What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don't like something to saying tha... — Thomas Sowell

What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don't like something to saying that the government should forbid it. When you go down that road, don't expect freedom to survive very long.

Author: Thomas Sowell

Insight: There's a short distance between annoyance and authoritarianism that most of us don't notice we're traveling. Someone finds a book objectionable, a website offensive, a business practice sketchy—and the natural next step feels obvious: ban it. Not because banning always works or solves the real problem, but because it feels like the fastest way to make the discomfort stop. The scary part isn't the impulse itself; it's how reasonable it sounds once you're inside it. The twist is that this habit doesn't require malice. Good people with genuine concerns do this all the time. They see something they're convinced is harmful, and "the government should step in" feels like a proportional response, even civic-minded. But there's a ratchet effect built into this thinking. Once you accept that disliking something is sufficient reason for prohibition, you've created the exact framework that others will use against things you care about. The person lobbying to ban your preferred music or news source isn't necessarily wrong in kind—they're just using the same permission structure you helped normalize. Freedom survives not when everyone agrees, but when people stay uncomfortable with banning as the default answer. It requires tolerating ideas and choices you genuinely don't like, which is harder than it sounds but apparently necessary.