I was at Joyent when we deplatformed some group. The vast majority of the company was for this action, based upon what they interpreted as "their values." Their values were not shared in whole across the entire company. Some of us believed that speech, no matter how repugnant it is, should not be constricted.

This is the nature of the 1st amendment in the US. The government cannot restrain speech.

A private company was another matter. They can do whatever they want, within the boundaries of law. 1st amendment doesn't apply in this case.

The concern I had was that this would become "easier", and more frequent.

It has. This was the nature of my concern, that the slope would be more slippery.

Justifications for banning are getting "easier". Groups celebrate this deplatforming as "victories."

No one seems to worry much about the long term consequences of this. Well, Cloudfare did for a while, but then it stopped.

Right now, its hard for me to tell if bans are for ToS violations, or political wrongthink. I am troubled by this. ToS violations are generally fine, as long as the ToS aren't onerous. Most aren't. Wrongthink violations ... think of when the political winds shift, and when current rightthink becomes wrongthink.

Niemöller's poem[1] becomes an apt metaphor in this case.

[1] https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/martin-nie...