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Notes -
I don't think it is about age like that.
Many <30 year olds, also many under 40, are comfortable and happy with the idea of censoring people who say anything they don't like. That is the online experience they grew up into. They expect that any forum with "free speech" is unpleasant, nasty, brutal, without any pretense of civilized community norms, and that the overall experience will make them angry. They expect that any good, nice public discussion place has effective mod team, that the spammers and obvious trolls are removed, and preferably is not public in the first place. And when you have got into habit of banning and censoring trolls, it is just so convenient to remove people of wrong political opinions or speaking in the wrong emotional register or who otherwise make for an unpleasant experience. Every form of communication they have lived and breathed has been like this, and when it is not, they will complain.
(The perception is not helped by the fact that after the meek and agreeable people have adapted to the perceived consensus, only the disagreeable odd ones out remain to rebel against it. After all, you need a pretty weird personality to be willing to tolerate the social censure or be oblivious of it until the banhammer hits. And today the disagreeable rebel scoundrels seldom have the wit, elegance or strong moral character.)
I hazard a guess the proportionally largest number of classical "I disagree with what you say, I respect / defend until death your right to say it" free speech idealist is to be found among those who remember the time before internet or got the early internet of 00's and its optimism never left them. Today, it is 2024. Those people are old and rare. Stress on the word 'rare'.
The first part was is that the youngsters like censorship. The second part, anti-censorship was never too popular in the first place. Turns out, among their own generation, principled free speech idealists were in the minority. Vast majority of people in every generation nod along. Free speech and free press used to be part of the package of approved ideas. Today it is much more contentious.
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