Reddit has always had issues, beyond it's small scope of bigoted subreddits. I think the point the author misses is that he's dumbing the argument down into "immature children just want a place to be immature children."

I've been annoyed by some of reddit's more obnoxious qualities since I first started using it many years ago, but there's two big issues. The first is is that bullies and assholes will be bullies and assholes. Now they'll just try to find a different way to do exactly that. And it's not like the people on those questionable subreddits were the only bullies and assholes on reddit, those people were pretty much everywhere and still are everywhere. America isn't doomed because of reddit's shittiness. If that was the case 4chan would have spelled out our demise long ago. That sounds more like needless alarmism to me.

The second issue is that he's missing that a lot of people who are upset aren't exactly upset about /r/fatpeoplehate getting banned in itself, but rather the larger issue around it. I think most people that are upset aren't exactly out there supporting /r/fatpeoplehate. It was never exactly a hive of great minds. I chose to deal with it by just not going there. The larger issue though is that the culture has shifted in reddit to a more social justice friendly culture, which has been having the very negative effect of silencing dissenting viewpoints and snubbing noses down at those they deem to be counter their philosophy.

So it's also bad for people like myself who live in the center. I am a strong advocate for social issues, whether they involve race, LGBT issues, women's rights, etc. But if I choose to say that I think that a man can still be a victim of a false rape accusation, or that police gun deaths might sometimes be more complex than just based on racism, I have to deal with people who automatically assume I'm a bigot or that I'm too privileged to know anything about those issues. Or if I choose to think that we ...

Reddit has always had issues, beyond it's small scope of bigoted subreddits. I think the point the author misses is that he's dumbing the argument down into "immature children just want a place to be immature children."

I've been annoyed by some of reddit's more obnoxious qualities since I first started using it many years ago, but there's two big issues. The first is is that bullies and assholes will be bullies and assholes. Now they'll just try to find a different way to do exactly that. And it's not like the people on those questionable subreddits were the only bullies and assholes on reddit, those people were pretty much everywhere and still are everywhere. America isn't doomed because of reddit's shittiness. If that was the case 4chan would have spelled out our demise long ago. That sounds more like needless alarmism to me.

The second issue is that he's missing that a lot of people who are upset aren't exactly upset about /r/fatpeoplehate getting banned in itself, but rather the larger issue around it. I think most people that are upset aren't exactly out there supporting /r/fatpeoplehate. It was never exactly a hive of great minds. I chose to deal with it by just not going there. The larger issue though is that the culture has shifted in reddit to a more social justice friendly culture, which has been having the very negative effect of silencing dissenting viewpoints and snubbing noses down at those they deem to be counter their philosophy.

So it's also bad for people like myself who live in the center. I am a strong advocate for social issues, whether they involve race, LGBT issues, women's rights, etc. But if I choose to say that I think that a man can still be a victim of a false rape accusation, or that police gun deaths might sometimes be more complex than just based on racism, I have to deal with people who automatically assume I'm a bigot or that I'm too privileged to know anything about those issues. Or if I choose to think that we should be able to laugh at things that might be deemed offensive, I'm automatically a bully. Now of course I'm exaggerating a little bit, but that's just sorta the direction the culture has been shifting. And as those attitudes have shifted, people have chosen to leave.

In the end, I think the bigger issue is the "Us vs. Them" mentality we've cultivated. Everyone who doesn't share our opinion is now our enemy, so we cease to have civil discussion. And that's going on on both sides of this discussion.

Plus, lets' fact it, reddit was never really the best place for civil discussion anyways.

All communities need a dark side to level it out or they become what they don't want.

When I ran a forum 10 years ago, I had a guy that was infatuated with posting porn sites and underage girls. Of course in his country that was fine, but where I hosted the site it wasn't. We educated him to an extent and he stopped the underage girls (16+ nothing younger or we really would have had a problem.. he was of that age as well) but we let the random porn sites slide as they weren't breaking any laws and generally were harmless as he did post them in context most times. Also had a bunch of trolls that would lurk and cause problems. Since I was fairly good friends with them all they never really crossed the line publicly, more in chat, but for the forum to grow and stay active they were needed.

It's like running a one sided country, pushing out anyone that opposes your rule. It will be nice and all to start with but once you figure out that you have nobody who is a polar opposite to fight against, you will read problems into conversations with once like minded "friends" which will then result in further fragmentation of your "community" and in the end you are back at square one.

Any online community will have issues. No such website is perfect and the size of the those issues will alter, mostly depending on size of the user base. Also any society will have bad people, its just life we are all different. Plus sometimes the word bad, or terrible can be subjective, or just used to describe people that don't fit into your own philosophy.

The fact is hate, bigots, and such like do exist in real life. So why shouldn't they exist online as well? They often feel like the online world can provide a platform for their views. Then they come together with other like-minded people that justify these views. In real life they know they have to turn-down or tame their views to fit into society. So is the online world a real measure of how a country may be doomed? No, because the user base of Reddit is worldwide for starters. Yes a majority might be American, but as I said previously it's also people just shouting their mouth off because they can.

The bigger issue is the way the people in power are acting. We are building societies that are sweeping unpopular things underground by banning them, making them illegal in order to pretend they don't exist. Its been going on your years but more obvious now. It was made very clear how hypocritical governments are when many world leaders met in Paris during the Charlie Hebdo march. They all said how much they want to protect free speech whilst posing for pictures as a PR stunt, but soon as it was over they started making laws and persuading others that the only free speech they were keen on was protecting things they agree with. David Cameron was an ideal example as the minute he arrived back he started talking about banning certain content on the web, banning encryption, harvesting more data, etc... all was done using the keywords paedophile and terrorism. When in reality its eroding freedom of speech and expression. So seeing governments act in such a way, and doing it for so long it's not surprising other...

Any online community will have issues. No such website is perfect and the size of the those issues will alter, mostly depending on size of the user base. Also any society will have bad people, its just life we are all different. Plus sometimes the word bad, or terrible can be subjective, or just used to describe people that don't fit into your own philosophy.

The fact is hate, bigots, and such like do exist in real life. So why shouldn't they exist online as well? They often feel like the online world can provide a platform for their views. Then they come together with other like-minded people that justify these views. In real life they know they have to turn-down or tame their views to fit into society. So is the online world a real measure of how a country may be doomed? No, because the user base of Reddit is worldwide for starters. Yes a majority might be American, but as I said previously it's also people just shouting their mouth off because they can.

The bigger issue is the way the people in power are acting. We are building societies that are sweeping unpopular things underground by banning them, making them illegal in order to pretend they don't exist. Its been going on your years but more obvious now. It was made very clear how hypocritical governments are when many world leaders met in Paris during the Charlie Hebdo march. They all said how much they want to protect free speech whilst posing for pictures as a PR stunt, but soon as it was over they started making laws and persuading others that the only free speech they were keen on was protecting things they agree with. David Cameron was an ideal example as the minute he arrived back he started talking about banning certain content on the web, banning encryption, harvesting more data, etc... all was done using the keywords paedophile and terrorism. When in reality its eroding freedom of speech and expression. So seeing governments act in such a way, and doing it for so long it's not surprising others will follow suit and start peddling their ideals of free speech.

Also let's keep in mind Reddit is just a website. it owes you nothing. You didn't pay to join. Walk away and find another place. It's not the world, and some people enjoy drama. If they can't find it they have to create their own. Once we were all addicted to other websites, the internet evolves and things die and others come to light.

Also the internet is content driven. People write using keywords to drive an audience to their content. Reddit at present is one of those keywords. Its fashionable and trending, and no doubt Google data shows this. So much will be written about Reddit, but is any of it worth reading or taking seriously? I doubt it.

Sadly the answer to this Q is yes. But not in the way the article is pitching it. The reality is that any internet speech platform owned by corporate interests cannot survive without terrible corporatists like those who've take reddits riens.

It's frightening how much reddit has shit on free speech of late. And not just FPH, but anything that is outside the mainstream has been slowly but surely killed, and if not, pushed well off the front page.

I guess we will have to wait an see.