too blasé about democracy, as if it is some inevitable hands off natural end state. The opposite is true. Complacent, alienated or otherwise disengaged societies have almost always slid towards some form of tyranny. 
Democracy is a fragile, volatile thing that can only exist as a constant, conscious, careful balance between competing forces in order to maintain a state of acceptable equilibrium in the face perpetual instability. An eternal experiment of sorts. Fair and prosperous democracies are some of the most difficult things humans have attempted. 
Vigilance, always. Indifference is a slippery slope towards peril. >

What could happen now is those in power employ a little thing called “Necessity Over Freedom” where they can justify anything they do for the good of the nation, even if it’s destroying anything that does not share their stance. That’s the fascist thing they want. Freedom to destroy anything that isn’t them.
What is as the public should have done and we could still do (if we got our heads together) is to as a collective society, enforce our laws on those that believe themselves above it and make sure they know who is the majority here. Yes, it’s a little extreme and a bunch of people might die. But what’s the other option? Lay down and give up? 
TLDR: Instead of exposure and shame, you apply swift action and justice. >

that audience knows, they've got the receipts >

Yeah Davos a joke. >

It's because of the power social media gives propaganda. 
There's a lot of money and power to be had in propaganda. So dictators and aspiring dictators alike are putting a lot of resources into it, and there are enough idiots in the world, that allows them to be very successful at it. >

Tyranny is the norm for us backwards species.
Democracy requires earnest efforts and vigilance at all times. 
Humans should remind politicians daily that tyranny can run in both directions. (Though fancy people have a different word for when peasants employ tyrannical behaviors towards their enemies.) >

Tyranny is not the norm, it just feels that way because the way society is currently organized works towards that model of control. >

Wouldn’t you argue that most of history is tyranny? 
Nothing is natural in this sense, society is what you convince people it is. >

Most human history happened before cities existed. We're about 200,000 years old and tyrants are around 7k years old at best. There simply wasn't the ability to concentrated large enough slave/thrall populations until recently. 
To prop up tyranny you need might, to have might you need weapons and soldiers, to maintain soldiers you need to appropriate wealth, to appropriate wealth you have to police many with few, to do that you need to geographically concentrate them, to do that you need irrigation and agriculture.
Even after the rise of tyrants it's only the last few generations that independent subaltern peoples have truly been brought under the thumb of centralised states. Look how easily state building efforts fell apart and how little control governments had over people far from the capital. >

Agriculture has existed since 10,000 BC and nobody cares about what happened before that cause that's before civilization even began.  Can't go back to a hunter-gatherer egalitarian society anymore.  Tyranny began since sargon took his first city and unfortunately we can't go back to a time before that. >

But that's different to saying that tyranny is the norm for our species, isn't it? >

'No do not waist more of our tax money on wars created by the US We don't stand by this war at all it could have ended but the US is the main course not Russie'
​
- A Facebook comment I found >

That's because democracies aren't taking tyranny seriously.  There are extreme right wing movements in nearly every democracy now, and they're all working together like globalists (coordinated by Steve Bannon and his ilk and sponsored by Russia) to overthrow democracies.  Most of them continue to operate unimpeded despite having committed numerous crimes for which they haven't been held accountable.  It's time to hold them accountable.  The fascists who are trying to overthrow democracy belong in prison for life.  The turning point in this war against fascism will be when democracies decide to take the problem seriously and start going after fascists and arresting them for their crimes. >

Democracies will never take the problem seriously as long as they are run by neoliberals >

Further dividing the opposition to fascism only makes the problem worse. The socialist party in the Weimar Republic said similar stuff to what you’re saying now, and refused to work with any of the other political movements. This is one of the big reasons the Nazis came to power. 
Let’s learn from history. We should be unifying the opposition to fascism. >

I can’t tell from your comment whether you know what a neoliberal is. It sounds to me like you think it just means liberal that isnt far left enough
US Neoliberals have fomented coups and supported autocratic murderous dictatorships throughout the Americas for the past 70 years or so. See: Pinochet, the Duvaliers. The only difference now is they are applying similar policies in the US, Canada, and Europe. >

What in tarnation, a lot of people on Reddit have this bizarre idea of what neoliberal means. I think it comes from the 2016 primary... I don't know.
Neoliberal is a right wing economic philosophy. Yes free trade is part of it, but so is massive deregulation and reduced government spending especially on social welfare.
That's not center left. I know a lot of center left people in this country and they all want increased government spending on social welfare and an increase of regulations on the environment, labor, etc.
Where progressives and the center left disagree is on how far to go and which areas to prioritize. And process/electability/partisanship issues. But on policy aside from immigration, they have nothing in common with neoliberals.
If you're actually a neoliberal, like textbook neoliberal not weird reddit bastardization, then you're pretty right wing on economics. Far outside the mainstream of even the democratic party, maybe Manchin/Senema/Gottheimer kind of a Dem but not the center and certainly not center left. >

Dude was so wrong and strong. Neoliberalism is a really old political concept. It definitely does not mean “MoDeRaTeLy LeFt PoLiTiCaL PeRsON”. Read a book, ya goof.  - an actually left of centre political person >

Speaking to a room who buys tyrants