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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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of tyranny
When Lorne Greene, Richard Hatch, Dirk Benedict, and the rest of their ragtag fugitive fleet fled the Cylon tyranny, one of their first ports of call was the pleasure planet of Carillon for a spot of R&R.
—
Richard Edwards, Space.com, 15 Jan. 2025
During that terrifying first year of tyranny, Mon Mothma, Saw Gerrera, and Bail Organa face the encroaching darkness.
—EW.com, 14 Jan. 2025
After one bride runs from the double wedding, Khalid’s tyranny becomes even more overt.
—Ben Kenigsberg, New York Times, 10 Jan. 2025
Annotated Liz Tracey April 19, 2024 Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language declared Americans free from the tyranny of British institutions and their vocabularies.
—The Editors, JSTOR Daily, 27 Dec. 2024
See all Example Sentences for tyranny 
Richard Edwards, Space.com, 15 Jan. 2025
During that terrifying first year of tyranny, Mon Mothma, Saw Gerrera, and Bail Organa face the encroaching darkness.
—EW.com, 14 Jan. 2025
After one bride runs from the double wedding, Khalid’s tyranny becomes even more overt.
—Ben Kenigsberg, New York Times, 10 Jan. 2025
Annotated Liz Tracey April 19, 2024 Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language declared Americans free from the tyranny of British institutions and their vocabularies.
—The Editors, JSTOR Daily, 27 Dec. 2024
See all Example Sentences for tyranny
Recent Examples of Synonyms for tyranny
Noun
-
When Johnson Sirleaf came to power, in 2006, Liberia had been wracked by more than a decade of civil war, a military dictatorship, and chronic poverty.—
John Cassidy,
The New Yorker,
8 Feb. 2025
-
If allowed to proceed, Trump's purge of our federal law enforcement workforce will expose America to authoritarianism and dictatorship.—
David Faris,
Newsweek,
3 Feb. 2025
Noun
-
Did defeating the Nazis spur the Allies to a golden age of justice or rid the world of fascism?—
Richard Brody,
The New Yorker,
5 Feb. 2025
-
The movement, which has gained traction on social media, brands itself as a fight against fascism.—
Hannah Parry,
Newsweek,
5 Feb. 2025
Noun
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Western governments have burdened Georgia with a special status as a democracy-in-the-making in a region otherwise beset by despotism.—
Christian Caryl,
Foreign Affairs,
26 Dec. 2024
-
Although Adolf Hitler met his road to perdition, Joseph Stalin survived and extended his despotism.—
Voice of the People,
New York Daily News,
14 Mar. 2024
Noun
-
When a leader sets legislators on the sidelines, as Gov. Gretchen Whitmer did during the COVID pandemic and Trump is doing now, republican governing gives way to autocracy.—
Nolan Finley,
The Mercury News,
28 Jan. 2025
-
Trump’s transactional and pragmatic engagement with adversaries may do more to tame geopolitical rivalry than Biden’s view of a globe defined by a clash between democracy and autocracy.—
Charles A. Kupchan,
The Atlantic,
10 Jan. 2025
Noun
-
And this particular slide into totalitarianism is a rather recent development (which gives one hope that it could be reversed).—
Christian Blauvelt,
IndieWire,
26 Jan. 2025
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With the help of grants from Jewish groups, social psychologists, sociologists, and other scholars investigated how antisemitism was connected to totalitarianism, religion and other forms of racial and ethnic stereotyping.—
Asaf Elia-Shalev,
Sun Sentinel,
9 Jan. 2025
Noun
-
In our skies as in our social lives, incremental change, like ring rain, seems to work slowly, while acts of frightening absolutism seem to happen overnight.—
Adam Gopnik,
The New Yorker,
22 Dec. 2024
-
In other words, the absolutism or the abolitionist approach to cutting out meat from our diet doesn’t work for a lot of people.—
Shalom Daniel,
Forbes,
19 Dec. 2024
Articles Related to tyranny
Thesaurus Entries Near tyranny
Cite this Entry
“Tyranny.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/tyranny. Accessed 16 Feb. 2025.
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