Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny is an important exploration of how tyranny has, can, and will manifest throughout time. He not only provides historical examples, but in depth analyses of underlying mechanisms that allow for tyranny to take root and thrive. He makes a number of complex arguments and conveys them with great simplicity and readability, sans academic jargon. This book is pretty dope.

Calling on Milgram’s shock experiments (21), Snyder explains how complacency and a blind adherence to normalcy without question or individual thought are essential conditions for the rise of tyranny (40). Should a person blindly accept that an explanation contrary to reality and physical evidence to be truth, then they are poised to passively accept tyranny (66). Passivity and nihilism are just as essential for tyranny, as zealous acceptance.

Snyder later recounts how after being democratically elected, Nazi ruled Germany used the Reichstag fire as a means to enable an “enabling act,” which expanded the powers of the ruling body at the expense of civil rights (105). Similar to Naomi Klein’s argument in The Shock Doctrine, those in power can and have exploited crises to instill changes that would not normally fly in a democracy.

Furthermore, one of the most important points Snyder makes is detailing the differences between “nationalism” and “patriotism,” and how these pertain to President Trump. Snyder asserts that, “...patriotism involves serving your own country. The president is a nationalist, which is not at all the same thing as a patriot. A nationalist encourages us to be our worst, and then tells us that we are the best...Nationalism is relativist, since the only truth is the resentment we feel when we contemplate others” (113). This is a painfully important distinction, especially as so many who believe themselves to be 'patriotic' have in actuality fallen under populist nationalism.

Another key argument Snyder drives home, is that democracy and other institutions we believe to be all-powerful, are in actuality quite fragile (22). They only exist as long as people allow for them to exist. To ensure that institutions we hold dear continue to operate requires personal civic engagement. When Snyder communicates what he means be civil engagement, he clarifies that actions in addition to words, are essential. “Protest can be organized through social media, but nothing is real that does not end on the streets” (84). In an age of 'online-activism,' I certainly agree that a true progressive has to do more than 'bravely' share their opinions on Facebook.

At this point I must confess that much of this text proved to reaffirm a great deal of what I already believe and practice. After the 2016 election, I immediately began donating to institutions that work for causes that I felt would not be supported (or would be outright attacked) by a Trump government, like Planned Parenthood, the Nature Conservancy, and the ACLU. I march in rallies and support those who worked to utilize their first amendment rights in productive, patriotic ways.

So if you too feel fatigued from the now necessary levels of engagement we must actively do to maintain our rights and important institutions, then this book will do for you what eating a mushroom does for Mario. I have a lot of respect for practice-what-you-preach manifestations of activism, so I definitely recommend this book. Good stuff.