Its interesting how people are dogpiling this person in the name of “freedom of speech”…because they don’t like what he said?

To be clear, they don’t like that he’s threatening to ban people from somewhere over speech. That is, first of all, not mere speech - that’s an action they’re threatening to take.

Second, it’s not some kind of gotcha or contradiction that some speech might be disapproved of in the defence of free speech. You might espouse the principle of peacefulness, yet no-one would suggest that responding violently in self-defence was in contradiction to that. Being in favour of free speech doesn’t mean being in favour of all speech; many and varying exceptions are made, for example for hate speech, threatening speech or indeed speech which has the effect of restricting or chilling the speech of others. And we’re not talking about a violent or legal response here but rather dogpiling - and while that does chill speech in general, it’s not on the same level so deservedly has a lower bar.

This isn’t about me, this is about what people from persecuted minorities have told me they need, when I bought this exact argument to them.

The same arguments apply, though.

Your version of blocking doesn’t exactly handle the problem you’re describing well, either, as someone wishing to spread hate or “off-screen harassment” can block their direct target which, under the model, will mean they can’t see it, and then post.

The paradox of tolerance doesn’t mean what you think it means.

The “paradox” is fully resolved if you have strong guarantees for the tolerance you care about: fundamental freedoms and equality, and punishments for those who attempt to subvert them. So you don’t “tolerate” people who are in the process of dismantling that tolerance by advocating for or engaging directly in harassment of trans people (for example) but you also don’t punish people who, for example, are opposed to trans women participating in womens’ sports - because while equal participation ought to be a guaranteed matter of equality, we’ve also broadly agreed as a society that sports ought to be split, and the precise nature of that split is not a guaranteed matter of equality.

Applying this to Lemmy, there is no risk to tolerance in allowing a discussion about sex, gender and sports. There is a risk to tolerance in allowing a “discussion” in which trans people are generally disparaged on the basis of their transition, because it can lead to actions which go beyond mere speech.

To look at this another way, rather than linking a wikipedia page with a dumb insult and saying “try learning something”, you’d be better off identifying the behaviour you don’t want to see, what action you want to take about it, and why it’s justified based on the consequences of not taking that action. “Tolerance” and “intolerance” are vague terms, so have a more productive discussion by being precise.