Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 6 – Be Wary of Paramilitaries If you missed the earlier posts, you can find them here:

If you missed the first posts of this series, you’ll find them here:

• Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4,Part 5

Timothy Snyder’s sixth lesson is:

Be Wary of Paramilitaries

This one feels like something from a dystopian TV show, not your neighborhood. But Snyder’s warning is based on real history: when unofficial armed groups start acting with government approval—or indifference—that’s a red flag. When they’re used to intimidate protestors, voters, or marginalized groups, it’s not just about violence. It’s about silencing people through fear.

If you missed the first posts of this series, you’ll find them here:

• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 1
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 2
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 3
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 4

Holding the Line: The Role of Professional Ethics

Timothy Snyder reminds us that professionals play a critical role in resisting tyranny. Lawyers, doctors, journalists, engineers—these are the people who keep systems running and, ideally, keep them honest. But when professionals cave under pressure, institutions lose their integrity, and corruption spreads like a bad case of malware.

If you missed the first posts of this series, you’ll find them here:

• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 1
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 2
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 3

Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 4 – Taking Responsibility for Our Online World

In his book “On Tyranny,” historian Timothy Snyder challenges us to “take responsibility for the face of the world” by removing hate symbols. But in 2025, nasty stuff doesn’t just show up as swastikas spray-painted on walls — it’s embedded in our feeds, comments, and search results.

If you missed the first posts of this series, you’ll find them here:

• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 1
• Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 2

Timothy Snyder’s third lesson is:

Beware The One Party State

This one is especially important for all Americans to pay attention to right now.

Donald Trump made the following statement during a speech on Friday, July 26, 2024, at an event organized by the conservative group Turning Point Action in West Palm Beach, Florida:

If you missed the first post of this series, you’ll find it here: Using Technology To Oppose Tyranny: Part 1

Timothy Snyder’s second lesson is:

Defend Institutions

Since this series is about using Technology To Oppose Tyranny, I thought this section would be a good place to demonstrate how you can use AI, in this case the Deep Research model provided by Perplexity.ai, to assist you in figuring out what you can do. Which institutions should you defend, if you want to oppose tyranny?

Timothy Snyder’s excellent little book On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century is a must-read for anyone who would like to live in a free and fair society.

(By “little” I mean that it’s smaller than my hand and only 126 pages long, so anyone can read it in an hour or two.)

I have a theory that doing anything, no matter how small, is better than doing nothing. This is the first of a few tiny posts on how to use technology to do your part to oppose tyranny.