Existing scholarship often states that repression is politically costly. Repression is believed to create strong negative emotions that motivate people to revolt. Yet, some leaders employ widespread repression while maintaining high levels of popular support. How is this possible? I argue that bystanders to repression (not the direct targets thereof) can support its use against perceived threats. Drawing on novel data on protests and repression in Egypt, I investigate how repression of Islamists affected citizen support for the regime of Abdel Fattah al-Sisi after the 2013 coup. This article aims to advance scholarship on repression by centering attention on how everyday citizens perceive state violence, while highlighting several policy implications for human rights.