Yes. Unfortunately, propaganda, intimidation and many lies and illegal actions from authoritarian regimes do work. The ones in power also don’t need to care if they’re still being supported by the population or not. After they’re in power, they don’t need supporters in the general population anymore, they just need people to be inactive and suck it all up so that they can continue staying in power. As long as there’s no revolt or upcoming election which actually gets rid of the regime and its background helpers, people are simply letting it happen right before their eyes. And so it will happen. And it will get even worse.