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Something something we did it reddit!

https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/3fx2au/content_policy_update/

Is anybody else very excited right now!?

Yeah it's very great that /r/coontown's gone, but I'm not too happy about /r/pomf and the like being banned as well.

They banned talking about fat people before something called coontown?

Fatpeoplehate was banned first for putting up pictures of reddit's sister site, imgur's admins after they took down fat hate images.

i do think coontown should have been banned earlier. BUT HEY WE DID IT STILL!

GG, now the racists of coontown are going to spread to the rest of reddit.

as if the site wasnt racist enough as it is

From what I heard, it was because they harassed the staff

What's coontown even context please?

Racism.

tl:dr like stormfront on reddit. a sub to be racist against minorities and jews and then hide behind facts

Oh boy racism! But yeah, bye bye nothing of value lost blah blah.

{ Fatpeoplehate was banned first for putting up pictures of reddit’s sister site, imgur’s admins after they took down fat hate images. }

That is legitimately the funniest thing I have read all day (actually that's only funny if they're fat, are they fat?)

I mean I'm pretty sure that falls under the 1st Amendment if that's what reddit wants to be all about but I also read after that Asian CEO that everybody hated stepped down, whoever took over moved to implement a more strict interpretation of "free speech".

I don't use reddit at all so I don't follow these things very closely.

Have they ever explained what standard they're using for all this? Because it seems to me that they're being intentionally vague so they can ban/quarantine essentially whatever they want on a whim without having to answer to a specific violation of their own policies.

And let's be real here- banning a racist sub does not get rid of the racists. Not even from Reddit, as Twisty already pointed out.

I wonder what other subs are gonna get banned. Or if these rules are gonna be followed at all without abuse, or is just a stunt to at long last get rid of some undesirables.

Either way, no skin off my nose. I hate stupid shit like /r/coontown. Even if I don't trust the method used to get rid of it, I'm glad its gone regardless.

You know, it's weird. I'm glad, but I feel guilty for feeling glad. I don't generally like the idea of the restriction of ideas in a general sense, but I understand that there are limits. Like, it wouldn't make sense to suddenly make killing people by strangling them with one's hands legal because it is an expression of nonverbal speech (i.e. how much you dislike that person). Not to mention things like obscenity, defamation, literal fighting words, literally causing mass panic, legtimately inciting a crime, and sedition are all legal exceptions to free speech which everyone has to abide by and most people agree they are either a good idea, or not a bad idea at least. (Source:https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/free-speech-primer-what-can-you-say). Not to mention Reddit isn't a company, so they can choose who they ban.

At the same time, an irrational part of me feels bad despite disagree very strongly with the messages that come from that place. I guess it's because I despite the reasoning behind the ban is logical, the evidence that such organisations like that subreddit do more harm than good to society isn't simple and physical and obvious, even if I feel the evidence is substantial and relevant and collected well.

I'm not worried about a slippery slope to 1984 or anything, I guess I just feel bad saying "you can't say that" in any sense, even if it's logical and justified. I don't know, I'm probably crazy. I'm just glad that it might lead to one or two less bullies in the future, because they came accross a healthier hobby a bit after the time in the lives where they would have discovered the sunreddit if it wasn't wiped out.

"I mean I’m pretty sure that falls under the 1st Amendment"

Oh yes I keep forgetting the world wide web was an american thing.

Back to topic.

I can hear the racists crying out censorship now, even though its clearly not.

Reddit is based in San Fransisco, twathole. It's governed by US law.
If other countries want to block access to it that's their deal.

censor (v):
to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable (censor the news); also: to suppress or delete as objectionable (censor out indecent passages)

The definition you just linked says.

"a person who examines books, movies, letters, etc., and removes things that are considered to be offensive, immoral, harmful to society, etc."

Reddit is it's own private website. They can do with the website as they please. If they decide that they want to remove subreddits they consider offensive, they have every right to do so.

I mean your definition you posted could mean you could draw a dick on a piece of paper, leave it on a table and never come back to it and I come along and think its a bit of an eyesore and chuck it in the bin, I would have censored you.

@Spider-Byte

Did you scroll down?

"Reddit is it’s own private website. They can do with the website as they please. If they decide that they want to remove subreddits they consider offensive, they have every right to do so."

Yes they absolutely do. And that is censorship.

In regards to your scenario, if you'd assumed that I had intended my artwork to stay there and be seen by other people, and you had chucked it anyway, then that would be the correct term for it as well. What's your point?

Spider-Byte said:

Reddit is it’s own private website. They can do with the website as they please. If they decide that they want to remove subreddits they consider offensive, they have every right to do so.

Sure they can, but it's still censorship. I'll never understand where this "it's not censorship because it's not the government" definition came from. There's been plenty of "industry groups" over the years that have played censorship roles. Private or public doesn't make a difference.

Good to know people here support racists spewing their bile everywhere

Now just clue me in for a non-murican, but where does the first amendment protect obscenity?

Supporting free speech does not mean you will always support the speech made. In fact, quite the opposite is true.

Now with that being said, of course anyone who thinks this has anything to do with the First Amendment is completely ignorant. In fact, there's only one SCOTUS decision that I'm aware of that upheld a private company being prevented from restricting individuals from exercising their FA rights on their "grounds". But if you look into it, what the court actually determined was that the provision in the California Constitution which resulted in this action was acceptable, as Pruneyard Shopping Center had claimed that it was a violation of the Fifth Amendment.

What that means is that, in theory, a law could be passed at the state level which limits the ways that the websites hosted within its jurisdiction can censor speech, so long as it was written reasonably enough. (Though there would surely be a challenge by some organization.)

AFAIK it just means you can't be arrested/executed for the things you say in public. Reddit is a private company, so they don't have to abide. Reddit was originally something with free speach.

Important question coming up…

Why do any of you even care? Do any of you even go to reddit? Did coontown ever spread outside of its own quarantine?

It all just seems so stupid and pointless to care about this.

>Do any of you even go to reddit?

I, For one, do.

Did coontown ever spread outside of its own quarantine?

Yes. Several times.

I'm going to assume it was dealt with pretty easily by mods, making it almost non-existent as an issue.

Unless you mean it seeped outside of the thread, in that case. That really won't stop, even with the removal of the board.

The way I see it, from every possible angle, this is virtually a non-issue. Because of that, it's incredibly naive to celebrate the loss of it.

It spread outside of the board, yes.

I meant the site, whatever. Outside of the board isn't really that much of a problem because, again, moderators.

It's really not pointless to care about racism, quarantined or not.

It was irresponsible of reddit to ever allow something like this to exist.

I'm not saying it's pointless to care about racism, I'm saying it's pointless to care about this.

What has this accomplished at all? Racists were driven out, but they're not gone. They're still on reddit, they're still around. The only thing this has done is given people like OP a false sense of victory that he can jerk himself over.

Not a single thing in this thread has convinced me that any good was done in any way.

What has this accomplished at all?

Racists were driven out

You answered your own question. Reddit was knowingly giving racists a free way to host their hate speech, thus perpetuating it. Now it's well known that it won't be tolerated. Seems like a victory to me.

And you assume that will stop them?

You seem to think people who can harbor extreme distaste based on skin color are capable of logical reasoning.

Also, by "driven out", I meant from the board. Not from reddit. They're still there, they still have their opinions, they'll still gather together. Nothing has been accomplished.

Will their hate speeches getting deleted and their subsequent banning stop them from posting hate speeches? I mean… yeah, probably. At the very least their posts will no longer be kept up, which, again, is a moral victory.

Ever heard of "precedent"?

True, but they can still post the stuff they want elsewhere. There are places that are going to accommodate them.

And a lot of the information they post is links. The info is still there, you just can't access via reddit.

Plus, nowadays censorship comes with a negative connotation that makes people think any form of censorship is some way to completely eradicate some opinion or information.

If KYM changed its NSFW rules, and this meant removing images that broke the rules, you could call it censorship, and by the definition it is, but who would even call it that? Probably someone to make it seem like its doing a bad thing.

I've never been a fan of moral victories. I see them as a loser's attempt at justifying failure.

As for the precedent thing, from my understanding, fatpeoplehate was banned because it targeted specific people. It definitely can't be because it painted fat people in a bad light because there are still subreddits for that.

So, assuming the precedent follows the same path; there will still be racism on reddit, it just won't be targeted at anyone in specific.

Edit: So, either precedent means nothing and Reddit has no idea what the fuck it's doing. Or racism will still be around. Either way, neither is a victory.

I’ve never been a fan of moral victories. I see them as a loser’s attempt at justifying failure.

/r/iamverysmart

So, assuming the precedent follows the same path; there will still be racism on reddit, it just won’t be targeted at anyone in specific.

To me it's pretty clear that they're implying that they won't tolerate racist subreddits anymore. Not sure about fat bias.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make with the first bit. If it was an attempt at mockery, I'm actually quite disappointed you would resort to an attack rather than actually refuting the point. Of course, given our history of arguments, I should have expected no less from you. You always did like to insult when you had no good points to make, but I digress.

That last bit is assuming they will stick with the decision. They removed fatpeoplehate under the premise of making reddit a more accepting place and they've failed at removing fat people bias in general. What's to say they won't just stop after everyone is convinced they've done it? (much like what seems to have happened with fatpeoplehate)

Twenty-One said:

Good to know people here support racists spewing their bile everywhere…

I support free speech. I may not like what you say, but I'll always defend you're right to say it. Going by your logic, I guess everyone on SCOTUS except their most conservative member is a bigoted homophobe.

…but where does the first amendment protect obscenity?

SCOTUS covered obscenity in Miller v California. Basically, almost everything--including hardcore porn--can qualify as "art" and be protected. You're probably more thinking of hate speech, which was covered in Brandenburg v Ohio and stated that there are three requirements for speech to be banned due to its hateful nature. It needs to be intended to be hateful, advocate imminent action by the speaker, and have a high likelihood of actions actually be carried out as a result of the speech.

This is somewhat moot as the first amendment doesn't apply as it's a private business doing the censorship.

Coontown should have been banned a long time ago.
Better late than never I suppose.

Are you people downvoting me for laughing at fat imgur mods or for saying hating fat people falls under free speech? jw.

To me it just says, "We can ban anything we don't like for any reason" with a thin veil of limitation to racist or hate group subs.

After all, what counts as a sub that exists solely to annoy other redditors? What are the qualifications of an action that prevents admins from improving reddit? Are there any actually concrete stated qualifications for a sub that makes reddit worse for everyone?

It's a lot of vague, arbitrary language, that denotes nothing outside of "Admins can ban who they feel like banning". Because without any concrete guides or rules, ones that are not vague and open to interpretation, it all comes down to an admins personal preference. What an admin thinks is a sub that's bad for reddit, bad for redditors, and serves no purpose but to annoy.

Better hope your fandom isn't one an admin hates, or else they could be banned for making reddit a bad place and serving no purpose but to annoy the admin and other redditors with liking stuff they don't like.

Read an article about this yesterday that had this in it:

{ The company posted a new policy--about 350 words long--banning content that “is illegal; involuntary pornography; encourages or incites violence; threatens, harasses or bullies or encourages others to do so; is personal and confidential information; impersonates someone in a misleading or deceptive manner; is spam.” }

At least the new rules qualifiers and factors for banning are concrete now, hopefully.

Yeah, not to happy about this. I hope they don't start cracking down on pantsu, ecchi, and the like.

It shouldn't be banned, but people shouldn't be forced to host it if they don't want to

Boy, this thread is angrily charged, innit?

I think it's safe to say that nobody currently arguing in this thread is open-minded enough to genuinely consider the opposition's points. Ergo, nobody is going to get anywhere and all "contestants" will just continue to grow more and more pissed off. For all your sake, might I suggest moving on?

To add something vaguely on-topic, I support the removal of a sub that was unabashedly racist. I don't think free speech should also protect racism and hate speech, but I'm also aware of the slippery slope that's liable to occur if we start making exceptions to amendment number one.