One thing I've changed my opinion on within the past year is the censorship issue when it comes to social media. I was never a free speech absolutist. Because frankly, some speech on social media should not be allowed. I mean we see it on this very website. There are just people who bring the entire experience down for everyone and getting rid of them makes the community objectively better for all. I'm talking mainly people who harass, people who make threats, etc. But I did say that while I am not an absolutist, I am for allowing most speech. Even speech I find vile. Like mocking the death of others and such.
Within the past year, I've changed my opinion on that. The argument for it is "We need this speech to be brought into the light and exposed. So we can find out who you(the ones with vile thoughts) are." I've come to realize that I was pretty naive and idealistic feeling that way. The unfortunate reality of social media is it has allowed a lot of mentally ill and violent people to congregate and form communities. And they all feed off each other's madness. And whether or not the shooter of this particular crime was within that community remains to be seen, but it doesn't matter. There is a simmering going on within the bowels of social media and if it continues at this pace, eventually it's going to explode. Whether it's one year, five years, ten years it's going to eventually get there. And knowing what "BlueCat98341" thinks about Charlie Kirk or Donald Trump or Joe Biden or whoever else is not going to prevent that from happening. We've created a monster and I think society would be far better off if these kinds of people were kicked off of social media and sent back to stewing in the corner of their bedrooms to themselves instead of feeding the rage and fantasies of others. You're always going to have deeply mentally ill people beyond repair, but some of these people would be so much better off if they were forcibly taken offline. If that's even possible at this point. It might be too far gone when it comes to technology and access.