All these armchair protesters who moan about free speech on Reddit don't really understand the concept of free speech anyway.
As much as I'm an advocator of free speech, I think that some rules are necessary for a community like this and I actually like that Snapzu has some rules when it comes to content.
Most of the people complaining about free speech have no idea what they're talking about
"Protect Fat People Hate's freedom of speech!!!1!!!"
I've said this before, and I'll say it again: it's not a motherfucking freedom of speech issue
If you harass other users on a website, the admins have every right to kick your ass off it. If I work at McDonalds, and if I talk shit about them while I'm on their payroll, they can (and probably will) fire my goddamn ass. If you don't like what a website has done: close down your account, stop giving monetary support, etc. Let the website know that you, as a consumer, are pissed off about a policy of theirs. That's how the market works.
See I agree with you that the FPH thing was not a free speech issue since the reason shown for their ban was brigading other subs and active harassment of people. However, I still think a group has the right to have their own tribe so long as they keep everything in the tribe and don't harass or brigade outside the tribe even if the content is detestable to outsiders. I'm starting to feel like I'm the only person here with this opinion.
I agree with you on that note. IF FPH was just a sub that hated on fat people, but also just minded their own business, then I would object to the banning. But since they were harassing people outside of their subreddit, I fully support their being banned.
As Evelyn Beatrice Hall said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”.
Yeah, I agree with your notion. After all, this can be issue with controversial topics. The line of hate speech I have learned can be quite shady at times...
Then how exactly do you think free speech is supposed to work?
IMO, there's always going to be a tradeoff between freedom of speech and quality of speech, and there's no way around that. That's why academia, which is designed to ensure high standards, doesn't allow free speech for everyone; it has a high barrier to entry for submitting articles to journals, and a ruthless process of expert peer review for weeding out bad stuff.
Personally, I would nearly always take quality over liberty, which is why I'm very happy that Snapzu has actual rules and a decent barrier to entry.
Free speech means the government can't arrest you for what you say. It does however not mean that I can't throw you out of my house when you bloat hate speech. Reddit (or any internet community) is very much like private property. You're invited to the party as long as you follow the rules which are set up by the hosts/admins. If you don't, you'll be asked to leave. If that happens, your right to free speech isn't being violated.
Oh, I was talking about free speech as a principle itself, and so were most of the armchair Reddit protestors. As a matter of government and legal policy, though, you're completely right.
Generally, I think that everyone is entitled to whatever opinion they wish to hold, even if I don't support it or even hate it. But I don't think that every opinion has a place on every platform. Therefore I think that banning things you don't want on your message board is completely justified from an admin's point of view.
If I don't like the policies of a message board as a user, I will leave and find myself another community, just as some users of the recently banned subreddits did with Voat. Reddit was very liberal with literally any kind of content for a very long time before they started removing things that didn't fit their "image." I guess people are pissed because they were allowed to have their playground for a while and then suddenly some admin threw them out. If they had rules from the beginning and, more importantly, enforced them from the beginning, the backlash would have certainly been less severe.
It sounds like you're talking about the First Amendment. The First Amendment protects your freedom of speech from the government, yes. Your freedom of speech in private spaces is up for grabs, though, and you have to defend it yourself, which is what the users were doing.
I'm kind of on the fence about this one. You have a classic moral dilemma here: the users' right to free speech vs. the site owners' right to run their site as they see fit. Now, if it were something that was clearly illegal, and it would bring the law down on reddits' heads, then I'd be more sympathetic, but this is much more of a grey area. What reddit's leadership was alleging was that FPH were using the platform to coordinate harassment. FPH denies this.
This would probably be less of an issue if it was a site like Facebook, where users don't expect to have free speech, but reddit has a tradition of allowing anything on their site, as long as it doesn't break the law. This is why users were upset: they felt like they'd been betrayed. I can't really blame them, and it does feel like a bad sign when communities start to get the axe, even when those communities are as odious as FPH.
All these armchair protesters who moan about free speech on Reddit don't really understand the concept of free speech anyway.
As much as I'm an advocator of free speech, I think that some rules are necessary for a community like this and I actually like that Snapzu has some rules when it comes to content.
Most of the people complaining about free speech have no idea what they're talking about
"Protect Fat People Hate's freedom of speech!!!1!!!"
I've said this before, and I'll say it again: it's not a motherfucking freedom of speech issue
If you harass other users on a website, the admins have every right to kick your ass off it. If I work at McDonalds, and if I talk shit about them while I'm on their payroll, they can (and probably will) fire my goddamn ass. If you don't like what a website has done: close down your account, stop giving monetary support, etc. Let the website know that you, as a consumer, are pissed off about a policy of theirs. That's how the market works.
TL;DR: http://xkcd.com/1357/
See I agree with you that the FPH thing was not a free speech issue since the reason shown for their ban was brigading other subs and active harassment of people. However, I still think a group has the right to have their own tribe so long as they keep everything in the tribe and don't harass or brigade outside the tribe even if the content is detestable to outsiders. I'm starting to feel like I'm the only person here with this opinion.
I agree with you on that note. IF FPH was just a sub that hated on fat people, but also just minded their own business, then I would object to the banning. But since they were harassing people outside of their subreddit, I fully support their being banned.
As Evelyn Beatrice Hall said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”.
Yeah, I agree with your notion. After all, this can be issue with controversial topics. The line of hate speech I have learned can be quite shady at times...
Then how exactly do you think free speech is supposed to work?
IMO, there's always going to be a tradeoff between freedom of speech and quality of speech, and there's no way around that. That's why academia, which is designed to ensure high standards, doesn't allow free speech for everyone; it has a high barrier to entry for submitting articles to journals, and a ruthless process of expert peer review for weeding out bad stuff.
Personally, I would nearly always take quality over liberty, which is why I'm very happy that Snapzu has actual rules and a decent barrier to entry.
Free speech means the government can't arrest you for what you say. It does however not mean that I can't throw you out of my house when you bloat hate speech. Reddit (or any internet community) is very much like private property. You're invited to the party as long as you follow the rules which are set up by the hosts/admins. If you don't, you'll be asked to leave. If that happens, your right to free speech isn't being violated.
Oh, I was talking about free speech as a principle itself, and so were most of the armchair Reddit protestors. As a matter of government and legal policy, though, you're completely right.
Generally, I think that everyone is entitled to whatever opinion they wish to hold, even if I don't support it or even hate it. But I don't think that every opinion has a place on every platform. Therefore I think that banning things you don't want on your message board is completely justified from an admin's point of view.
If I don't like the policies of a message board as a user, I will leave and find myself another community, just as some users of the recently banned subreddits did with Voat. Reddit was very liberal with literally any kind of content for a very long time before they started removing things that didn't fit their "image." I guess people are pissed because they were allowed to have their playground for a while and then suddenly some admin threw them out. If they had rules from the beginning and, more importantly, enforced them from the beginning, the backlash would have certainly been less severe.
It sounds like you're talking about the First Amendment. The First Amendment protects your freedom of speech from the government, yes. Your freedom of speech in private spaces is up for grabs, though, and you have to defend it yourself, which is what the users were doing.
I'm kind of on the fence about this one. You have a classic moral dilemma here: the users' right to free speech vs. the site owners' right to run their site as they see fit. Now, if it were something that was clearly illegal, and it would bring the law down on reddits' heads, then I'd be more sympathetic, but this is much more of a grey area. What reddit's leadership was alleging was that FPH were using the platform to coordinate harassment. FPH denies this.
This would probably be less of an issue if it was a site like Facebook, where users don't expect to have free speech, but reddit has a tradition of allowing anything on their site, as long as it doesn't break the law. This is why users were upset: they felt like they'd been betrayed. I can't really blame them, and it does feel like a bad sign when communities start to get the axe, even when those communities are as odious as FPH.