Reddit CEO: Site Is 'Not a Bastion of Free Speech,' Change Coming

An anonymous reader writes: Reddit's new CEO, cofounder Steve Huffman, has made a statement regarding the site's controversial racism- and abuse-related community "subreddits." He said, "we don't have any obligation to support them." In the brief announcement, Huffman explains that a robust content policy is something they have "been thinking about for quite some time" and is in the cards in the near future. It has also come to light via former CEO Yishan Wong that ousted interim boss Ellen Pao was one of the few defenders of the controversial subreddits, favoring a strategy of coexistence over the board's plan to eliminate problem communities. Wong blames another co-founder, Alexis Ohanian, for strategy changes that led to the firing of "Ask Me Anything" administrator Victoria Taylor whose unexpected absence crippled that component of the site.

Comments

No Free Speech

[Anonymous Coward]

Means no more page views from me. I really enjoyed the idea of a site that managed to keep the racists corralled into their own little playpen while the adults had quality discussion.

Re:No Free Speech

[dugancent]

Then you haven't been to reddit. What you are asking for has NEVER been the way that site works.

Re:No Free Speech

[AmiMoJo]

To whoever modded the parent -1 Troll: the moderation system is not your personal disagree button. If you disagree, post. Make your case, explain your disagreement. Moderation is supposed to be factual, and the parent is clearly not a troll.

Don't ruin Slashdot. Moderation is what makes it great, use the power responsibly.

Re:No Free Speech

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I wonder how much, if any, of this is actually a personal reaction to the site's evolution; and how much is simply the decision that the bad press (Reddit: Nastier than StormFront!) needed to stop and it was time to monetize the better neighborhoods harder than in the past. Clearly the popular AMA coordinating employee didn't get sacked for bad performance in doing things as they had previously been done, which certainly suggests that change was in the air even before the real fuss started and Pao left.

Re:No Free Speech

[Falos]

GParent: Yes it is.
Parent: No it isn't.
Reply: [pending]

Are you requesting what I think you're requesting?

Re:No Free Speech

[cayenne8]

Hmm...I guess I need to look up what this reddit thing is. Not familiar with it.

I've heard like 1 or two people I know in meatspace mention it off hand once, but that's about all I've heard about it.

Re:No Free Speech

[Rakarra]

When I've down-modded something for being non-factual, it's been for things that are actually non-factual and fact-checkable, as opposed to subjective statements like "Reddit has NEVER been about free speech!"

Even then, if something is factually wrong, Troll/Flamebait are inappropriate, since that wasn't the original intent. I use "overrated," especially if it was modded up, as the post is not a high enough quality to support its "high" (which might be the default) mod value.

Re:No Free Speech

[geminidomino]

Well, to be fair, the "free speech" thing is fact-checkable in their own words: it's right on top of the damn rules page.

Re:No Free Speech

[geekd]

No. The first thing anyone should do when they join Reddit is *unsubscribe* to the defaults. Then subscribe to ones they are actually interested in.

I though this was common knowledge, but I guess it is not, because I see statements like yours all the time.

Re:No Free Speech

[alvinrod]

Limits to moderation is what makes Slashdot great. Look at Reddit where everyone can essentially moderate at all times and it's an utter mess.

Slashdot's system works as well as it does because the site's creators realized that people will not be responsible with the system and it's far better to design a moderation system that accounts for that rather than assuming that people will be on their best behavior.

Also, plain text makes implication and inference difficult on the internet, which can lead to inappropriate moderation. If you or I were to make a sarcastic or facetious post, and someone with mod points completed missed the sarcasm, they very well may believe it's a troll or flame; or someone else makes a post that we think is off-topic only because we don't get the reference.

That's why the only reasonable way is to browse at -1 and just accept that we'll have to scroll past a few comments that aren't worth reading.

Re:No Free Speech

[zieroh]

Moderation is supposed to be factual

You must be new here. Moderation at Slashdot has never, ever, ever resembled what you describe.

Re:No Free Speech

[bluefoxlucid]

I'd say 90% of the racism I've seen online has pretty obviously been kids

I've seen kids throw racism around as a joke, trolling, just being obnoxious. Some of them are pretty vicious attention whores, but they're approximately equivalent to Leopold.

Real, deep-seated racism? That comes from self-important assholes, the kinds of people who grew up already, have their own kids, and treat their children like the negro slaves they wish they owned. It comes from border conflict territories like Israel and Palestine, where everyone cheerfully acknowledges that they would definitely strangle those dirty arabs (the other arabs, not themselves) on the other side of the fence if they could just get a hand around one of their throats, even their children--especially their children. It comes from political opinions about rich white bankers or English-impaired Mexicans taking all our money and jobs.

Have you ever explained your utopian idea?

It somewhat requires a good grasp of economics; due to difficulty with this, I developed a unifying economic theory that's relatively simple to conceive of. For convenience's sake, I'll give a brief explanation of that first; it's enough for anyone determined enough to work out all the nuances, although I find the basic premises (like most truths) are offensive to most people.

My basic theory of wealth is simple: Economic growth requires a cycle of unemployment. Every cost is human labor. When you make huge bulk purchase agreements, your suppliers go to their suppliers, who go to their suppliers, all negotiating similar bulk agreements, all squeezing down their per-unit profit margins to gain a massive sale, bringing everything at every level closer to the human cost. In competition, your competitors can undercut your prices only if they can produce at lower cost, which means involving less labor in the entire production chain. In supply-side economics, the first units of a product--the so-called "low hanging fruit"--require less labor per unit than the later units, which eventually limits the supply (you can grow more oranges by using land in colder climates, but you need greenhouses and fuel and you produce less, thus more labor goes into every orange, and they become expensive, thus limiting supply of $2/lb oranges).

If you start with 1,000 laborers making a product with a one-year lifespan, each laborer making $10/hr, hand-making the product in 8 hours, you invest $80 in that product. Build an assembly line, and your efficiency doubles: 500 laborers make the same number of units per day; you invest 4 labor-hours per unit, and the product costs $40. That means you can make the same amount of profit selling it $40 cheaper; you can put $40 per unit per consumer per year back into every consumer's pocket, at the expense of firing 500 laborers--unemployment.

Now that every consumer has $40 per unit of residual wealth to spend (money is not wealth, but is a measure of wealth), you can sell them each any combination of products and services totaling 4 labor-hours for each unit they buy of the now-cheaper product. If they buy 4 of these widgets per year, for example, they all have $160 more in their pockets than they did before--you can sell them 16 more labor-hours of work.

Because of this, you can come up with new products and services to sell to consumers, who can now afford to buy them. Obviously, you will need labor. The amount of labor is, theoretically, exactly the amount you displaced: those 500 workers will eventually find jobs again. EVENTUALLY. Not immediately. Once they do, consumers will spend exactly what they did before--the same percentage of their income (or, really, of the total income in the economy)--and they will buy more and better goods. They'll have more, for the same amount of money; they'll have more wealth (like I said: money isn't wealth; suddenly, $160 has more buying power).

This explains all kinds of shit. Competition, su

For an alternative

[Yosho]

If you're interested in a Reddit-like site that won't arbitrarily close your subreddit and shadowban you because they don't like what you're talking about, voat.co is shaping up pretty nicely.

Re:For an alternative

[LaurenCates]

The same Founding Fathers that owned slaves and being so imperfect likely held what we would probably consider politically incorrect beliefs?

For instance, I have no trouble believing that Benjamin Franklin was, in the common parlance, an "incorrigible poon-hound".

So, even if they didn't engage in that sort of behavior, I'm sure they at least ribbed each other with a joke or two of the variety.

I daresay they may have even had a good laugh about this sort of thing if they could see it.

Re:For an alternative

[Anonymous Coward]

You must be so triggered by now.

Re:For an alternative

[Daemonik]

At least if Jefferson posted to /r/Coontown, it would be full of gravitas!

Re:For an alternative

[Krojack]

If you're interested in a Reddit-like site that won't arbitrarily close your subreddit and shadowban you because they don't like what you're talking about, voat.co is shaping up pretty nicely.

Not yet anyways. Once they get big enough and popular outside groups will start putting pressure on them to close various subs.

Also I have yet to see voat. It's always down when I go there.

Re:For an alternative

[Yosho]

However once it gains enough mass and becomes a sufficiently large enough target, then things might change. As they have with Reddit.

And if it does, then people can move somewhere else. I don't see the point in staying somewhere where you know you might be banned on a whim for stepping out of line because you're afraid of another place that could possibly become that way sometime in the future.

Re:For an alternative

[ScentCone]

What don't you get about free speech?

What YOU don't apparently get is that when we talk about "free speech," we're talking about your speech being free from government infringement. That has nothing to do with private businesses and gathering places. They have the freedom to assemble and conduct themselves as they see fit, without you telling them that they must support, for example, rape/race/kiddie forums, just because you think they should. That's the whole point. If YOU think that's the sign of freedom, YOU can run your own web site where those are the things that are celebrated.

The government isn't stepping in to say that Reddit must shut down race-baiting or fat-shaming forums. That's a personal editorial decision made by the people who actually own and operate the site. That you can't make the distinction between government limits on speech and editorial decisions made by private businesses suggests that you should really stop saying anything on the subject, because you're just poisoning the well. Also, please do not vote - you're too uneducated to do it safely.

Re:For an alternative

[dreamchaser]

Given the ignorance of the post you replied to I wouldn't be so sure that the person posting it has even heard of Voltaire.

Re:For an alternative

[Archangel Michael]

The politically correct crowd will willingly ignore horrible behavior as long as the person is otherwise supportive of their cause. I point to William Jefferson Clinton (Bill) as my defacto example of someone, who had they been had an (R) after their name, would have been judged completely differently by the PC (read, liberal) crowd.

So I take the cries of the PC crowd to be largely hypocritical.

Re:For an alternative

[king neckbeard]

The First Amendment is about government infringing that right. Private censorship is still censorship, and it can potentially become as big of a threat to social progress as speech repressed by the government. For example. lots of social issues have been avoided in mainstream media because of corporate/political incentives to stay quiet about the subject. On the flip side, there is censorship that most would find totally acceptable. I'm quite fine with not seeing the genitals of a man who was streaking through a stadium. But that's still censorship, and we need to acknowledge that, and consider it as such.

Re:For an alternative

[ScentCone]

it always makes me laugh when some chucklehead tries to defend censorship and says censorship isn't taking place since the government is not the actor

I see. So, who is preventing you from voicing your opinions about, for example, rape and race-baiting? Is Reddit somehow preventing you from setting up a web site and hosting all the conversations you could possibly want on the subjects? No, they're not. They can't. They are unable to censor you. Censorship of your views is not taking place, and you're confused about the difference between being forced to be silent vs. having some third party not being in the mood to spend money to provide you a free platform from which to amplify your views. Amazed that you can't understand the difference, but you're in good company with a lot of other muddle-headed people. Again, please do not vote.

Re:For an alternative

[dave420]

Hint: There is more to the world than the internet.

Re:For an alternative

[Runaway1956]

Except - EVERYONE LOVES RACIST AND SEXIST TALK! Go almost anywhere on the web, and make a blatantly sexist or racist comment. Everyone comments. Left, right, male, female, young, old, black, white and in-between - EVERYONE CHIMES IN!

Maybe I exaggerate a little. There are some dignified souls who can just shake their heads, and go on about their own business. Not many, but some.

Re:For an alternative

[mccrew]

it always makes me laugh when some chucklehead tries to defend censorship and says censorship isn't taking place since the government is not the actor.

It always makes me laugh when some chucklehead misinterprets his freedom of speech as a requirement for someone else to provide him a soapbox.

Re:For an alternative

[gstoddart]

Sadly, the lines are being redrawn ... as we pass laws making ISPs and carriers responsible for policing copyright, child porn, terrorism (infidelity, tax evasion, sedition) we create a world in which instead of being merely a conduit, entities are responsible for the crap their users access or do.

Industry is being coopted as an enforcement arm of governments, who in turn have been coopted as the enforcement arm for corporate interests.

And the more this happens, the more people will say "you can say anything you want, but not here".

But as long as the stuff people do on the internet can legally affect other entities (even if it's just to comply with a subpoena), this notion that other people will provide you a platform to voice your crazy is now quaint and antiquated.

Free speech means the government can't outlaw what you say. It does not mean, and never has, that someone else is responsible for providing you with the platform.

And when you're talking about a corporation who has to keep their shareholders happy, providing a forum for people to make unpopular statements isn't going to work if it negatively impacts their reputation/legal standing.

Censorship has now been outsourced, and has to be weighed against corporate interests.

Threats to rape people, racist rants, or posting underage photos ... well, not so much.

In the same way you can't go on private property in the real world and demand unlimited free speech, you also can't do it on the internet.

Re:For an alternative

[AmiMoJo]

Advertisers won't want to go near a site where their ads could potentially end up on /rFatPeopleHate or next to stolen nude photos of a 16 year old gymnast. By pushing those guys over to Voat, Reddit has not only made itself advertiser friendly but also managed to poison Voat's potential ad revenue in the process. Voat may not care for now, but one day they will need to make money, at which point they will have to offload those users on to the next sucker.

Re:For an alternative

[Blue Stone]

What you raise, is an often raised response to discussions about free-speech and censorship.

What is often left out of these discussions, however, is the pervasive nature of corporate control over speech in the 'real' world (as well as the virtual). Corporations (and rich individuals) own newspapers (which trumpet *their* voice) TV stations (which do the same). The space for the mass dissemination of people's voices is small, and relegated to small groups, public meetings and protests (often barely tolerated by our democratic representatives).

When it comes to the mass dissemination of individuals voices, the internet is similarly coralled. Get a blog, people scream, on your own website! And there, the footfall is often small in scope. On sites where many people come together, those sites are owned by corporations and businesses, often merely looking for a proft..

The stark fact is, there are no public spaces on the internet. It's all owned by someone.

Re:For an alternative

[bws111]

You seem to be confusing a right to free speech with a right to be heard. One (speech) exists. The other does not.

Re:For an alternative

[Blue Stone]

I would argue that if the places that exist to be heard are so small that they are barely noticed, that is an effective stifling of free speech.

Re:For an alternative

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I'm certain that I don't even want to know. Not how big, not how numerous, not what they are patterned to resemble, just no.

Re:For an alternative

[Osiris Ani]

But when someone wants to kick the soapbox out from under you and sell it for a profit because you have used it to attract a lot of attention there is no problem at all?

If you want your own soapbox, then buy your own soapbox. You seem to be writing about someone else’s soapbox, to which you have no actual right.

Re:For an alternative

[king neckbeard]

No, censorship is when something is censored. Government censorship is when the government censors something. Someone might even self-censor to avoid offending others, even out of pure politeness. That's what the word means. You do touch on one reason why we consider non-government censorship to be much less of a concern: competition. If one channel won't air something, another might not. Generally speaking, we don't have as many options regarding our government, so we take government censorship much more seriously.

Re:For an alternative

[penguinoid]

it always makes me laugh when some chucklehead tries to defend censorship and says censorship isn't taking place since the government is not the actor.

It always makes me laugh when some chucklehead misinterprets his freedom of speech as a requirement for someone else to provide him a soapbox.

It always makes me laugh when some chucklehead misinterprets censorship as the act or practice of controlling or suppressing the behaviour of others, usually on moral grounds

Re:For an alternative

[quantaman]

The politically correct crowd will willingly ignore horrible behavior as long as the person is otherwise supportive of their cause. I point to William Jefferson Clinton (Bill) as my defacto example of someone, who had they been had an (R) after their name, would have been judged completely differently by the PC (read, liberal) crowd.

So I take the cries of the PC crowd to be largely hypocritical.

In what sense?

I assume you're referring to his affair, I'd say the reaction seems mild because a) affairs are tough for the family and a personal indictment but not really a public policy issue and are generally ignored, b) Clinton never presented himself as an example of a perfect family man so it wasn't very hypocritical, c) the reaction of the Republicans was completely over the top.

I don't deny that the PC crowd can be hypocritical but I don't think they're moreso than any other group.

Re:For an alternative

[tompaulco]

I'm quite fine with not seeing the genitals of a man who was streaking through a stadium. But that's still censorship, and we need to acknowledge that, and consider it as such.

No, that's not censorship.

Yes, that is censorship. Censorship is a big boy and is capable of existing without the word government in its definition.
Non-government entities can feel free to censor all they want. But we don't have to change the definition of the word just because some people can't understand the concept that censorship is not always illegal or even always a bad thing.

Re:For an alternative

[pla]

No, defending freedom of speech means defending speech from interference by the government. It's not about controlling the editorial policies of publishers running private businesses.

This tiresome point comes up in every discussion on free speech and censorship.

We have a constitutional right to free speech in the US - Reddit's policies can't violate that, you have that much correct.

Reddit's policies can, however, violate the principles behind why we have the right to free speech enshrined in our constitution in the first place. Our culture doesn't believe in the ideal of free speech because of the first amendment; we have the first amendment because we believe in free speech.

Reddit absolutely has the right to ban whatever the hell it wants. And its users, in turn, have the right to call them out as hypocrites for it.

Re:For an alternative

[mccrew]

"The sky is blue!!!"

"No, the grass is green!!!"

Censorship is censorship. There is no misinterpretation. This is censorship. The question is, so what?

Does a private entity have the right to control - "censor" - speech in its forums? Absolutely yes. END OF STORY. People are still free to express displeasure (like here, I suppose), but the private entity doesn't owe them a soapbox or public forum.

Please knock off the straw man argument about censorship in the private sphere like it is something novel and some egregious violation of personal freedom. It happens everywhere all the time. When you buy Oracle you sign away your free speech rights (publishing benchmarks is prohibited). When you live in a condo, you sign away your free speech rights to display the U.S. flag (appearance standards). Employment contracts and severance agreements contain non-disparagement clauses.

<disclaimer>Government, political speech is obviously a different story</disclaimer>

Re:For an alternative

[Trailer Trash]

The politically correct crowd will willingly ignore horrible behavior as long as the person is otherwise supportive of their cause. I point to William Jefferson Clinton (Bill) as my defacto example of someone, who had they been had an (R) after their name, would have been judged completely differently by the PC (read, liberal) crowd.

So I take the cries of the PC crowd to be largely hypocritical.

In what sense?

I assume you're referring to his affair, I'd say the reaction seems mild because a) affairs are tough for the family and a personal indictment but not really a public policy issue and are generally ignored, b) Clinton never presented himself as an example of a perfect family man so it wasn't very hypocritical, c) the reaction of the Republicans was completely over the top.

I don't deny that the PC crowd can be hypocritical but I don't think they're moreso than any other group.

His "affair"? No, his multiple affairs, his predatory sexual assaults on subordinates, and his perjuring himself in a lawsuit (while also suborning perjury through witness coaching) were the issues that the liberals overlook and continue to try to obfuscate (as you've done above). Had a Republican done even half of that we would still be reading about it in the press.

Re:For an alternative

[meta-monkey]

I think Bill would have been characterized as a misogynist and sexual predator. It's one thing to have an affair. It's something else to have sex with your subordinates.

Re:For an alternative

[Forgefather]

No the point is that some shitty behavior is not relevant to issues at hand. Yes, Benjamin Franklin loved his prostitutes, but that didn't make him any less of a brilliant inventor and leader.

The question that needs to be answered isn't how to stop people from being shitty, but when does being a shitty person begin to infringe on the rights of others. Take a few examples: In scenario 1 someone calls me an asshole. Certainly if said with n provocation that is a shitty statement to make, but it doesn't infringe on my rights in any way. Even if that person calls me an asshole I do not have to change my way of going about my life to accommodate their behavior.

In scenario 2 an anonymous individual on the internet tells me that they will feed me feet first through a wood chipper. Without any other supporting statements this still does not infringe upon my rights because by itself it is not a credible statement. despite being a shitty thing to say it is indistinguishable from basic hyperbole, and doesn't require me to change my life style.

In Scenario 3 some tells me that they will be waiting out side my house (providing a specific address) with a gun on xxx date at xxx time. THIS is where my rights are infringed because the threat is credible. It has tangible specifics about time and location, and assuming the threat resulted from a heated discussion (not a far fetched idea on the internet) there is motive. A threat like this is when I have to legitimately change my behavior to accommodate their speech out of fear for my well being.

As for shitty behavior in general, why should we be outraged? Are you or I under any obligation to listen to them? Of course not. They are free to speak, and we are free to ignore them, as long as their speech does not infringe upon our own rights.

I had never heard of r/FPH/ before this fiasco, and out of curiosity I went to check it out. Needless to say most people are right when they said the place was truly a den for some of the shittiest people imaginable, but that didn't matter because no matter how hard I looked I couldn't find a instance where the rights of others were being violated. The site shames fat people. I'm sorry but an individual being ashamed of being called fat is not and infringement of their rights no more than it is infringing on someones rights if I call them an asshole. You don't have a right to not be offended, and you are not obligated to be outraged at the words of shitty people.

Re:For an alternative

[meta-monkey]

No. The definition of censorship is not limited to government interference. Anytime someone forcibly shuts somebody else up, that's censorship.

"Editorial decisions" are about what someone chooses they themselves will or will not say.

If I choose not to post racist rants on my blog, that's a wise editorial decision on my part. If I choose to delete your racist comments from my blog, I've censored you.

And justifiably so. You have no expectation that you can say whatever you want on my blog. But I've still censored you.

So I dislike this whole "no no it's not censorship!" dodge. That's just twisting language so things sound more palatable. I'm reminded of Orwell's Politics and the English Language. "No no, it's not torture! These are 'enhanced interrogation techniques!'" "No no, this isn't censorship! It's 'editorial discretion!'" Call it what it is and deal with it.

Re:For an alternative

[zieroh]

There's a really funny flaw in your argument. Who is preventing people from creating their own websites? Why don't you ask the SJW's who keep DDoSing Voat. (That's a felony for those of you playing the home game!) I think we're at, or passed 5 separate DDoS attacks so far.

ScentCone is pointing out that Reddit banning certain subreddits is not actually censorship. Unless Reddit is the one DDoSing voat, your point is utterly moot. Even if Reddit were DDoSing voat (which I very much doubt) that still does not amount to censorship, since the individuals who would otherwise post on voat are still able to speak elsewhere, or to put up their own website. So your point is doubly moot.

TL;DR: Private parties are generally not obligated to give individuals a soap box on which to stand. That does not mean the private parties are preventing free speech, it just means the private parties don't have to foot the bill.

Re:For an alternative

[painandgreed]

The politically correct crowd will willingly ignore horrible behavior as long as the person is otherwise supportive of their cause. I point to William Jefferson Clinton (Bill) as my defacto example of someone, who had they been had an (R) after their name, would have been judged completely differently by the PC (read, liberal) crowd.

So I take the cries of the PC crowd to be largely hypocritical.

Well, that goes both ways. If he had R next to his name, all the people (like my family members) who were talking about how "he is obviosly sick in his sexual predatoriness", would be going "it a private matter we shouldn't be worrying about" just like they have done for the other Rs caught in such things. When you mix political parties you are invoking knee jerk factionalism that will color everything else.

Re:For an alternative

[Trailer Trash]

and yet... NOBODY (but you) GIVES A DAMN.

He was stripped of his law license in Arkansas as a result of perjury. Somebody besides me cared quite a bit - including a judge and the AR bar association.

It's always interesting that folks like yourself think sexual harassment is the absolute worst thing a guy can do - unless he's a Democrat.

Obligations

[mwvdlee]

"we don't have any obligation to support them."

Nor do the redditors have any obligation to keep visiting the site.

This isn't about obligations, it's about ethics.

Re:Obligations

[AmiMoJo]

If it's about ethics then I don't see a problem with no supporting /rFatPeopleHate. It's not like they are being silenced, Reddit just declined to offer them a free platform for their content, following their own ethical code.

There is a difference between defending someone's right to say what they like, and actually setting up a soapbox for them. There are people I'd never help spread their message, but I wouldn't want the government to ban them from saying it either. Freedom of speech does not imply an obligation to facilitate other's speech, or listen to it.

Re:Obligations

[bfandreas]

"we don't have any obligation to support them."

Nor do the redditors have any obligation to keep visiting the site.

This isn't about obligations, it's about ethics.

I don't see how one can construct an argument that puts "fatpeoplehate" on the proper side of ethics.

Re:Obligations

[jittles]

If it's about ethics then I don't see a problem with no supporting /rFatPeopleHate. It's not like they are being silenced, Reddit just declined to offer them a free platform for their content, following their own ethical code.

There is a difference between defending someone's right to say what they like, and actually setting up a soapbox for them. There are people I'd never help spread their message, but I wouldn't want the government to ban them from saying it either. Freedom of speech does not imply an obligation to facilitate other's speech, or listen to it.

Very well said. "Free Speech" means the GOVERNMENT can't make certain speech illegal, or ban books, or silence dissent (even though all those things do happen, even China enshrines free speech in their constitution). It DOES NOT mean I have to support you, or help you disseminate that speech.

(Still with me... you won't be in a moment)

It's the same reason a Jewish printer can turn away business from a pro-Palestinian group, and the same reason a Christian baker can^H^H^H should be able to refuse to make a gay wedding cake.

Right. Or a KKK member baker from making a black person's wedding cake. Or for a eugenics supporter to not serve a handicapped person. And the list goes on and on. There's no reason to protect any of those people from discrimination. It's not like there has been a history of any of these groups of people being oppressed, or anything like that... oh wait.

How about adult subreddits?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about adult subreddits? Fetishist subreddits? Political subreddits that you might find offensive, such as Men's Rights? Religious subreddits that you probably find offensive, like Scientology? Do we ban vaccine deniers and conspiracy theorists? People that talk about piracy?

In Reddit's quest to become mainstream, it has lost something.

Re:How about adult subreddits?

[fafalone]

The drug-dealing subreddits are still open too. I'd imagine. Allegedly. So I was told. By someone I don't know. Nevermind, such a thing doesn't exist and if it does I don't know about it! Now leave me alone.

Re:How about adult subreddits?

[AmiMoJo]

Their policy appears to be to ban subreddits that are actively harassing people. Discussion is fine, posting stolen pictures of fat people from social media, or stolen celebrity photos from iCloud, or organizing raids, or doxxing people is not.

Can you really not see a difference between saying "disgusting obese people should do more to control their fucking weight" and posting a photo of an obese person take from their Facebook page (copyright infringement) along with a torrent of abuse purely designed to shame and injure them?

Re:How about adult subreddits?

[dwpro]

2 things:

Their policy appears to be to ban subreddits that are actively harassing people.

That policy seems to have been implemented unevenly enough that the justification is questionable.

posting stolen pictures of fat people from social media

if you post a photo to social media and someone that's been given access to see the photo shares it, that's not 'stealing' in my book.

Hmmm Huffman

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/02/reddit-co-founder-alexis-ohanians-rosy-outlook-on-the-future-of-politics/3/

Speaking of the founding fathers, I ask him what he thinks they would have thought of Reddit.

"A bastion of free speech on the World Wide Web? I bet they would like it," he replies. It's the digital form of political pamplets.

A more complete summary of the situation

[vivaoporto]

A more complete summary of the situation below, based on a rejected submission of the same story.

Reddit policy to be updated, CEO says site was not created "to be a bastion of free speech"

After a string of dramatic events like the removal of the Fappening and FatPeopleHate subreddits, the dismissal of Victoria Taylor and the subsequent AMAgeddon culminating in the resignation of the former CEO Ellen Pao, the recently returned Reddit CEO and site founder Steve Huffman announces that a comprehensive Content Policy and the tools to enforce it are currently in development motivated in part by the media and internal repercussion of "the more offensive and obscene content" on their platform.

Mentioning without specifying some communities "whose purpose is reprehensible" and disclaiming that they "don't have any obligation to support them" the CEO announces an AMA (Ask me Anything) next Thursday 1pm where they "as a community need to decide together what our values are".

The CEO states that "Neither Alexis nor I created reddit to be a bastion of free speech, but rather as a place where open and honest discussion can happen.".

In a top comment in the announcement a site user refutes this claim point to a Forbes article from 2012 where Ohanians, answering a question of what the founding fathers would think of Reddit, replies: "A bastion of free speech on the World Wide Web? I bet they would like itâ. Alexis himself, in a Google Plus post from 2012 (archived version), says that he is "really, really proud of these quotes".

Re:A more complete summary of the situation

[jargonburn]

The CEO states that "Neither Alexis nor I created reddit to be a bastion of free speech, but rather as a place where open and honest discussion can happen."

[not] a bastion of free speech, but...open and honest discussion

Wow! Steve's gonna want some Tylenol after all the cognitive dissonance!

Re:A more complete summary of the situation

[phantomfive]

"Neither Alexis nor I created reddit to be a bastion of free speech, but rather as a place where open and honest discussion can happen.".

I don't think you can have "open and honest discussion" without free speech. That seems like a necessary prerequisite.

Re:A more complete summary of the situation

[FreeUser]

The CEO states that "Neither Alexis nor I created reddit to be a bastion of free speech, but rather as a place where open and honest discussion can happen."

Wow! Steve's gonna want some Tylenol after all the cognitive dissonance!

Yup! Double-plus ungood.

Re:A more complete summary of the situation

[fwarren]

"as a community need to decide together what our values are".

I am pretty sure that is the same kind of "community" that Mark Shuttleworth had. We vote on everything and we all have a voice. Till he moves the window controls from the top right hand side (windows style) to the top left hand side (mac os style). The community voted to move them back. At which point Mark said he listens to community input but ultimately it is his decision.

The board of directors at Reddit have decided what their values are, and the new CEO has agreed with them to get the job. Now they will do an AMA where they put forth as many of their values as possible in such a way that it looks like the community came up with them. The remaining values they will Mark Shuttleworthed on the community.

Thank you for playing.

Re:A more complete summary of the situation

[0100010001010011]

Some other great reading:

"We're a free speech site with very few exceptions (mostly personal info) and having to stomach occasional troll reddit like picsofdeadkids or morally quesitonable reddits like jailbait are part of the price of free speech on a site like this."

-/u/Hueypriest Comment

"We stand for free speech. This means we are not going to ban distasteful subreddits. We will not ban legal content even if we find it odious or if we personally condemn it. Not because that's the law in the United States – because as many people have pointed out, privately-owned forums are under no obligation to uphold it – but because we believe in that ideal independently, and that's what we want to promote on our platform. We are clarifying that now because in the past it wasn't clear, and (to be honest) in the past we were not completely independent and there were other pressures acting on reddit. Now it's just reddit, and we serve the community, we serve the ideals of free speech, and we hope to ultimately be a universal platform for human discourse (cat pictures are a form of discourse)."

-/u/yishan Gawker article + interview

Re:Cue the assholes ...

[Merk42]

The problem is that the definition of "punks, assholes, douchebags and morons" can change.

Re:MOAH POPCORN

[Anonymous Coward]

So... a virtual lynchmob went after Pao because they decided she must be an "SJW" because she once sued a former employer for sexual harassment.

Not really, no, it was the endless wave of mass media news articles about how she was tackling misogyny in Silicon Valley and standing up to those patriarchal neckbeards, a wave she was all too happy to ride, that did that.

They interpreted a closure of a subreddit that was harassing people in real life as being content based, and by Pao, because they assumed that was what a straw-SJW would do.

What appeared to be a hardline feminist was put in charge, next thing you know subreddits are being shut down and people are getting fired. Of course members were getting agitated.

And it turns out that Pao was supporting them all along - that is, arguing against a board that did actively want to remove the more offensive subreddits, and not actually the person who pushed out the fired employee.

We only have one person's word for that.

I'm seeing a hell of a lot of people who:

1. Label someone who says something that makes them slightly uncomfortable an "SJW".

2. Assume that because their victim is an SJW (because they labelled them one), they must be a straw-SJW

3. Ascribing positions and acts to their victims, misinterpreting the words they say, and creating the most absurd conspiracy theories about their victims, simply because that's what a straw-SJW would do.

SJWs hate it when their own tactics are turned back on them.

Free speech has no meaning

[waspleg]

until you defend someone else's right to say something you disagree with. As for the pictures, if they're real, then that's already illegal and I have no doubt a dozen TLAs are already watching.

Having an outlet in text for these kinds of things is far better than having none and then having these people act it out for real in their areas. It can also give people a head's up since some of these people post their manifesto before they act out.

Life is full of unpleasant things. Making it illegal to talk about them does not make them go away; it just allows them to grow in the dark.

Re:Free speech has no meaning

[Pseudonym Authority]

What's your real name and address then?

Re:Free speech has no meaning

[meta-monkey]

The difference is that at its founding free speech was one of the core values of the site. Here's a place where you can go, and say whatever you want. And people can discuss things openly. And who knows, maybe seeing some other opinions will change some minds. It does happen.

But now that it's popular, they want to change it, and pretty much entirely to be advertiser friendly. It has nothing to do with responding to cries of offense and oppression from the user base. There are no such cries. Brigading is already banned, and people saying nasty things in one subreddit doesn't impact anyone in another subreddit. Don't like /r/CoonTown? Don't go there. I don't.

But I don't want to see /r/CoonTown banned, either. I want them to stay there, and say the stupid shit they want to say to each other. And when I'm talking with someone and I check their profile and see they're subscribed to /r/CoonTown, I know I'm dealing with a shitbag. It's useful information.

So, yes, I'd protest the shutting down of /r/CoonTown, because on a platform where everybody gets a soapbox, they should have theirs, too. AniMoJo, I disagree with 90% of your posts, but I'd protest if /. banned your overly-sensitive, trigger warning needing ass, too.

Re:Free speech has no meaning

[Bathroom Humor]

I don't think AniMojo is a dumb person, but they certainly love a good moral panic and catering to the equally destructive polar opposite end of the overly offensive asshole spectrum; the ultra fragile crybaby.

I understand that allowing these people who make bigoted or disgusting posts a free speech zone turns a few platters of the server rack into a vile pit of shit, but getting a balance between what is acceptable or what is not is REALLY hard, and certainly shouldn't be left to the people who's lives get crushed by mean words on a computer screen. Not only that, but just because a person might unwind by saying shitty things on the Internet doesn't mean they aren't generally OK people, or just have a crude sense of humor that doesn't cause them to hate the people they joke about. I fit into that category, laughing at some people but not showing any real hatred.

People like that undoubtedly rag on Voat and 8chan (even though generally hateful sections of the sites aren't even the most prevalent, last I checked) for being too lenient on hate speech, but when it comes to open platforms for free thought, you're GOING to end up dredging up some fucked up opinions, even if the site has generally normal people posting on it. Even gold nuggets end up sitting next to rotting fish corpses at some point before someone pans them out of the riverbed. Being too "nice" to a certain subsection of the population will keep some communities from becoming interesting and diverse, if not crude.

Same old same

[buk110]

Site builds large user base.
Site gets some VC money and thinks they can make a profit.
Site realizes they need to make changes but changes cheese off the majority of it's user base and they go elsewhere.
Site becomes a ghost town.

Remember Fark? Remember Digg? This is what will happen with Reddit. First they came for the fatties, and I didn't care because I don't have condishons. Then they came for the racists and I didn't care because I'm not racist. But then they came for the rest of the site and no one was left

Reddit is a Business with Business Needs

[eepok]

I hate the idea of major sites like Reddit, Fark, etc. giving up what made them popular: being a sanctuary for people to communicate things as they see fit. But I also accept that once an online community becomes sufficiently large, they will need to:

(1) Bring in revenue to support the people maintaining the site and to pay for the hardware/bandwidth required to actually have a site to support.
(2) Those who provide revenue will impose requirements upon the site that will erode what previously defined the community.
(3) When a community gets sufficiently large, they attract people who weren't part of the original concept and they will demand to be catered to. This will require further erosion of the community's core principles to facilitate because, since revenue's needed, those managing the community must make everyone feel welcomed.
(4) Be ready for lawsuits from people who do not accept the original principles, but want to be part of the community regardless.

This happens with ALL communities and this looks to be Reddit's semi-collapse. Reddit won't die-- not by a long shot. But many will leave and what made Reddit most distinctive from other sites will be watered down. That's called death by success.

Who cares?

[xenotransplant]

Does Reddit have power to amend the constitution? No? Then why are you all crying? You can still speak all the hate you want to elsewhere on the internet. Heck you could even do it in public, you cowards. Go outside and talk to other humans, you'll be interested to know that most of them are not going to put up with your bullshit.

Re:MOAH POPCORN

[Anonymous Coward]

So... a virtual lynchmob went after Pao because they decided she must be an "SJW" because she once sued a former employer for sexual harassment.

I notice you omitted a vital fact in your rant - that she sued *and lost*. If she had sued and won, then at least it could be argued that she was actually the victim of discrimination. However to play the gender card, and subsequently be shown to be bullshitting, firmly puts her in the SJW camp.

And that's before we even get to her ban on salary negotiations in reddit, because one gender is supposedly better than the other at them, thus giving an unfair advantage. Equality through handicapping. Sounds pretty SJW to me.

They interpreted a closure of a subreddit that was harassing people in real life as being content based, and by Pao, because they assumed that was what a straw-SJW would do.

Again you've got it wrong. They assumed that she was responsible because she was the CEO. Nothing to do with gender, or politics.

And it turns out that Pao was supporting them all along - that is, arguing against a board that did actively want to remove the more offensive subreddits, and not actually the person who pushed out the fired employee.

Please, please don't tell me you're now believe the bullshit that's coming out of that clusterfuck of an organisation. You're like the global warming denialists, cherry-picking the starting point for your data. "See, the latest line to come out of reddit HQ is that Pao was fighting for you all along! You're all idiots I tell you, IDIOTS!"

Give it a couple of days, we'll hear some other bullshit line by then.

Re:MOAH POPCORN

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

It's especially curious because she came in to management from the VC world after Reddit's sale. Not all of them refrain from letting emotion cloud their judgement; but those are exactly the variety of management figures who are brought in when somebody has to do some ruthless but pragmatic organizational restructuring. Apparently they were so worked up about the fact that the VC was female that they forgot to check for acid blood and a willingness to cut perceived deadwood.

Re:Fucking SJW

[war4peace]

Pretty much this.
I access exactly ONE subreddit - it belongs to a rather small EVE Online alliance. All posts there are nice, positive, interesting, it's a warm little community and I enjoy being a part of it.
To me, Reddit is that little corner and nothing else. Of course, I could make the effort of searching for other subreddits and finding one that's uncool, but what's the point?

O RLY

[russotto]

And here's Alexis Ohanion, in 2012, calling Reddit... yes.... "a bastion of free speech".

I wonder how high they had to stack the bags of money to get this sort of backpedaling?

Re:Fucking SJW

[jimbolauski]

assaults? How does one assault another person when they don't know where they live or who they are? I think the term you are looking for is harassment, which can only be achieved if the harassee looks at the harassment. Comparing mean things people say on the internet to the civil rights movement shows a giant ignorance on your part when the mean people of reddit start spraying fire hoses at people that are strong enough to peel of skin, burning down houses, lynch people, or have their dogs attack other people then you can make that comparison.

Re:MOAH POPCORN

[nine-times]

I feel like there's a bit of irony here.

The thing that bothers me about "social justice warriors" is that there's a sort of contrived generation of outrage against imagined slights, and if someone is successful in getting that outrage to catch on, it has the potential to turn into a sort of witch hunt. There's a real reason to be concerned that, to give an example, if you post a random off-color joke, it could go viral with your name attached, and that could result in losing your job and having a hard time getting another job. Online, there's no sympathy. If you say something that people don't like online, it's rare that anyone tries to find a deeper understanding of who you are. In their mind you become a two-dimensional villain without any redeeming qualities, and you deserve to have your life ruined. At least, that's the kind of thing that worries me about the whole SJW phenomenon.

So what I find ironic is, the people who get most upset about the SJW thing also have a tendency to do the same thing. If a woman has a blog describing sexist tropes in video games, the anti-SJW crowd will be outraged that she's questioning the quality of their favorite games, and that she's questioning the developer's intentions. It's like, "How dare she imply that Super Mario Bros is oppressing women! She should have a more nuanced understanding of what's going on!" On the other hand, they might also be failing to understand the nuance of that woman's blog. In a way, they're generating the same kind of contrived outrage and the SJW.

And I think that's a component of what happened here. I don't have any behind-the-scenes knowledge to tell you whether Pao was a good or bad CEO, or which decisions were hers. I support the reddit community's right to stand against inappropriate policies-- if you don't like what's going on with the site, you have every right to refuse to participate, including shutting down the subreddits that you moderate. However, it doesn't really seem like the reddit community knew enough about what was going on to warrant so much hatred of Pao. I still haven't heard an explanation as to why Victoria Taylor was fired. Do we know?

It seems like there was a major fuckup in managing the relationship between reddit, the moderators, and the user base. Things weren't communicated well, changes were made that seemed arbitrary, and from that I would agree that there needed to be a change in leadership. However, the kind vitriol leveled at Pao seemed childish and... kind of fucked up.

That's my feeling anyway. I won't claim to be thoroughly knowledgeable about the whole thing, but as a bystander, I thought it was cool that the user base is able to strong-arm the corporation when they feel they need to, but I still didn't like what I was seeing.