> Take opposition to the US invasions of Iraq, for instance. Anyone who opposed it - even the Dixie Chicks, famously - was deplatformed and attacked in the med

> Take opposition to the US invasions of Iraq, for instance. Anyone who opposed it - even the Dixie Chicks, famously - was deplatformed and attacked in the media. I know of lots of people who participated quite vocally on protests against that war. None of the were fired or kicked out of any organization. I don't think I would consider that opposition "underground". > But could any argument be made that the PRC has made a tactical mistake in pushing these movements underground, that they're thriving because they were underground and would be less successful above ground? I think it is a tactical mistake. I think that trying to censor such a widely known and iconic event made the rest of their censorship and propaganda less effective because it makes the censorship so much more obvious. I do think censorship can be effective, especially against ideas and knowledge that are just starting to spread. I think the more brutal and authoritarian you can be, the more effectively you can censor things. However,I also think that there is clearly truth to the concerns about censorship with high personal consequences pushing widely spread ideas under ground. I think whether underground ideologies grow or shrink has a complicated dependency on network topology and state of spread. I think it's pretty clear that underground ideologies tend to become more extreme and harder to reconcile without violence.