As a society crumbles, as bitter divisions grow and disorder spreads and nothing seems to work, anger comes and people begin to want a man who will say “Enough!” and slap down the malefactors–by any means necessary. A man who will make the trains run on time. A man who will make it safe to walk in the parks. This is the authoritarian impulse. As corruption grows, as a coagulated government fails to function, the temptation comes. It is coming. Recently I read that in Brazil some thirty men gang-raped a young woman, left her emotionally devastated, bleeding, with a...