26 ms·

What you describe is neither cruel nor oppressive I think "tyranny" misses the mark.

• roenxi 5y ago
  I've got a lot of concerns about your use of language here, because: 1) Tyranny is different to cruelty. Tyrants don't have to be cruel. 2) How is this not oppression? Someone wants to buy their son a chemistry kit, the son is probably all excited about it because there is something dangerous and exciting to learn about and then some random enforcer is coming in and stopping that from happening because they disagree with that family's value judgements. If that isn't oppression in the small, oppression may not exist. Oppressors can all say that they're worried about the safety of the people they oppress - that is a common argument oppressors make if they feel like justifying themselves. Imagine that line coming out of the mouth of a Communist Party spokesperson over in China, they aren't implementing their policies out of a sense of malice - they think they are good for China.
  • sumthinprofound 5y ago
    "cruel and oppressive government or rule." is the Oxford English Dictionary definition of tyrrany.
    • roenxi 5y ago
      Curiously, Webster's [0] doesn't include the word cruel. Possibly the Americans and the British use the word differently. I suspect the British are working around the fact that they have a monarch; the US definition is closer to my understanding of the original Greek tyrants. [0] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tyranny https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tyranny