Basic Trope: The most intelligent people support a tyrannical government.
- Straight: The intellectuals support The Empire.
- Exaggerated: Intellectuals support the Evil Empire even though it was created entirely and openly for the purpose of kicking dogs and making life hell.
- Downplayed: The intellectuals don't support the rebels and instead think that it's possible to reform The Empire from within.
- Justified:
- The Empire is highly pro-intellectual and treats people of average or below-average intelligence like they have a disability. They can be bought and sold like everyone else.
- The Empire controls the educational system and what people learn through college. Intelligent people can still be manipulated, especially if all they learn in college is to support the Empire.
- The uneducated are unable to be brainwashed by the Empire specifically because they are uneducated.
- The Empire is keeping its citizens safe from something worse than any of its mistreatments that only the intellectuals know about.
- The Empire does not require its scientists to adhere to ethical guidelines, instead giving them free range to perform experiments.
- The smart people know that getting on the Empire's bad side is tantamount to suicide.
- The intellectuals are still human, and are bribed by the Empire. No level of intelligence can excuse their immoral behavior.
- Inverted:
- The Empire is only supported by idiots.
- The Empire's main policy is one of Anti-Intellectualism.
- Intellectuals are The Empire's top opponents, carefully balancing their opposition with being too useful to be disposed of.
- Subverted:
- The intellectuals only pretend to support The Empire out of fear of the Secret Police.
- The Empire isn't actually evil despite the rebels believing it to be so.
- The Empire's supporting "intellectuals" are poseurs and buffoons; actual intellectuals are with La Résistance, having been driven underground.
- Double Subverted:
- The Mole claims that he only supports The Empire out of fear of the Secret Police, but then turns around and gives a Motive Rant about why the "philistines" in the Resistance deserve their fate when he inevitably betrays them.
- The Empire is even worse than its harshest critics thought it was.
- Emperor Evulz has pseudo-intellectuals to flatter him in front of the masses, while also having a group of real intellectuals who are allowed to question Evulz's ideas and plans.
- Parodied: Intelligence tests are based solely on one's support for The Empire. This isn't even absurd propaganda — this is in neutral or enemy countries!
- Zig-Zagged:
- Some intellectuals support The Empire, others don't.
- The support varies mostly by field.
- Some intellectuals go back and forth between supporting and opposing The Empire.
- Some intellectuals support The Empire, others don't.
- Averted: It's not shown whether intellectuals support The Empire or not.
- Intellectuals take a dim view of both the empire and the rebels with reasoning explicitly explained in detail.
- Enforced:
- The Author is an anti-intellectual and is demonizing intellectuals.
- The Author is writing about a real-life dictatorship that performed cruel human experiments.
- Lampshaded: "Why does every smart guy support the tyranny? You would think that they'd know better because they're smart."
- Invoked: Emperor Evulz gives lots of benefits to intellectuals to gain their support.
- Exploited: Emperor Evulz uses intellectual support as a Propaganda Piece to demonize rebels as idiots.
- Defied: The rebels go to a lot of trouble to make sure intellectuals know everything there is to know about the atrocities committed by The Empire.
- Discussed: "I can't believe all my colleagues agreed to work for The Empire! These experiments are utterly barbaric, and they aren't even scientific!"
- Conversed: "Well, obviously, that's a more livable place than, say, Khmer Rouge-era Cambodia, but that might make it worse for good government in the long run because the best and the brightest can come up with good defences of their regime."
- Deconstructed: The support that The Empire had from the intellectuals (real or imagined) causes anti-intellectualism to flourish post-revolution, resulting in a purge. After The Purge, the rebels, who are now in charge, have a lot of difficulty rebuilding damaged infrastructure due to the loss of people with difficult-to-replace technical skills.
- Reconstructed: For that reason, they learned the technical skills from the disfavoured intellectuals — though said intellectuals remain disfavoured for the good reason that they supported the repressive former regime. So, they think in terms of Good Powers, Bad People here.
- Implied: Imperial representatives shown to be Wicked Cultured are visiting a region where The Empire is unpopular. Locals denounce them using Slobs Versus Snobs rhetoric.
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