I think there would be a lot more tolerance of language if it didn't have real negative policy and workplace outcomes.

> We used to tolerate being offended

I remember when a pop country band got death threats for saying the Iraq war was a bad idea. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_Chicks_controversy

The pendulum is swinging because for a long time, people have felt downtrodden by those who told them they had no choice but to tolerate such treatment, and now those same downtrodden realize they no longer have to be. In the age of the internet, people have found commonality in their oppression, solidarity in their commonality, and strength in their solidarity.

That being said, the pendulum has swung a bit too far in many places. Persecuting small offenses is surely a form of oppression in and of itself. Careful consideration must be taken as to what is actually intolerable and what is simply offensive. The latter is excusable, the former is, well, intolerable.

Neoliberalism has very close to nothing at all to do with this, being a center-right economic ideology that's basically unconcerned with any axis of offense. Occasionally, neoliberals tactically engage in superficially identity politics (progressive or regressive) to draw in allies that don't have an fundamental preference for corporate capitalismo, and might engage in perfomative offense gestures as part of that, but they aren't the driving force there they are using to to appeal to other groups.

> We used to tolerate being offended

No, “we” didn't, unless by “we” you mean oppressed minorities. Dominant social groups in used to openly (and to a lesser extent and less openly still do) murder people for offending them, with virtually no accountability, and before that it wasn't even extralegal, the grounds of offense were written into law with harsh punishments.

> If I have a giant microphone for the entire world, I would tell everyone to toughen up a bit and ignore people who offend you.

The people with the resources to have metaphorical giant microphones have always has that message to the people that don't; that's no innovation.

Of course, they usually are no less prone to offense.

> Right now as it stands, I am in the Silicon Valley and it feels like I can be hung for using the wrong pronoun even.

Yes, a lot of propaganda effort by relatively privileged groups has been directed at making you feel that way. But when (much rarer than it used to be within living, but it still happens) people actually do get hung for offending people in the US, it's almost without exception by the people that are behind that propaganda effort not the people at whom it points blame.