Censorship, left and right

The degree to which a society censors itself is the degree to which the society doesn’t trust itself.
Let’s translate that.
The degree to which government and government-aligned institutions censor the citizenry is the degree to which the government and such institutions don’t trust the citizenry. And the degree to which the individual citizen accepts this censorship is the degree to which that individual citizen agrees they are not trustworthy.
I remember a time when the Left was against censorship and against big government/institutional authority. I wonder what happened? I think the Left was a political power game and only cared about such things in order to weaken the current non-Leftist powers, and now those powers are weak the Left has no intention of continuing to adhere to its old noble maxims.
Does anyone think left and right still mean anything in politics? I’m genuinely curious.
Let’s translate that.
The degree to which government and government-aligned institutions censor the citizenry is the degree to which the government and such institutions don’t trust the citizenry. And the degree to which the individual citizen accepts this censorship is the degree to which that individual citizen agrees they are not trustworthy.
I remember a time when the Left was against censorship and against big government/institutional authority. I wonder what happened? I think the Left was a political power game and only cared about such things in order to weaken the current non-Leftist powers, and now those powers are weak the Left has no intention of continuing to adhere to its old noble maxims.
Does anyone think left and right still mean anything in politics? I’m genuinely curious.