There was definitely that as well. If nothing else, it's a more straightforward version of what the West does when it ostracizes people for holding certain views. It may not be the government doing it here, but if holding a certain opinion makes it difficult to find work or to avoid being physically attacked or doxxed, then the difference isn't really that great, at least conceptually.
So there are three major differences between what happens in the West and what happens in Dictatorships. The first is, as you mentioned, it's ostracization as opposed to jailing or death.
The second is that, in most cases, the ostracization is good. We should ostracize people who hold repugnant beliefs. Now it's true that sometimes people are ostracized for ideas that aren't actually bad. And that's why it's good that we have difference number three.
The West has freedom of speech, so we at least have the ability to change popular opinion. In fact, now that we have the internet, we can attempt to do so anonymously. In a Fascist country, that's out of the question. In Fascist Italy, you couldn't change the opinion that Mussolini is awesome, because Mussolini would have you shot.
It just shows that, even in a society that claims to value individualism, collectivism ultimately prevails. Groupthink wins in the end, so the game just becomes a matter of directing said groupthink. In the last 20 years, the left has become very good at that, and with big tech's push of "woke" culture, it's turning the West into a parody of itself.
Humans are tribalistic. Most people rather be a part of the "Culture War" than develop their own opinions. But at least we have the ability to talk about our own opinions without fear of death. At least we do now because the Right hasn't taken over.
Plenty of non-Western cultures don't make this mistake, because they understand the value of tradition. They realize that social roles and norms tied to tradition are the most important, and they certainly don't subscribe to the postmodern nonsense in the West. They don't buy into the excesses of feminism, critical race theory, or transgender ideology.
Traditionalism can be best summed up as: This thing is good because it's how they used to do it. According to the Church of Traditionalism, we should bring back slavery and witch-burnings.
People have always gotten things wrong. Something isn't good just because it's traditional. And if you think non-western cultures just happened to get everything right thousands of years ago, just look at their living standards compared to ours.
And by the way, what's often considered "traditional" is more new than you'd think. We've had trans people and multiple genders in literally every culture going all the way back to ancient Sumeria.
I used to think Islam's growing presence in Europe was a problem, but now I see that maybe Muslims will bring back some of what Europe lost over the years.
I hate to be a bad news bitch, but nope. Muslims assimilate to European society just like they assimilate to American society. Conservatives have been talking about how Muslims were going to take over Europe and turn it into a Caliphate ever since the fifties. Just like they used to say Catholics were going to turn America into a colony of Rome. Neither ever happened.
