Reddit Bans Subreddits about Making Fun of Fat People, Neogaf, and others.

[Somekindofgold]

Alright so some more information has popped up with former mods and users answering questions and telling their side of the story on places like KiA.

First, I was wrong about the size of FPH. It was the 19th most active subreddit with over 150k subs, it was a big community. But it was also unheard of for a lot of people. This is because the FPH mods were, according to these posts, fantastic at containing FPH. Strict enforcement of every reddit rule, the mods and the community were worried that they would be targeted by SRS and did not want to give them any excuse to shut them down.

Second, the infamous doxxing image. It was a composite shot of thumbnails taken from publicly available imgur images uploaded by the people freely with the phrase 'even their dogs are fat' underneath. There was no doxxing or harassment from this, it was a bitchy joke.Taking publicly available images and sources is NOT doxxing.

Third, there was no promotion of brigading or targeting people. They were mean but they never committed 'organized raids' like some people are accusing them of and any attempt to was swiftly beaten down by the mods.

All the links provided to prove they were harassing people? half of them are the 'victim' going into FPH and saying things that openly challenge the subs community. That is not random targeting or harassment, that is a moron walking into a lions den with a steak around their neck. You do not go to /pol/ and post about how great it is to be Jewish, you do not go to a subreddit named fatpeoplehate and post about why fat people are great.

Whats interesting to note is that nearly every mod involved with FPH was banned, you remember the jailbait scandal that happened a while back? not a single mod from that was banned.

This paints a picture that goes against the common story that the news and the admins are parading. In fact several of the 'facts' that even I believed are wrong, there was no doxxing of the imgur staff, that is a straight up lie because you cannot dox someone just by using a publicly available picture of them. Yes, FPH were assholes and hurt peoples feelings. But all we have are the word of the admins that they committed an act that goes against the rules, and the word of the former posters of FPH say its not true.

I dont know who you guys will believe, but its suspicious.

Also suspicious? the fact that Tess Holliday, a 'plus sized supermodel' posted these on April 5th- 6th 2015. While they are now deleted, its still interesting and I hope people do some more digging in this direction.

https://new3.fjcdn.com/pictures/Fat_a6fc49_5555254.jpg

http://web.archive.org/web/20150611044312/https:/twitter.com/tess_holliday/status/584868740921171969

I have another theory for those who werent fond of my previous one. FPH got too big, too loud and went against one too many popular celebrities, who got in contact with reddit to demand FPH be taken down. Its no secret that in todays world celebrities are the demigods of popular culture, and more importance is placed on their word than some random asshole. This demand saw the reddit admins looking for any excuse, no matter how flimsy, to get rid of FPH, and when the imgur 'doxxing' happened they put the hammer down, regardless of the fact that it wasnt doxxing (I will admit the line can be a bit hard to see, but the important distinction is publicly available=not doxxing).

I still have no idea why the other subs got hit. Maybe they also had celebrities complain against them? maybe the reddit staff decided to preemptively get rid of them before some celebrity complained about them too?

 

[Jux]

Has the Great Culling happened yet? As much as I will applaud reddit for being a little less of a cesspool by getting rid of harassers and doxxers, I still can't in good conscience frequent the site. Here's to hoping for the eradication of all the sexist, racist, transphobic, animal abuse watching, (do they have pedo 'child model' boards too?) shitty subreddits.

 

[Zacharious-khan]

Yes lets make fun of fat people in the real world as opposed to on a secluded area of reddit, they've been having it too good as of late. Besides how will the fats even know we hate them if we stay on our own subreddit and not go bother them on theirs.

 

[chikusho]

Here are some exceptions to freedom of speech in the US:

Speech that involves incitement, false statements of fact, obscenity, child pornography, threats, and speech owned by others are all completely exempt from First Amendment protections.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions

Other exceptions include threats, fighting words, and offensive speech.

Take your pick as to what applies to the subreddits in question, and then quit using "freedom of speech" as an argument.

 

[Dr. Crawver]

Spare me your grandstanding nonsense.

And seriously, what is the danger if this is unevenly applied? Or never invoked again? Reddit is only slightly improved instead of massively improved? I don't get why this is an issue. Nor do I get why people assume everything is going to be perfect and instantly fixed when a company says it is going to make improvements. That isn't how real life works.

Then, to put it bluntly, you don't understand freedom of speech. Regardless of what people say, they have a right to say it. I mean, sure, we may wish they wouldn't, but, the important part is allowing them to say it.

The reason for this, is because, if one ever finds themselves on the opposite side of things, and having an opinion that is unpopular, say for example, being in a fan group of a man who defends paedophilia and thinks men can't be raped, there is a freedom to have those opinions, regardless of how lowly others think of you for doing so.

It's an ideology, and I'm not going to claim to be particularly good at explaining it, but, simply, if one imagines applying the dearness they hold for having usergroups which mock other people on the forums to another subject, and then some entity tells you that's not okay any more.

Sorry to butt in, but I actually think it's you who doesn't quite understand free speech. It gives you the right to say and feel whatever you want, but does not protect you from consequences of it. For example the owner of a privately owned gathering place banning you because they find what was said disgusting. There was no free speech violations there because it was private property, where the owner has the final say (provided any consequences he decides to dole out aren't illegal themselves, like say assaulting the person).

In the same way that if someone starts yelling "******" in the middle of a family restaurant will be forced to leave, saying "Free speech" means nothing.

 

[Somekindofgold]

Here are some exceptions to freedom of speech in the US:

Speech that involves incitement, false statements of fact, obscenity, child pornography, threats, and speech owned by others are all completely exempt from First Amendment protections.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions

Other exceptions include threats, fighting words, and offensive speech.

Take your pick as to what applies to the subreddits in question, and then quit using "freedom of speech" as an argument.

Exept none of those happened, at least in FPH. Unless you consider laughing at publicly available photos as 'threats'.

 

[Don Incognito]

Here are some exceptions to freedom of speech in the US:

Speech that involves incitement, false statements of fact, obscenity, child pornography, threats, and speech owned by others are all completely exempt from First Amendment protections.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions

Other exceptions include threats, fighting words, and offensive speech.

Take your pick as to what applies to the subreddits in question, and then quit using "freedom of speech" as an argument.

Precisely zero of that applies, because the government did not take down the boards in question. The owners and operators of the website in question decided what to do with their own servers. "Freedom of speech" doesn't even enter into the discussion.

 

[AgedGrunt]

This is surprising? IIRC, some time ago it was banning articles about Tesla Motors for being in the popular r/technology subreddit (where they were widely viewed and popular). A mod claimed an electric car was no different from a normal car, but given the political controversy over Tesla, it's highly suspect.

Then there was the infamous purge of climate change skeptics from r/science. Independently (or maybe not) some Reddit mods do this with users for a living. I recall reading about a subreddit for transgendered people, and anyone who regretted transitioning and spoke about it was a target. In one specific instance, the mod assumed someone legitimate was a "TERF" troll.

Every website has to censor to control content. A Digg or Imgur can do this through voting and manipulation, but it's a lot more obvious with how Reddit is designed.

 

[chikusho]

Here are some exceptions to freedom of speech in the US:

Speech that involves incitement, false statements of fact, obscenity, child pornography, threats, and speech owned by others are all completely exempt from First Amendment protections.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions

Other exceptions include threats, fighting words, and offensive speech.

Take your pick as to what applies to the subreddits in question, and then quit using "freedom of speech" as an argument.

Precisely zero of that applies, because the government did not take down the boards in question. The owners and operators of the website in question decided what to do with their own servers. "Freedom of speech" doesn't even enter into the discussion.

Now, I'm legitimately curious.. "Freedom of speech" has been echoed over and over again in the backlash against reddit. Freedom of speech is irrelevant in the case, since this is not an instance of government intervention. I made a post providing further reasoning against using Freedom of Speech as an argument, government intervention notwithstanding.

And then you reply, to my post, to say that Freedom of speech does not apply to this discussion?

If you personally did not use Freedom of Speech as an argument, what was the purpose of responding to my post? If you agree with me that using said argument is wrong, why are you writing to correct me when I'm saying that using that argument is wrong?

 

[Don Incognito]

snip

Easy, friend. Merely pointing out that the line of argument is moot.

 

[Redryhno]

This is surprising? IIRC, some time ago it was banning articles about Tesla Motors for being in the popular r/technology subreddit (where they were widely viewed and popular). A mod claimed an electric car was no different from a normal car, but given the political controversy over Tesla, it's highly suspect.

Wait, I'm actually curious now, what did Tesla do to harm the Feelz Brigade? I admit I don't know a huge amount beyond the normal things you pick up, but how is he politically controversial?

 

[InsanityRequiem]

All this shows is that Reddit and the admins of Reddit like to cherry pick certain subreddits that they think the rules should be enforced on. Because, it's been a few days since I last read the rules, but if the admins uphold them hard, then I'd say at least half of Reddit would be banned. Hells bells, I can list a few of the current Default subs and a few large ones that should be banned according to the rules. Heck, I'll list them anyways.

-Aww
-Pics
-Gifs
-Videos
-WTF
-World News
-News
-Politics
-Conspiracy
-Best Of

If hosting a Publicly Available image is deemed a means of doxxing and harassment, then Aww, Pics, Gifs, Videos, and WTF need to be banned, because that's the M/O for those subs. If the actions of the sub members being overly aggressive and such to the point of extreme harassment is bannable (And lets be honest, FPH was a overly aggressive), then World News, News, Politics, Conspiracy, and Best Of need to be banned. Heck, Conspiracy and Best Of both violate Reddit rules heavily and they're still around. Conspiracy has gone to great lengths to "investigate" their conspiracies in person, two of the biggest being them going after a small child care and the Boston Bomber fiasco. Best Of is a brigading nightmare and harassment subreddit, especially when whatever is considered best of material goes against the sub's core membership.

I'd say that this situation just shows how hypocritical the Admins of Reddit are. There's so many subreddits that violate those rules, but only a handful of them were banned?

 

[Erttheking]

I swear, is there a reason we can't just sit down and talk about things? Do we always need to freak out?

 

[runic knight]

I swear, is there a reason we can't just sit down and talk about things? Do we always need to freak out?

Probably because the first step is never trying to sit down and talk and instead it is some action such as this where people can only react to it after the fact. Sort of puts a dampener on things when you say "why can't we talk about this like civilized people" after someone already hit the nuclear option in dealing with it. Comes off as sort of disingenuousness or like an attempt to deflect the fallout of the actions done.

Not that civil discussion is bad, but I find few use that as a first resort, and far too many only call back to it out of reflex after their actions have been called out as grossly over-reaching.

 

[Bat Vader]

I swear, is there a reason we can't just sit down and talk about things? Do we always need to freak out?

Probably because the first step is never trying to sit down and talk and instead it is some action such as this where people can only react to it after the fact. Sort of puts a dampener on things when you say "why can't we talk about this like civilized people" after someone already hit the nuclear option in dealing with it. Comes off as sort of disingenuousness or like an attempt to deflect the fallout of the actions done.

Not that civil discussion is bad, but I find few use that as a first resort, and far too many only call back to it out of reflex after their actions have been called out as grossly over-reaching.

That does raise a question though. If someone treats a nuclear reaction with one of their own does that make the responding person worse than the first offender? Personally I feel people should use calm civil discussion against a nuclear option every time. I can't get interested in a discussion when most of the people involved are screaming and yelling at one another like animals.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Reddit was like 4chan for average IQ people anyway. Nothing valuable would be lost if most of it's boards were closed apart from a valuable resource for marketing people.

Personally if someone asked me if they could come into my house and use my phone to harass people I wouldn't let them in. Free speech ain't free like that.

 

[runic knight]

I swear, is there a reason we can't just sit down and talk about things? Do we always need to freak out?

Probably because the first step is never trying to sit down and talk and instead it is some action such as this where people can only react to it after the fact. Sort of puts a dampener on things when you say "why can't we talk about this like civilized people" after someone already hit the nuclear option in dealing with it. Comes off as sort of disingenuousness or like an attempt to deflect the fallout of the actions done.

Not that civil discussion is bad, but I find few use that as a first resort, and far too many only call back to it out of reflex after their actions have been called out as grossly over-reaching.

That does raise a question though. If someone treats a nuclear reaction with one of their own does that make the responding person worse than the first offender? Personally I feel people should use calm civil discussion against a nuclear option every time. I can't get interested in a discussion when most of the people involved are screaming and yelling at one another like animals.

It is certainly nicer if someone is trying to be civil, but expecting it after doing something like that is just not realistic. If I socked you in the jaw and then you got up and started to kick my ass, my saying "Hey now, lets talk this over civilly" really is kinda absurd to expect to be greeted with that unless the one you did it to has the patience of a saint. Sadly, most people are just emotional people.

As for being better or worse, I'd liken it to responding in kind rules applied to self defense in general. If you didn't shot til shot at, you aren't in the wrong. You aren't nice by any stretch if you do, but neither are you wrong for replying to force with force. Sure as hell are not worse at any rate.

Still, considering the backlash to this reddit thing is largely just very vocal disagreement and shouting matches, and shitposting, I'd say most people avoided responding with the nuclear option so good on them. Mockery and parody is a hell of a lot better than resorting to threats and force after all. And even though nuking the subreddits was considerably more extreme beginning to this current conflict, angry voices and shitposting mocking still seems a pretty tame response.

 

[SecondPrize]

Actual harassment isn't hard to archive when one finds it. Why would you believe it without seeing any?

Ocaam's Razor. Whats more likely, a conspiracy to make Reddit an SJW hugbox that somehow doesn't have a problem with subreddits dedicated to the same thing, just under a different name (eg: Shit Niggers Say was shut down, but Coontowm, among others, still persists) or perhaps that the five subs in question that are all mean-spirited in natured violated some new rules? Besides, on FPH they were posting personal details about imgur staff. Thats a pretty good basis to shut them down.

You apply the razor in situations where one cannot be sure, not when one party claims something but is light on evidence.