Lack of free speech necessitates an over abundance of control, misinformation, lies, and overt propaganda in order to quell any free thought that would push people to ask questions openly. That is the distinct irony of people saying we must control free speech, thought, and information, in order to prevent misinformation from compelling people to violence or what have you. It doesn’t work that way, and it’s openly promoted on this website quite fervently.

The only speech that brings people back to the middle, away from the extremes, is free speech and open debate. That is it.

I think free speech is a very difficult pill to swallow when it's not convenient for your own agenda. As soon as one side makes an exception then the other side can, all the way to full censorship of each other's opposing sides.

This is fascinating to observe in political chat rooms and message boards where anyone submitting a dissenting opinion is called a spy or troll and will be banned until there are no dissenters left.

It is a difficult pill to swallow because convincing someone they are going down the wrong path where free speech reigns requires nuance, knowledge of subject, listening, empathy, and tact. All things people are too lazy to do now, especially politicians, teachers, media, and media gatekeepers, who are the worst offenders of this, and simply wish to drive eyeballs, create a monopoly for their crappy ideas, and rile up their bases. Simply banning something never actually makes it go away, especially ideas.

It’s easier to declare them as an enemy of the state, communists, nazi’s, right wing, left wing, formenting insurrection, compelling violence, or whatever other set of buzzwords that sound dangerous enough and catchy.

Then you feel morally justified in silencing them, although you really haven’t silenced them, now they simply go into the dark recesses of society and simmer for years or decades, sometimes a generation or two, until it spills out in actually violent and chaotic ways.

I just wish people would actually sit down and talk again in real life. I wish online forums would stop driving engagement with votes and likes, and would stop downvoting and silencing for actual opinion or thought and drove real healthy engagement that cut this sort of behavior off at the knees.

I feel like a dinosaur at this point watching the comet come in.

Yeh this feeling of watching a comet resonates. I have a theory that we arrived at this point because sadness, anxiety, and loneliness in the world has increased due to social media and people's reward systems being messed up. People will usually rage when there is something else in their life that is not going quite right. Anyway, just a theory. I love reading back stories of those who have ventured from the center to a further right/left position and why. Honest accounts including other things going on in their lives. Because these stories aggregated are the reason why things are the way they are.

So yes, more face to face, less social media / news addiction.