Why sociopolitical communities believe they’re reasonable but that their opposition is nutty
Even without what anyone would call censorship, sociopolitical communities engage in selective amplification of certain viewpoints, and these dynamics lead to each side believing their own community is less radical than their opposition.
First, among the range of viewpoints within my own community, I am more likely to amplify viewpoints that are less, not more, radical than my own. I agree with milder viewpoints — I just happen to have an even stronger position — but more radical positions hold stronger views that I reject.
Second, among the range of viewpoints within my opposition, I am more likely to amplify more radical viewpoints. They are more absurd from my community’s standpoint, amount to easier targets of substantive criticism, and are more ripe for ridicule.
Because sociopolitical communities mostly listen to the statements their own side makes, an immediate consequence is that my community will have the impression that it’s less radical than we in fact are, and that our opposition is more radical than it is.
And the folks in the opposition will believe the opposite.
That is, sociopolitical communities end up with an organic, emergent “censorship” of sorts, or biased broadcasting dynamic, such that each side genuinely believes, given the distribution of viewpoints it actually observes, that its own side is reasonable, but the other side nutty.