Obvious as it may sound, people with authoritarian beliefs hiding behind free speech actually consider it as a weakness akin empathy. It allows losers like them to amplify their reach despite not being in power. They abandon their “free speech absolutist” postures the moment they think they are in power.
I respect your ideal and i think its a good basic value to have, but lets be honest. Reddit has always had content moderation in one way or another but had very high level of tolerance. I remember when every second post on reddit was a huge ascii of pedobear and they had subreddits with legal yet very untasteful pictures of underage girls and bullying fat people had their own subreddit. At some point it became large enough to get large investors that doesn’t want their name next to a barely dressed 14 year old. Then TheDonald and other right wing subs was banned, so it has mostly upheld free speach for what is popular among its users for the longest of time but has never been a free speach platform. Even 4chan today is nowhere near what it used to be, for good reasons i think because i think no sane person would look at it and think, this is free speach in its prime.
I disagree with the notion that moderation is done when the recipient doesnt want to see it. Moderation is the tools of censorship.