Toxic Online World and Mass Shooters

I usually don't blog about extremism online.  That said, mass-shootings keep happening and often what these folks post online is alarming.  And people can and will post pretty extreme stuff online.  Then, I came across an article this morning about online extremism in the Wall Street Journal:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/inside-the-toxic-online-world-where-mass-shooters-thrive-11567608631?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1#comments_sector

As a librarian, I tend to have some pretty strong opinions on the first amendment.  As Louis Brandeis once put it, "the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."  Now if government were running these web sites or it was a state employee making arbitrary determinations on who gets to speak on-campus and who is silenced, that's a big problem.  Some years ago, movie studios, theatre owners, and other key stakeholders wised up to this and implemented MPAA ratings.  After all, the government didn't give the film an R or NC-17 rating.  To be fair, state and federal employees who weren't asleep during history class appreciate that too.  Here's the thing: Whether it's the MPAA or a web site, these are non-public organizations.  Outside of the public square, companies can determine what they want posted on their web sites.  And the internet is different than other forms of media.  Aside from maybe some off-beat community access channel programming, the "dark corner of the internet" is radically different than what you could get on cable television.  While it's hard to predict the future, I can see tech companies trying to self-regulate, not unlike how the MPAA rates films.

Over the years, my experience with those who hold extreme views is that they all too often give "a 'canned' response" to defend their ideology as the WSJ article noted.  In all my years working as a librarian and meeting more than a few such folks in libraries, my response initial response was that perhaps I met a true eccentric and occasionally that was the case.  Then I'd do some research and find a book.  So I'd meet someone with an interesting ideology, then I'd read a book:
https://www.amazon.com/Edge-Political-Cults-Right-Left/dp/0765606399

It turns out that the Trotskyist in England may not be much different from one you meet in New York or Pittsburgh.  To be clear, holding extreme ideas is much different than actual violence.  It helps to keep a sense of perspective.  The vast majority of criminal acts are non-ideologically driven.  That time I got robbed?  Nope, it wasn't about reclaiming my property for the proletariat revolution.