interestingly I have had private chats with some Silicon Valley tech workers lately that find those bans and censorship repulsive but are too afraid to state this publicly.

I'm wondering if this is not the result of the ultra loud vocal minority once again?

If that true then they kind a deserve it, when the majority didn't use their number as strength to do something but it then they deserve to lose.

The problem is that the pro-censorship crowd is openly using the internal open communication channels with full support and engagement from both HR and upper management.

Having numbers doesn't equate to having equal or greater power.

It's also because the old guard is no longer in control influential. The early internet was very libertarian, which included you're ACLU-left wing and right wing versions. Both of which hold free speech as one of our greatest strengths.

Libertarianism as I see it practiced by my rich friends and acquaintances is very much the corporate kind, and never the anarchic kind.

This forum has been a place for corporate Libertarianism to flourish, and I have been here for a few years even though I am not the kind of user who gets alot of karma. I have never seen any very popular anarcho-libertarianism here, because it is not very profitable.

Or... competition responds to other competition. If your competition fires 50 employees, you no longer have the pressure to keep an extra 50 employees just to compete with them. Same principle here, that's why all these bans are happening together.