And frankly, I'm A-OK with communities having heavy-handed moderation no matter what side of the aisle you're on. That's great! At least when you join those communities, you know what you're signing up for.
But the trouble comes when you have lightly-moderated spaces that are targeted by authoritarian extremists with the explicit goal of trying to shift people's opinions. That's subterfuge, and lightly-moderated spaces are defenseless against it, since at point you either introduce moderation or throw up your hands and let the extremists win.