One opens the regular Czech mainstream press, reads about what the police are doing, and the suppression of political opposition is listed first. I don’t know how much energy the police really devote to this and what they think about it. But it shows how the Czech political establishment is perceived by members of the ruling group and what image they are trying to create. The aim is no longer to create the impression that the Czech lands are a free space where everyone can live and speak freely. The aim is to create the impression that in the Czech lands people are under surveillance and repression is omnipresent.
Perhaps the poisonous question might arise as to what, then, is the freedom that so distinguishes this establishment from “dictatorships” and which is the only justification for wars and other hostile actions against these dictatorial states. But there is no need to answer that question. Better to put the questioner in jail.
Is that weird? Yes and no. Freedom is the child of equality and solidarity. When equality ceases to be an ideal and solidarity ceases to function between members of different opinion bubbles, the space for the ideal of freedom understandably disappears. It is naturally and logically replaced by the ideal of loyalty to the group.
Here, too, we return to the Middle Ages.