It's both antithetical to freedom and a check on runaway tyranny.

Sure, people in a democracy have some ability to push back against government overreach. One of the problems is that they will only do so, when the overreach is unpopular.

The worst aspect, though, is that popular violations of rights can be initiated by a democracy, when they may not have happened otherwise. For example, "Tax the rich!" is probably a non-starter outside of democracies.

Any system where people's rights are made secondary to the desires of others is not a free society.