I’ve been observing a number of video and video-responses via social media for a few years now, and observing the antagonism between Catholics and Protestant apologists. I’m all for healthy dialogue, and in the process of this, we have to expect that we will be corrected on our own perceptions of our own faith as well as those of others. We always run into problems when we consider ourselves experts on another faith, even if we have had experience studying and living in that faith-culture.
In the process of examining how things are misunderstood about our own faith, we also have to ask, sincerely, whether or not we our behavior and words have misdirected others toward such false “strawmen.” But this requires a great deal of charity, meekness, which to be honest, I am not always convinced exist in the online forum. I tend to read body language quite well, and am often off-put by a defensive response. Nonetheless I also have such reactions myself, and likely am off-putting to others. So at best, I think we can agree that while the dialogue needs to happen, and I’m glad it is, it is going to happen imperfectly.
When it comes to matters of salvation, our passions can be aroused with a degree of seriousness and zeal - after all, getting this wrong can lead others in the wrong direction - namely hell. So when people are genuinely concerned about the salvation of others, its normal for us to get our “back-up.”
We are also trying to preserve the Divine Revelation that comes to us from the Most Holy Trinity. We are discerning His vision for us, and giving Him glory by maintaining a childlike faith, by deferring to His judgment, rather than our own. None of that excludes the intellectual life, but rather makes us more rational and reasonable, when we defer to the Logos.