Using the example of someone typing “r@pe” to get around auto moderation is a pretty specific complaint, and not really an example of self censorship since that person clearly still got to say whatever they wanted to say.
At least online, there is a decent argument to be made that a good cohort of people have significantly lost the ability to self moderate.
That's just because reddit is almost entirely children and bots/shills. Yes, a platform full of children is going to be childish.