Honestly, I'm realizing that this is just becoming debate club. I'm not going to go down a rabbit hole of point/counterpoint with you any longer. Maybe you enjoy that kind of debate and maybe you are better at it, but that doesn't make you right and whether or not you can pull apart every point and try to find contradictions in them doesn't invalidate the need for net neutrality. I prefer substantive debates that aren't zero sum (and will likely result in a draw).

I think NN is important for now and for the future and I think there are valid reasons for that that don't depend on debating the history of internet protocols.

Given the scary level of media consolidation, and the investment that ISPs have come to have in media companies its not a stretch to consider that with the capability to prioritize different types of traffic and sources of traffic that they will choose to encourage the consumption of media from their own sources. Corporations are increasingly focused on shareholder value and this is a clear case where to not prioritize their own products and services would be to essentially throw away money. One thing I think we can count on is that corporations are smart when it comes to making money and it would give any ISP that owns media companies or stakes in media companies a competitive advantage if they choose to push those to customers by making their media cheaper and more available or making others media more expensive or less available.

Aside from just being contrarian (which I think a lot of people get a kick out of), I honestly can't see how anyone who is a consumer and doesn't own stake in a telecom company will think that removing NN is going to be good for them just because it wasn't abused back when it wouldn't have been as easy or profitable.

I don't think you will be convinced by any of this, I suspect you are enjoying being a non-conformist (much like the author of the article if I had to guess) but this is a high level view of where I, and probably many others are. I don't have the time or energy to write a 100 page essay proving beyond a reasonable doubt every single step with extensive history of how I got to where I am and honestly I don't think it is necessary. In general I'm pretty much exhausted with constantly having to prove things that it shouldn't be up to me to prove. I'm not a biologist but I'm constantly having to convince a intelligent-design proponent on evolution, I'm not a physicist or geologist but I'm expected to have to explain why I don't think the planet is 6000 years old. I'm not saying that you are into ID or are a young earth creationist, but your argument style reminds me of arguments I've had with people like that. Draw people out into debates over minor facts that non-expert will eventually fail to be able to explain, causing literally any conversation to become a draw (even if it started as a conversation, it is turned into a debate).

Of course this is the total point - to kill the conversation and end discussion, casting just enough doubt to delay any kind of decision on the issue. If every issue is confusing enough, any action is as good as any other action and you can assure that enough people will just tune out and allow people to get away with anything. I'm not saying this is your intent or that you consciously are doing it, but it works extremely well so its hard to expect people to not do it. I hope that we (people that care about issues and try to support positive changes) can come up with effective counters to this tactic.