Poland and Hungary are both hybrid regimes now, with Hungary leaning on the authoritarian side.
Why? What changed? Realize that Kim Jong-un is worshipped like a living God in the DPRK; Lukashenko is powerful and corrupt, but he's not worshipped. It is very difficult to get into and out of the DPRK; it is (relatively) easy to get in and out of Belarus. Kim Jong-un is really in a class of his own, and it would be remarkable for any other country on Earth to become like the DPRK.
Some things are better in Belarus than in North Korea, some are worse, but politically, the regimes are similarily totalitarian.
BTW, your link does NOT say anything about a sentence for a smiley. It says she did post a smiley, among other things. That's what is in your story.
The sentence is "two years of forced labour without displacement", the article says it clearly. This is much harsher than the 1 year suspended sentence of the Ukrainian dude for wearing the CCCP T-shirt.
Not that I support punishing people for wearing svastika or red star, but this is common in many European countries, Germany and Baltic states are the most known examples.
On another hand, you are saying that sentence for a T-shirt is "common" (in my understanding it means that Estonia is very far, probably much farther than Belarus, from being a democracy). I can also reply to that with examples of people sentenced for tweets in EU or USA. This is also "common". And this discussion is actually getting nowhere, just shows that we have different biases.
Even though I don't like polish government, I really don't think the country is not democratic (but if course all depends on the definitions). I would even argue that many western countries are less democratic after seeing for example some videos from protests in the Netherlands[0]
Didn't they apply for the permission or it's not as easy as you claim (at least in the times of COVID and lockdowns)?
I don't think videos of protest say much about how democratic a country is. It just demonstrates a shortcoming of democracy.