Dictators Are Not Entertainment For Comfortable Democracies

Lede

Comfortable democracies keep turning authoritarian leaders into spectacle while the people trapped under them live with the bill.

Hermit Off Script

Authoritarian leaders should never become entertainment for people living safely in democratic countries. For some, they are memes, headlines, punchlines, strongman theatre, something to admire from a sofa with heating, food, rights and a passport. For the people under those regimes, they are not characters. They are the wall, the prison, the fear, the hunger, the missing child, the dead neighbour, the door that may open at night. Only the people who suffer under these systems can cry properly about how strange it looks when the democratic world finds their oppressors amusing.
Take North Korea. People in that country live under control so severe that even normal human expression becomes a risk. Yet the leader becomes a subject of fascination, even admiration. Trump said in 2018 that he and Kim Jong Un “fell in love” after exchanging letters, according to Reuters, and in 2025 he said he would reach out to him again. That is not diplomacy with cold eyes. That is celebrity treatment for a man whose people cannot even live as free citizens. And then people wonder why democracy in the United States feels threatened from inside Washington DC itself. If leadership starts admiring authoritarian energy, do not act shocked when democratic habits start looking like old furniture nobody wants to polish anymore.
Then there is Ukraine. People live under threat every day because Putin’s war does not care about normal life. The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants in 2023 over the alleged unlawful deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children, and still the machinery of war rolls on. Normal people die because one leader dreams in borders, maps and imperial ghosts. The rest of the world calls it tragedy, then checks the oil, the gas, the trade, the price at the pump, the election mood. Keep people comfortable now, then act surprised later if Europe has to pay for a larger war because money was allowed to feed the smaller one.
And Gaza is the wound nobody wants to touch with clean hands. I am not talking about protecting Hamas or any terrorist group. I am talking about children, families and ordinary people who should not have to pay forever because adults with flags and weapons cannot build a political answer. If the leading countries had truly wanted to force a serious settlement, protection and survival would not always arrive last, after the speeches, after the cameras, after the bodies. The land matters for Israel’s security, yes, but for Palestinians it has also been decades of existence, loss, siege, displacement and waiting. Maybe, as an idea, not a fact, Trump will end up treating Gaza like Greenland: another place to admire, rename, buy, brand and file under property.

That is the sickness of power now: people suffer on land, while leaders discuss the land as if the people were furniture.

What does not make sense

• Democracies call dictators dangerous, then sell their image as political theatre.
• A leader can crush a population at home and still be treated abroad like an exotic negotiating partner.
• Children can be deported, buried or starved, while powerful states describe the problem as “complex” and continue the paperwork.
• Oil money is treated as normal trade until the same money returns as missiles.
• Gaza’s civilians are told to wait for peace while every side explains why the children cannot be safe yet.
• Democracy cannot survive if its leaders admire the posture of dictatorship more than the discipline of rights.

Sense check / The numbers

1. In September 2025, UN Human Rights said the human rights situation in North Korea had not improved over the past 10 years and described increased suffering, repression and fear. [UN OHCHR]
2. In 2018, Reuters reported Trump saying he and Kim Jong Un “fell in love” after exchanging letters; in January 2025, Reuters reported Trump saying he would reach out to Kim again. [Reuters]
3. On 17 March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued 2 arrest warrants for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova over alleged unlawful deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children. [ICC]
4. In April 2026, OHCHR recorded at least 238 civilians killed and 1,404 injured in Ukraine, the highest monthly civilian casualty toll since July 2025. [OHCHR]
5. UNICEF says more than 64,000 children in Gaza have reportedly been killed or injured, and more than 56,000 children have lost one or both parents. [UNICEF]

The sketch

Scene 1: The sofa summit
Panel description. A comfortable viewer sits on a sofa watching a dictator on a giant screen. Behind the screen, tiny silhouettes stand behind bars.
Dialogue:
Viewer: “He is fascinating.”
Prisoner: “He is Tuesday.”
Screen: “Season renewed.”

Scene 2: The oil receipt
Panel description. A suited trader hands coins into a pipeline labelled “business as usual”. The pipe exits as missiles above a small Ukrainian home.
Dialogue:
Trader: “Energy stability.”
Home: “Incoming.”
Pipeline: “Paid in advance.”

Scene 3: The land meeting
Panel description. Leaders stand around a map of Gaza with rulers and property stamps. Children wait outside the room beside empty water containers.
Dialogue:
Leader: “Security first.”
Child: “Safety when?”
Stamp: “Pending.”

What to watch, not the show

• The media habit of turning dictators into personalities instead of systems of harm.
• Western leaders confusing flattery with strategy.
• Fossil fuel revenue that keeps war affordable for Moscow.
• Security language used to delay civilian protection.
• Voter comfort becoming a policy goal above long-term peace.
• The slow normalising of authoritarian behaviour inside democratic politics.
• Reconstruction talk that treats land as an asset before people are treated as human beings.

The Hermit take

A dictator is not content.
If democracy laughs too long at tyranny, one day it may recognise itself in the mirror.

Keep or toss

Toss.
Keep diplomacy with cold discipline.
Toss the admiration, the theatre and the business that funds tomorrow’s war.

Sources

• UN OHCHR North Korea report: https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/09/dprk-un-report-finds-10-years-increased-suffering-repression-and-fear
• Human Rights Watch North Korea 2026: https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2026/country-chapters/north-korea
• Reuters Trump and Kim letters: https://www.reuters.com/article/world/we-fell-in-love-trump-swoons-over-letters-from-north-koreas-kim-idUSKCN1MA04D/
• Reuters Trump reaching out to Kim: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-says-he-will-reach-out-north-koreas-kim-2025-01-24/
• International Criminal Court Putin arrest warrant: https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/situation-ukraine-icc-judges-issue-arrest-warrants-against-vladimir-vladimirovich-putin-and
• OHCHR Ukraine civilian casualties April 2026: https://ukraine.ohchr.org/en/Protection-of-Civilians-in-Armed-Conflict-April-2026
• CREA Russian fossil fuel exports April 2026: https://energyandcleanair.org/april-2026-monthly-analysis-of-russian-fossil-fuel-exports-and-sanctions/
• UNICEF Gaza children crisis: https://www.unicef.org/emergencies/children-gaza-need-lifesaving-support
• OCHA Gaza humanitarian situation 15 May 2026: https://www.ochaopt.org/content/humanitarian-situation-report-15-may-2026
• Reuters Trump Gaza takeover proposal: https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-netanyahu-set-pivotal-talks-middle-east-agenda-2025-02-04/
• Reuters Greenland protests and US consulate: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/greenlanders-demonstrate-against-trump-us-diplomats-open-new-consulate-2026-05-21/