In our user research, we found that most people joining Nostr get turned off and leave when they have somebody harass them or when they see harassment. So a way to protect free speech and also address these issues are to provide a way of users to choose labels and filters to shape their experience. It empowers relay operators to choose what they want to host, and users to decide what they want to see in their clients.
Nobody's telling you that you can't say whatever the hell you want on Nostr, but it is giving people tools to shape their social experience.
We see lots of women join Nostr, love what it offers, and then be harassed until they leave. This has happened many times. While you may want a platform which feels like 4chan, lots of others don't. You should be able to have your flamewar fun time while others don't have deal with that.
Nostr is held back because of the reputation of the content on the platform, not the quality of the apps and features of what we're doing. I'm saying, we should be able to use the protocol with communities of many norms.
Look at how many people are accusing Nostr with being a pro-nazi platform...
https://www.google.com/search?q=nostr+nazi+bar