Real-world situations aren’t binary. They don’t just automatically go to the extreme edge case. It’s a common mistake of programmers whose brains are trained to think that way (mine included!)

So when the government is bad people who have guns, it might be tempting to think “There is no mitigation for this because they have guns! They can just exert infinite leverage at any point to squelch any mitigation to their corruption!”

But reality is there are only so many bad guys with guns and they can’t be everywhere all the time. Every additional tool people have to circumvent corruption helps.

Can they access the internet and read content from free countries? Educate themselves? It helps. Even if it invites persecution, it helps.

Can they access some way of storing value their corrupt leaders can’t just steal or print away? It helps. Sure someone can come to the door with a gun and demand your wallet key, but until then, it helps.