this post was submitted on 20 Sep 2025
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The trick about the word authoritarian is that while most people have a strong negative reaction to it, different groups have wildly divergent understandings of what the word means. This leads to confusion and hard feelings. Some people define "authoritarian" based on structural hierarchy, rather than exertion of control. Ask 10 people of different ideological persuasions to define the word and you will get 10 wildly different answers. And also many people define the word on a purely vibes basis, which is quite frustrating Personally I don't use the work much because I don't find it that useful.
This. I could see someone equating "authoritarian" to fascist, which then leads to OP's post becoming this absurd nonsense: