What you say is true, but tragic. What is a professional reputation worth if one ignores inconvenient truths? No opinion (however lay or erudite) is deeply serious if truth is less important than ego preservation. Any system of thought that disregards truth is ultimately incoherent and will produce nothing of real value.
I think that self-censorship is practically universal and a core tenant of our social behavior.
Somehow I think some group(s) of people have gotten it in their head that they are the only ones who have to self-censor and that they are a victim for it, but I think if you challenge yourself you can come up with hundreds of times self-censoring in social situations is the obviously correct choice (political or not).
Think about it, from disallowing words like "hell", to talking about death, to discussing sex, to oversharing, there actually is a very small percentage of combinations of words that are appropriate conversation.
