5 Reasons Why I Should Never Be Dictator-For-Life

“Darnley Portrait” (c. 1575, Wikipedia)

#5. I would censor everything. Queen Elizabeth I would look like a champion of the free press compared to me.

#4. I wouldn’t be able to keep a straight face when it came to establishing a personality cult. The public needs to feel spiritually at peace with my tyrannical rule, venerating me as a saint and paying homage to my likeness. Characters like Stalin and Castro just eat this stuff up. Me? I’d laugh myself to death. Without a thriving cult, my position in power is doomed to fail.

#3. I would institute the death penalty for various “verbal crimes against single women.” You know what they are.

#2. I’m too much of a pacifist, and I’m not into promoting military culture and winning over the hearts and minds of my soldiers. Needless to say, it would be difficult to build and maintain an empire, let alone prevent a military coup.

#1. I don’t have the time to be either a benevolent dictator or a malevolent dictator. This is my inner-microeconomic theorist speaking. Micromanaging the world sounds exhausting. Call me lazy, but I prefer surfing the internet all day.