> most of the internet was not like this 10-15 years ago. forums and even large social media platforms were moderated lightly, if at all. you would commonly see edgelords dropping slurs, but it did not dominate the discussion.

Either you're thinking of a time much further back than 10-15 years (that is, 2008-2013), or you're wrong. Or - could be you were just in the Nazi bars at the time, also. My experience in a variety of online places at that time was that "edgelords" got told off or kicked out in most. A few places didn't, and they were already or became the Nazi bars. Alternately, the Nazis would be herded into a smaller subset of the platform, which became the Nazi bar.