ABSTRACT
The relentless attempts of totalitarian regimes to prevent free thought
and new ideas and the persistent assertion of their own rightness bring
on them an intellectual stasis which they project on to the nation at large.
Intimidation and propaganda work in a duet of oppression, while the
people, lapped in fear and distrust, learn to dissemble and to keep silent.
And all the time the desire grows for a system which will lift them from the
position of ‘‘rice-eating robots’’ to the status of human beingswho can think
and speak freely and hold their heads high in the security of their rights. (Aung San Suu Kyi 1995: 175)
