{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "description": "Maria Ressa is a remarkable individual. She's a journalist, author, activist and is both innovative and tireless in her pursuit of truth and justice. How to Stand Up to a Dictator is an essential read and an especially relevant one. She has faced off against rising authoritarianism at home in the Philippines, fought to fend off the malign influences of big tech and refused to back down no matter how difficult that fight became. Journalism is at its best and most essential when it is fearless, when it speaks truth to and holds power to account. Ressa exemplies this. She faces challenge after challenge and is unwavering in her determination to face and overcome evert single one. Now, a few years after this was published, we continue to face the rise of authoritarians across the globe. Sitting here in the United States, it's easy to see the parallels. We have a president who has weaponized the department of justice to attack his enemies both past and present with trumped up lawsuits and charges, a president openly and brazenly engaged in corrupt acts to enrich himself, a president commanding a rogue, militarized and inept immigration agency as his own secret police force, a president itching to enact martial law, a president clearly looking to curtail the rights of anyone he disagrees with, a president overseeing an economy failing everyone but the rich who cozy up to him, a president seeking to reignite imperialism abroad and tear down alliances in the process. We need journalists like Ressa now more than ever. In the US, those journalists are either independent or operate as small cooperatives. Corporate media is being bought up, consolidated and turned into little more than state propaganda, while pretending otherwise for anyone naive enough to believe them. We, collectively need to stand up to dictators and having journalists do so is vital. Organize, support one another and do not stop fighting, do not stop working to get the truth out there.",
  "path": "/reading/books/9780753559215/how-to-stand-up-to-a-dictator",
  "publishedAt": "2026-01-19T00:00:00Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:sttgf52vkk46f6yuknvqxvgh/site.standard.publication/self",
  "tags": [
    "journalism",
    "politics",
    "nonfiction"
  ],
  "title": "How to Stand Up to a Dictator"
}