Over the last year, attitudes toward social media have turned from ambivalence to hostility, at least according to a new Axios poll. It found that 57 percent of Americans now believe that social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter actively harm both democracy and free speech. This change in viewpoint is most noticeable among Republicans, who were always more antagonistic to social media than Democrats, but are now far more aggravated. Within the GOP, 69 percent now believe that social media causes harm, up from 52 percent last November.

Rising Republican hatred of social media sites has been fueled by both misinformation spread by political leaders and a lack of public understanding of how tech companies actually work. Even if some social media companies are often imperfect, turning against social media as a whole neglects all the good it has done, and poses a threat to our culture of innovation.