[jetcata]

As a tourist that's how you felt, but did you speak to the people who live there? What you'll find is a people scared to criticize their dictatorship government, which is incredibly rich and lives a life of luxury whilst their citizens are very poor.

[acjohnson55]

Yep, I did. In fact, our government-provided tour guide was pretty open about that. I'm sure he felt that he could be open with us because the government largely doesn't care that much about micromanaging the impressions tourists get. So monitoring what he tells us simply is not a high priority. They care about long-term domestic control.

My point was just that for any short amount of time in most totalitarian states, you're unlikely to encounter the arbitrary crackdowns that have a chilling effect on free expression for people who live their permanently.