Values! Let's talk about what is happening this minute. Somebody just talked to me and then disappeared. All sorts of people with political opinions are self editing and deleting their own comments - or being banned or shadowbanned because their opinions don't fit consensus.

It is difficult for anybody to stand for their values in these conditions. China does not pretend to be a politically free society - but I believe I'd have a better shot freely talking about Western politics on a Chinese service than an American internet service today.

People with my opinions are not a threat to the CCP - so I would be left alone. The number of times I've been banned for speaking simple opinions that just don't conform to the consensus of the hour is more than I can count. All from American web services. Even Sam Altman - who owns some of those services has said the same. It's the synchronization that is causing all the overreactions and underreactions to events.

There's a big difference between government censorship and internet company censorship. Both are problematic but other than that they aren't in the same league.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_...

Why a difference? Internet company censorship is at scale and often works to further censorship by other organizations - some of them are even governments.

Ignoring governments - who can have valid political and strategic reasons to be censors - the social media censorship is more serious because it is operating at the social layer - all those capillaries. Social consensus enforcement touches more people in everyday life.