It's the paradox of tolerance or whatever, we're seeing that free speech and open elections have allowed the intolerant / autocrats to take over and take away those liberties, which implies that in order to have stopped them, they shouldn't have had those rights.
One point of concern is that the idea of free speech has been used by foreign influences to change the opinions of people over the years.
Anyway, counterpoint, unless there was voter fraud etc, democracy allows people to vote against democracy, so if that is the will of the majority, so it goes. Of course, one could argue it wasn't the will of the majority but of a vocal minority, which is the other problem with democracy.
