On Tyranny

As people bend the knee to more control over their lives, History weeps.

Long before Alexis de Tocqueville coined the phrase, Tyranny of the Majority, an ancient Greek sage by the name of Solon warned the people of Athens what would happen if liberty was not defended.

Around 561 BC Athens stared into the dark recesses of tyranny through the figure of Pisistatrus, who wooed the people with his façade of caring. His greatest feat of illusion was when he rode his chariot into the marketplace convincing the people that he had been set upon by his political opponents, the intent being to murder him. So roused were they by this assault upon the man they believed to be on their side, that the Assembly agreed to furnish him with fifty armed guards – called clubmen.

Solon was wise enough to see through the veneer of trickery and argued against the motion but was unsuccessful. He lambasted those who couldn’t see through the plot of deceit and declared his own bravery against the rest who were afraid to stand up to the tyrant despite being able to see.

So the people passed the decree and did not place any strict limit on the size of Pisistratus’s bodyguard, but allowed him to keep as many men as he liked and to march them about in public, until finally he seized the Acropolis.

As we jump the timeline two and a half thousand years, it is plain to see that, apart from the clothes we wear, our response to rising tyranny has not changed. The last few years has seen a steady increase in the abolition of our individual rights through censorship and finger wagging from politicians who claim they care for us.

While in 2025 we don’t face a single and solitary figure such as a Pisistatrus, our challenge comes in the form of a bureaucratic behemoth known as the Leviathan.

And the Leviathan has grown strong.

Much of the pain began decades ago with increases in legislation that have continued unabated to now. Kerry Packer’s famous response in 1991 to a Senate Select Committee is more telling than ever, when he suggested the government ought to repeal an old law before implementing a new one, asking the valid question, “Why do you want to change the rules again?”

Our rights have been steadily eroded to the point where we today face harsh penalties for engaging in what state or federal governments determine to be hate speech.

The Leviathan’s grip upon us is such that most lack the strength or willpower to push back against its ever-encroaching tentacles of control. However, as we enter a federal election, it is heartening to see that among the ruins of our once great liberal democracy there are a few who will.

During a recent press pack gathering with the Prime Minister and two of his ministers, a young man interrupted the show from the back of the room to ask a question. He wasn’t rude or offensive in any way; he just didn’t follow the media wolfpack protocol. As this was a tightly managed and well massaged political “show”, the young man was quickly escorted from the building.

One would think the opposition would see an opportunity to assuage the man’s concerns, and indeed the whole nation’s concerns, by assuring him, and us, that they would provide a positive solution to the malaise infecting the prospects of young people. Considering that another protest by climate activists occurred around the same time, which interrupted a press conference with opposition leader, Peter Dutton, they could have given us some hope that our concerns would not fall on deaf ears.

Instead, speaking on ABC Insiders, Liberal Senator James Paterson criticised all protestors, referring to those who acted in such a heinous way as “ratbags.”

“These ratbag protestors who are turning up at events might think they’re being clever, but all they’re going to do is make politicians more removed from the public.”

It is hard to say if Paterson was referring only to the climate activists with this remark, but given they occurred around the same time, it would have been a far better look to adopt a more positive position. Paterson, and by default the Liberal Party, revealed their weakness and demonstrated indifference to the plight of everyday Australians by ignoring the issue of immigration and housing. And indifference is worse than loathing. For at least the latter reveals some level of feeling.

But who was listening? And if they were, did they care? Or are they too demoralised to care?

Judging by the amount of mainstream media coverage the young man received (all negative, of course), coupled with the enormous social media content, a lot of people did hear and see the Senator’s remark. Some will take up the standard for liberty and do their bit to agitate from the sidelines, but too many will turn a blind eye. And in doing so we will arrive at the same place that Solon warned the Athenians about:

If you are suffering now through your own cowardice, you should blame yourselves and not the gods for this. No one but you has made the tyrant strong and that is why you are all slaves today.

If we are serious about reclaiming liberty for ourselves and our nation, we must go back further than de Tocqueville to seek inspiration. In looking into the origins of western civilisation we can see how far we have strayed from what the ancients gifted us – the blueprint to achieve the fairest and best way for a society to live and thrive.

Democracy is not perfect. Plenty of ancient sages argued against its existence. They did accept it as part of a trilateral arrangement that was ultimately fine-tuned by the ancient Roman Republic, handed down to us, and which worked reasonably well up until recent decades.

It is to our eternal shame that in 2025 we are unprepared or unwilling to do what it takes to hand the baton of liberty to the next generations.

Our negligence in defending it has rendered us undeserving.