[gavanwoolery]

You are absolutely correct - perceiving censorship does not equate to being censored.

That said (IMO), there is a lot of abusive behavior on all sides - so the question becomes, is the treatment equal? It may just serve as a litmus test, at worst a false positive, to consider which side thinks they are being censored more. :)

[monopoledance]

I think the root problem is reasonable discourse not winning the heads anymore. The monopoly of newspapers put a price on information and by that rate-limited lazy bits. Now spreading (mis)information is free. The short/simplistic message wins over complexity every time.

Additionally there is a fundamental difference in fitness for left and right discourse to this new ecosystem. There is a reason right wing terrorism isn't needed to be as centrally organized, as historical left wing terrorism has been. If you find spontaneous unity in atrocity your political movement has no clear borders; whereas the left is constantly fighting itself over irrelevant intellectual nuances. If the left answers to ceiling-less rightwing populism, this will end in race to the bottom. The right will always one-up the show.

I think right wing politics is the better, fitter meme in the current environment and the left hasn't found an answer yet, as better arguments isn't enough.

We will all lose in this. I hope we find a way to shift incentives in social media soon, or this will be the end of civilization.