as in dictatorship
a system of government in which the ruler has unlimited power
a popular uprising replaced that nation's tyranny with freedom and democracy
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of tyranny
How can merit become a kind of tyranny?
—
Belinda Luscombe, Time, 13 Oct. 2025
So he was presented as someone who was writing about censorship, repression, tyranny and restrictions on freedom of speech and freedom of thought.
—Pamela Avila, USA Today, 10 Oct. 2025
The new Constitution’s supporters, known as Federalists, faced fierce opposition from Anti-Federalists who charged that a powerful national government, unrestrained by a bill of rights, would inevitably lead to tyranny.
—Donald Nieman, The Conversation, 7 Oct. 2025
Males that tried to rule by asserting their dominance through violence, tyranny and threat did not last.
—Preston Fore, Fortune, 2 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for tyranny
Belinda Luscombe, Time, 13 Oct. 2025
So he was presented as someone who was writing about censorship, repression, tyranny and restrictions on freedom of speech and freedom of thought.
—Pamela Avila, USA Today, 10 Oct. 2025
The new Constitution’s supporters, known as Federalists, faced fierce opposition from Anti-Federalists who charged that a powerful national government, unrestrained by a bill of rights, would inevitably lead to tyranny.
—Donald Nieman, The Conversation, 7 Oct. 2025
Males that tried to rule by asserting their dominance through violence, tyranny and threat did not last.
—Preston Fore, Fortune, 2 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for tyranny
Recent Examples of Synonyms for tyranny
Noun
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Minister Kabawat is a member of the Christian minority and a longtime member of the opposition to the former dictatorship of Bashar Al-Assad that was defeated by Al-Shara in late 2024.—
Nick Lichtenberg,
Fortune,
27 Oct. 2025
-
After the fall of Hungary’s Communist dictatorship, dozens of decommissioned monuments were sent to Budapest’s Memento Park, including the boots from an enormous statue of Stalin, which had been torn down by irate crowds.—
Julian Lucas,
New Yorker,
24 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Politically or electorally speaking, Maoism could hardly be less relevant in this day and age—no one wants egalitarian totalitarianism anymore than (most) people want fascism.—
Kieran Press-Reynolds,
Pitchfork,
24 Oct. 2025
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Right-wing figures have blamed the Left for increasing the political temperature and resulting in Kirk’s assassination by weaponizing accusations of fascism, Nazism, and various kinds of bigotry.—
Emily Hallas,
The Washington Examiner,
23 Oct. 2025
Noun
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These achievements made the United States the political model of the liberal state, which displaced the monarchical dynasties of Europe in the nineteenth century, then rescued Western civilization from the totalitarian despotisms of Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union in the twentieth.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
28 Oct. 2025
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In recent months, as despotism intensified an increasing number of writers, scholars, and thinkers were declared foreign agents, and their books were taken off the shelves.—
Nina Khrushcheva,
Time,
3 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Because, as the analysis above suggests, autocracy always comes gradually.—
John M. Crisp,
Twin Cities,
22 Oct. 2025
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With autocracies outnumbering democracies for the first time in 20 years, and only 12% of the world’s population now living in a liberal democracy, the future of the global democratic experiment may well depend on the people of the United States.—
Shelley Inglis,
The Conversation,
19 Oct. 2025
Noun
-
Politically or electorally speaking, Maoism could hardly be less relevant in this day and age—no one wants egalitarian totalitarianism anymore than (most) people want fascism.—
Kieran Press-Reynolds,
Pitchfork,
24 Oct. 2025
-
In times of uncertainty, particularly under the growing threat of totalitarianism, utopian fantasies provide a way to reflect on the situation and, potentially, outline a path toward a positive outcome.—
JSTOR Daily,
JSTOR Daily,
16 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Two veteran data journalists are launching a new investigative publication to cover rising authoritarianism from the shadowy corners of the internet.—
Max Tani,
semafor.com,
27 Oct. 2025
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Vika Lomasko on authoritarianism, political art, and her book, The Last Soviet Artist.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
21 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Lyra’s quest to understand Dust brings her into confrontation with human and other worldly forces who champion moral absolutism over imagination, ignorance over knowledge, authoritarianism over free will and cold, disinterested rationality over empathy.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
17 Oct. 2025
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As Perez wrote, Musk’s free-speech absolutism was a fiction perpetuated by a pliant media.—
Jacob Silverman,
MSNBC Newsweek,
1 Oct. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Tyranny.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/tyranny. Accessed 31 Oct. 2025.
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