Hello again, ex:

By the way, here's the guy who came up with the list:

Timothy Snyder is the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. He speaks five and reads ten European languages. His eight chief books are Nationalism, Marxism, and Modern Central Europe: A Biography of Kazimierz Kelles-Krauz (1998); The Reconstruction of Nations: Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, 1569-1999 (2003); Sketches from a Secret War: A Polish Artist’s Mission to Liberate Soviet Ukraine (2005); The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of a Habsburg Archduke (2008); Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (2010), Thinking the Twentieth Century (with Tony Judt, 2012); Black Earth: The Holocaust as History and Warning (2015); On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (2017); and The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America (2018). He has also co-edited three further books: The Wall Around the West: State Borders and Immigration Controls in Europe and North America (2001); Stalin and Europe: Terror, War, Domination (2013); and The Balkans as Europe (2018). His essays are collected in Ukrainian History, Russian Politics, European Futures (2014), and The Politics of Life and Death (2015). Snyder’s work has appeared in forty languages and has received a number of prizes, including the Emerson Prize in the Humanities, the Literature Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Václav Havel Foundation prize, the Foundation for Polish Science prize in the social sciences, the Leipzig Award for European Understanding, the Dutch Auschwitz Committee award, and the Hannah Arendt Prize in Political Thought. Snyder was a Marshall Scholar at Oxford, has received the Carnegie and Guggenheim fellowships, and holds state orders from Estonia, Lithuania, and Poland. He has appeared in documentaries, on network television, and in major films. His books have inspired poster campaigns and exhibitions, films, sculpture, a punk rock song, a rap song, a play, and an opera. His words are quoted in political demonstrations around the world, most recently in Hong Kong. He is researching a family history of nationalism and finishing a philosophical book about freedom.

excon

1. Do not obey in advance.

In advance of what, what the authorities tell you the facts are?

2. Defend institutions.

Which ones?

3. Beware the one-party state.

And beware the illusion of choice when it's multi-party but still the same institution/establishment that lesson 2 tells you to defend blindly without specifying which institutions to defend.

4. Take responsibility for the face of the world.

By virtue of the fact that I am 1/7 billion humans I am 1/7 billion percent responsible by default relative to the rest of humanity and closer to 0 if you take into account how much damage I do compared to others who may individually be worth an entire million people or more in damage on their own. whether I take more responsibility than most or not is a personal choice and based on what others are doing it would be an uphill battle.

5. Remember professional ethics.

And remember that not everyone plays by the same rules. It's better to be flexible when necessary to adapt to them than be a loser/slave.

6. Be wary of paramilitaries.

Ok.

7. Be reflective if you must be armed.

k

8. Stand out.

These lessons are not contextualized enough to actually be valid/wise lessons. In the wrong situation, you are telling people to paint a target on their back or be unanimously seen as a freak or an enemy by the wrong crowd for no gain.

9. Be kind to our language.

You're basically saying to respect/preserve American English I think which is silly since language is meant to evolve over time and American English isn't even the original or superior of the two main types (british and american).

10. Believe in truth.

If its true you don't need to believe it, only be aware of it.

11. Investigate.

k

12. Make eye contact and small talk.

Are you discriminating against people with autism here? lol jk

13. Practice corporeal politics.

k

14. Establish a private life.

k

15. Contribute to good causes.

k

16. Learn from peers in other countries.

k but what about superiors or inferiors or deeming such classifications as a social construct etc?

17. Listen for dangerous words.

There are no inherently dangerous words, there are only dangerous ways to use them or allow yourself to be effected by them.

18. Be calm when the unthinkable arrives.

k

19. Be a patriot.

No

20. Be as courageous as you can. If none of us is prepared to die for freedom, then all of us will die under tyranny.

How enslaved are you to the notion of freedom if you would be courageous to the point of suicidal recklessness instead of putting up with some non-freedom in favor of a balance of safety and freedom?