This week, I had a chance to create a new relationship with someone who I didn’t really know.

I did that because I saw someone who did something different—they spoke out, and they did that where it was not expected and was not comfortable. It was something that created a quiet stir, in my opinion.

After that happened I quickly contacted that person and, I hope, created the start of a mutually respectful connection, one built on trust and shared values.

This was necessary because I needed this person to know that they had done something that matters: they stood out and broke the spell of silence. This matters, according to experts on authoritarianism.

One of the most important voices to help people understand how authoritarianism works and how to confront it is University of Toronto historian of authoritarianism, Timothy Snyder. He is best known as the author of Bloodlands, a detailed and magisterial history of genocides, campaigns of starvation and mass murder, and conflicts in eastern and central Europe in the first half of the 20^th century, bookmarked between the two horrific wars. I read about a third of it four years ago, and I did not have the stamina to complete it, but I was impressed by the scholarship.

(Go to my website to read the complete essay.)