But following this line we might find ourselves in a precarious position where we must admit that any democracy liable to being peacefully, insidiously manipulated by a minority through various means may fit this description.
We open ourselves to an argument by an anti-west person who would say that capitalism is a pseudo-totalitarianism by that measure because the Bezoses and the top .001% lobby lawmakers and manipulate mass media (that they own) to make people believe whatever furthers .001%'s personal agenda.
I disagree with that position, thus I apply a different criteria. Whether people can think freely, whether people can protest, access free media (yes, there is no longer Twitter, but many others left), disagree with the government, etc.
Have I not been in China somewhat recently, I might not have objected. But I saw how on Beijing airport transit rail there is a social advert basically showing a caricature of the rotten, corrupt West against the goodness of communism. A screen in every car playing it on a loop. This type of blatant conditioning is simply unimaginable in Russia.
So in my eyes there is a gradient, and observing the gradient is important to the cause. Not observing it is giving in to such black-and-white unthinking that is precisely the bread and butter of totalitarianism.
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I accept that there may be a communication objective where you want to hit a person with a strong statement to make them think. "You are living in a totalitarian country." Maybe they would be taken aback and reevaluate their life through this new lens. But I don't have the intuition that this is an effective approach. Hopefully they don't have China or North Korea to compare to.