Time To Dust Off The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide

In 2017, Polish activist Martin Mycielski offered advice on Twitter—hashtagged #LearnFromEurope—that eventually became a guide for dealing with fascism.

Originally published as a bonus piece for paid subscribers on The Big Picture, it is now offered in its entirety for all subscribers of Auntie Mavis’ Musings.

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To paraphrase a common saying, those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. Perhaps it's time—or past time—to pull The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide off the shelf.

A rise in fascism and authoritarian governments in the so-called bastions of freedom and democracy has been on a lot of people's minds lately.

It's occurring in settler-colonial countries like the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. It's also happening in colonized countries like those of Central and South America and South Africa. And it's also being observed in the home countries of the colonizers throughout Europe.

FYI: A settler-colonial country is one where the invading population eliminates or drastically reduces the population of the Indigenous inhabitants and replaces them through colonization and special privileges for settlers that share the same identity as the colonizers to create a new, transplanted racial or ethnic majority.

A colonized country is one where the Indigenous population retains the majority, but are subjugated and exploited by invading colonizers. Many such countries gained independence, but were forever altered by the colonizers, such as most of the Americas, most of Africa, and countries like India and Pakistan.

A shift away from the global minority—White people—holding most of the world's wealth and power had been underway before the rise of fascist movements in these countries, which were once solely controlled by a White majority or minority. These movements toward authoritarian governments are largely a function of the backlash against the loss of that White privilege.

As I and others have said many times, for a person who has always known unearned privilege, equality can feel like oppression.

At one time, as glib sayings like “free, White, and 21” attest to, being White and especially being White and male was a free pass through doors firmly closed to others. The height of unearned privilege was held by White, Christian, heteronormative, cisgender men of wealth.

So it should surprise no one that this is the exact demographic leading the charge in modern fascist groups and movements like MAGA in the United States, the People's Party of Canada, the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in Germany, the National Socialist Network in Australia, AfriForum in South Africa, and the British Nationalist Party and the Patriotic Alternative in the United Kingdom.

The ringleaders are usually rich, White, toxically masculine guys—with most getting their bootstraps pulled up by their parents’ or grandparents’ money—but the majority of their followers are their socioeconomic opposites. The under-educated working poor swell the ranks to support the people who have oppressed them for generations as those oppressors promise to hold the line against the scapegoats for the masses’ dissatisfaction with life.

In most countries, these far-right, fascist, White supremacist, Christian nationalist political movements have been rejected by the populace, with some suffering particularly humiliating defeats.

But in the United States, thanks to the MAGA faithful, along with disengaged voters coupled with voter apathy, the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives are now in the hands of the people who wrote a whole book—as detailed by Jay Kuo in Breaking Down Project 2025—about their plans to oppress women, the LGBTQ+ community, immigrants, and racial, ethnic, and religious minorities.

So when is the time to leave the United States and when is the time to hunker down and start hiding neighbors in the attic?

Is the United States there yet?

And what if there is nowhere for people to go or no way to get there?

What's Different Now Than In 2017?

In 2025, things seem very scary for a larger portion of the population in the United States—a new and shocking experience for people who always felt safe. In a stroke of irony, the backlash against the losses in White privilege created losses for White Americans.

But we were warned it was coming.

In January 2017, as Donald Trump took office for his first term, a series of tweets signed with the hashtag #LearnFromEurope went viral on Twitter. They were later compiled into The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide by their author, Martin/Marcin Mycielski who knows of what he speaks.

Mycielski holds a master’s degree in diplomacy and foreign relations, is a graduate of Stanford's Stern Leadership Academy as well as the USAID Executive Training Programme on Anti-corruption, Transparency and Public Integrity.

He worked in the European Parliament, then founded the International Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD International) and co-launched the EU DisinfoLab, the first European NGO strictly committed to countering disinformation, before spending two years as the Brussels correspondent for the top Polish daily newspaper, Gazeta Wyborcza.

He now serves as the Vice-President & Executive Director of the Open Dialogue Foundation, which works globally for the protection of human rights, democracy and the rule of law, with a concentration on former communist bloc nations.

Martin Mycielski; Open Dialogue Foundation

What began as a series of off-the-cuff tweets, Mycielski's posts reached 3 million views within one month.

The impromptu guide covered how to function under an authoritarian regime as well as descriptions and warnings of how the lives of citizens— regardless of their political affiliation—change when they allow democracy to falter or fall.

The first two tweets were simply observations, but the third began to offer guidance. Step 1 led to step 6 within a few hours on January 23, 2017.

Each posted step was accompanied by photos illustrating fascist actions taking place in the world.

“Step 1: Don't be indifferent. It WILL concern you eventually. Voice your objection IMMEDIATELY. Show them you care. RESIST.”

“Step 2: They rely on FEAR & IGNORANCE. Expose their scaremongering, raise awareness, educate. Don't let them distort FACTS.”

“Step 3: Organize protest movements, flood the streets. They WILL back off if they see your NUMBERS. They RELY on the PEOPLE”

“Step 4: Don't let them DIVIDE you. You're ALL citizens, ONE nation despite multiple beliefs. Stay TOGETHER for your country”

“Step 5: Don't give up, don't wait it out, hoping it'll pass. It WON'T. They will manipulate people, fix the system and STAY”

By step 6, Mycielski compiled a list of “6 RULES” for survival instead of just warning signs or steps of an authoritarian takeover.

“6 RULES for survival under an authoritarian power. Learn from our mistakes. - with love, your Eastern European friends.”

After last year’s election, Mycielski posted his updated guide to BlueSky with the prescient note:

“I'm sorry to my US friends that it's still relevant…”

Doomed To Repeat It

This isn't the first time oppression has taken root in the United States, of course, but it is the first time for many White Americans to feel like they're the target—or could at least get caught in the crossfire.

The founders of the United States used a blueprint borrowed from two powerful, centuries-old confederacies of Indigenous Nations—the Haudenosaunee and Powhatan—to create a federation of independent state governments outlined first in the Articles of Confederacy then finalized in the United States Constitution—as I touched on in Ignored No More.

But within years of the newly minted country signing treaties with the Haudenosaunee—an action they repeated with every other Indigenous nation they encountered throughout their expanding country—the United States began a centuries-long physical and ethnic, ongoing genocide against them.

Extermination—through bounties, authorization of military action, elimination of food sources, forced marches to reservations, and treaty-breaking land grabs—then forced assimilation—through boarding schools, termination of identity, child abduction and adoption, and laws making all aspects of their culture illegal—were the official government policies for Indigenous peoples in the United States until 1978 when the last of the Assimilation Acts was repealed and into the 1990s when the last of the policies was terminated.

In 2025, we're seeing some of these same practices happening again, as Mycielski noted in 2017, but now—unlike during the first Trump administration—almost no one appears exempt from threats from their own government.

During WWII, the United States used the Alien Enemies Act of 1798—a wartime law—to justify initial round-ups of Japanese nationals, a process that culminated in an executive order from President Franklin Roosevelt to detain and intern all Japanese Americans on the West Coast, including actor, activist, and friend of The Big Picture, Uncle George Takei.

Executive Order 9066, issued on February 19, 1942, authorized forced relocation of Americans from “military exclusion zones” to internment camps. The order didn't explicitly target any one group, but was used to take homes, businesses and other assets from, and to incarcerate approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans in what is now recognized as a racist application of EO9066 by the war department.

The Alien Enemies Act was used three times before 2025, during the War of 1812, WWI, and WWII.

The law “authorizes the President, during a declared war or in the event of an ‘invasion’ or ‘predatory incursion’ perpetrated or threatened by ‘any foreign nation or government’, to issue regulations directing the conduct of or otherwise restraining citizens or nationals of the hostile nation or government.”

In 2025, Trump is using the law to send any man his Department of Homeland Security— through their Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents—abducted without warrant or due process to a pay-for-play prison in El Salvador run by a self-professed dictator. The abducted women and children are being detained in the United States—for now.

On his first day in office for his second term, Trump used the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to declare “international cartels and certain transnational organizations” posed a security threat to the United States. According to the Trump administration, this fulfilled the requirements of the Alien Enemies Act.

The courts have consistently disagreed with the Trump administration’s claims about what is true and legal and constitutional when it comes to their extra-judicial abductions, but meanwhile, people are still being abducted at random.

So, is it time to hide your neighbors in the attic? Is it time to flee? Are those the only options?

Learn From Europe

I recently watched the film One Life, which tells the true story of Englishman Nicholas Winton's efforts—along with many others—to rescue children targeted by the Nazis in Czechoslovakia during WWII, before Germany could close its borders.

Winton's group saved 669 children by getting them British visas, raising funds for transportation and other fees, and finding British foster homes for each child.

The film begins 50 years after WWII, with an elderly Winton haunted by those his organization wasn't able to bring to safety, especially a ninth train with 250 children aboard. It was stopped at the station in Prague by Nazi forces after Germany invaded Poland.

To give a sense of the horror as well as the significance of the efforts of Winton and the British Committee for Refugees from Czechoslovakia, the film reveals that of the 15,000 mostly Jewish-Czech children sent to concentration camps during this period, fewer than 200 survived.

While the ninth train would have brought the total saved by Winton’s efforts to 919, 669 is still over three times the number of survivors among those who were detained by Nazi forces.

The limited series We Were the Lucky Ones tells a similar tale from the opposite side, featuring the true story of the Jewish Kurc family trying to survive Nazi occupation in Poland and France.

A common theme of people believing things won't get too bad, wanting to wait the bad things out, then racing against ever stricter authoritarian crackdowns to escape a fascist regime runs through all of these true stories.

But other resistance actions have been taken up in the face of fascism.

The film Defiance—the story of the Jewish resistance fighters, the Bielski brothers—chronicled how the murders and abductions of their family, friends, and neighbors led the brothers to armed resistance against the Nazis and their enablers.

The Bielskis established a community in the Naliboki Forest of what is now Belarus. Their incursions disrupted fascist activities in their area and saved hundreds of lives during WWII.

Leaving the United States seems tempting to many right now, but not everyone can afford to leave. And most who can afford to leave are the least at risk, unlike the situations Nicholas Winton and the Kurc and Bielski families faced.

The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide

Mycielski's guidance on Twitter in 2017 expanded beyond his first six rules.

By January 24, Mycielski had reflected on his experiences in modern-day Poland…

…as well as Hungary and Turkey, and his knowledge of the history of fascism in Europe, to develop a year one guide with 15 things to expect from an authoritarian regime…

…and an authoritarian checklist to help identify potential autocrats, in addition to his original six rules for survival.

On January 26, he added “7 RULES on Approaching Friends & Neighbors who Support TRUMP.”

You can see all four guides on Mycielski's website.

If you go through the lists to compare the warning signs of authoritarian regimes with life in the United States in 2025, I suggest you not make it a drinking game—as tempting as a stiff drink might be.

The United States has checked off every item on Mycielski's authoritarian checklist.

In Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill that funds and furthers Project 2025 objectives and was passed in the House of Representatives by one vote—a supposed budget balancing initiative that will actually increase the deficit by $3.8 trillion by 2034 while it gives more tax breaks to the wealthy and takes vital services from the poor and working classes—the GOP inserted a subsection to limit the federal courts’ ability to force the Executive and Legislative branches to uphold the Constitution.

Right there, in black and white, hidden in a budget bill, MAGA Republicans are seeking to kneecap the Judiciary from performing its primary function in our three-branched democracy.

With this provision, the courts could continue to cite violations, but would no longer be able to enforce compliance.

The time to ponder what happens if the United States becomes an authoritarian state has ended.

The question now is how do we deal with the authoritarian regime already in power.

What Are We To Do?

There is no simple or singular answer to this question.

Everyone needs to do what is right for them and their family.

But what isn't going to benefit anyone—other than the people orchestrating the chaos to line their own pockets and push their racist, xenophobic, misogynist worldview—is looking the other way and hoping it all ends soon.

Whether you join or organize a local or national protest; stay in constant contact with your elected officials by phone, email or office visits; join or organize boycotts; join or create mutual aid organizations in your community; campaign for like-minded candidates or even run for office yourself; or hide your neighbors in your attic, there are many, many things everyone can do.

Because history teaches us that fascist regimes have not been sustainable models.

As Mycielski pointed out:

“And above all, be strong, fight, endure, and remember you’re on the good side of history.”

“EVERY authoritarian, totalitarian and fascist regime in history eventually failed, thanks to the PEOPLE.”

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In addition to writing my own Substack, Auntie Mavis’ Musings, I also write for The Big Picture.