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

[Secondhand Revenant]

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So what happens when the corporations own everything? Please don't tell me it can't happen as they've already taken over incarceration and certain law enforcement duties. So we can sit in the backyard and talk to only a handful of people at once? Super! Let's just hope the corporations don't feel like censoring customer complaints. Oh wait! Some companies actually have put into their EULAs that in order to get a refund you have to sign an NDA stating you won't speak about your issues with the company. So it's starting.

That's why people have that issue. And it's more to do with corporations (which are NOT people despite what the SC said) rather than individual, small business owners. It would be a simple enough distinction to make legally.

I think you're missing the real big problem with your situation. See, the problem is corporations owning everything. It's just not a convincing argument to worry about limiting corporations in a situation where they own it all. How the fuck are you going to limit them if they do? You couldn't. They could do what they like.

It's like worrying about being polite come an apocalypse. You're worrying about tiny details in a ruinous situation.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

I didn't realize it was cool to censor negative things that we don't like. I don't give a shit what Reddit does, never been there. The only issue I take with them is that they apparently set themselves up as the bastions of free speech and then censored things (and yes, private companies can censor things; not just the government). My issue is mainly with everyone saying "Freedom of speech ends when you're mean." and I always thought that was the exact kind of speech that needed protecting. Granted it's tricky because we're talking about a private entity, but with the US government becoming less and less concerned with the awareness that our politicians are blatantly serving corporate interests, I can see a day when the distinction is irrelevant. I believe we're seeing the start. So have at me with your "Strawman!" and your "Slippery Slope!" cries as if they automatically invalidate a point of view. They don't; they are valid in some cases but not just because the word is uttered.

Why do you think it needs protecting from society? From the government, yes. But you seem to think ideas shouldn't be allowed to be weeded out of society.

It seems awfully... well weak to just want to protect all things regardless of their worth. Fear of making a judgement so you just protect it all.

 

[Objectable]

I've heard the phrase "ruining our fun" in regard to shutting down the fatshaming subreddit.

When did "fun" become code for "psychopathy?"

 

[The Lunatic]

It seems awfully... well weak to just want to protect all things regardless of their worth. Fear of making a judgement so you just protect it all.

Perhaps it's more the realisation that value is entirely subjective and that just because some people think some speech is more valuable than others doesn't actually make it so.

And so instead of arguments about value, it's simply better to accept that given the subjectivity of value, people should be free to say what they like, and others free to apply their own value.

 

[DrWut]

A lot of people seemed to be on board protesting and making fun of said business. Where were all the champions of the corporations back then, I wonder?

I'm curious, Wut, if you are one of those folks who generalizes "people" as some homogenous entity that speaks with one mind, and likes to imagine they are calling it out on hypocrisy. Or do you have specific individuals in mind?

I mean, I hear people on Reddit criticizing this decision, and then there are other people on Reddit supporting the decision! Fucking people right? Always contradicting themselves.

No, I am asking Zeconte specifically if, on that given instance, they would be on the same side of the issue defending the rights of corporations to deny service and kick out people who they have unilaterally deemed "undesirable". I was just putting an example of a previous issue were people were agreeing that the corporation in question were being idiots.

But don't let that get in the way of your little personal dig that has exactly 0 to do with any argument.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

No, I am asking Zeconte specifically if, on that given instance, they would be on the same side of the issue defending the rights of corporations to deny service and kick out people who they have unilaterally deemed "undesirable". I was just putting an example of a previous issue were people were agreeing that the corporation in question were being idiots.

I'm not Zeconte, but the pizza parlor had the right to do that (however distasteful) just as Reddit has the right to do this (however poorly handled).

But don't let that get in the way of your little personal dig that has exactly 0 to do with any argument.

Seemed a pretty fair representation of the argument you presented. I can see having it criticized has upset you, though, so...I'm sorry?

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

It seems awfully... well weak to just want to protect all things regardless of their worth. Fear of making a judgement so you just protect it all.

Perhaps it's more the realisation that value is entirely subjective and that just because some people think some speech is more valuable than others doesn't actually make it so.

And so instead of arguments about value, it's simply better to accept that given the subjectivity of value, people should be free to say what they like, and others free to apply their own value.

Value being subjective does not mean you must treat it all the same. That is the same foolish notion that leads people to think that if you believe morality is subjective you can never support one moral position over another. It has the bizarre implied belief that all subjective things must be treated the same. It simply isn't so.

Its really quite clear when you stop playing games when arguing. You can make judgements on their value then act accordingly instead of hand-wringing over how value is subjective so how can you possibly not treat them the same. Because we are not forced to be impartial beings.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

Why do you think it needs protecting from society? From the government, yes. But you seem to think ideas shouldn't be allowed to be weeded out of society.

It seems awfully... well weak to just want to protect all things regardless of their worth. Fear of making a judgement so you just protect it all.

And you seem to think the only speech that will ever be censored is that which is obviously useless. Do I think that "Fat People Hate" is an idea deserving of consideration and social debate? Of course not. But once the precedent for censorship is set, then it can broaden a little more...and a little more...and a little more. I'm not scared of making a judgement, but thanks for thinking an opposing viewpoint is automatically cowardice. I can't see why discourse goes nowhere on the internet at all.

Seem to think..? Do you have evidence or is this just an accusation because I don't agree with you? Do you think everyone who realizes that MUST agree with you?

And you somehow think taking a stand here is going to prevent people from ever moving forward on censoring something of value? What, do you think it will forever be ingrained in our minds that fph lost here so we have to allow other censorship? Do you think people who want to censor other ideas would change their minds if fph was allowed to continue? The problem with your logic is that there seems to be no clear cause and effect for how it happens. Just that SOMEHOW it broadens. But not any details on how that works.

I see it as weak because I see it as bring afraid for no justifiable reason. I see no clear way in which this idea spreads just because fph got banned. WHO changes their mind and decides it's okay for it to happen elsewhere because of this where they weren't okay with it before?

 

[DrownedAmmet]

Someone spray-painted hateful slurs on a charity center in my city. Next week, they are going to repaint that wall.
Tomorrow, I'm going down there to protest. They are blatantly censoring the graffiti which has a right to exist due to freedom of speech.

Who's coming with me?

That has to be one of the worst analogies I've ever seen in my life. I mean hell, even if Reddit COULD be compared to a charity instead of a the for-profit corporation it is, it still wouldn't work since a better description would be painting over graffiti for a business whose entire model is based on putting up ads next to graffiti to get revenue.

I think the analogy holds up pretty well, all you have to do is replace charity center with Wal-Mart.

I'm not losing any sleep for the loss of "fat people hate" posters because fuck those guys. They can feel free to find another place to be assholes in. Good job Reddit!

I have to disagree on account of the fact that Walmart doesn't operate by having ads placed next to the graffiti on its walls.

It doesn't help that they're lying about who what is being enforced and what their position is. Chairman Pao claims that it's only subreddits that are harassing or doxing people which are being banned, this is a lie. She also states that Reddit is all for freedom of speech, which is also a lie.

Okay, so a better analogy would be if Wal-Mart owned a billboard, and let people come and draw things on it, but then they came in later and covered some stuff up, and then people got mad....
Yeah, analogies suck...

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Okay, so a better analogy would be if Wal-Mart owned a billboard, and let people come and draw things on it, but then they came in later and covered some stuff up, and then people got mad....
Yeah, analogies suck...

I think what we can all agree on is that Walmart had no business covering up that graffiti.

Let's picket them.

 

[DrWut]

No, I am asking Zeconte specifically if, on that given instance, they would be on the same side of the issue defending the rights of corporations to deny service and kick out people who they have unilaterally deemed "undesirable". I was just putting an example of a previous issue were people were agreeing that the corporation in question were being idiots.

I'm not Zeconte, but the pizza parlor had the right to do that (however distasteful) just as Reddit has the right to do this (however poorly handled).

But don't let that get in the way of your little personal dig that has exactly 0 to do with any argument.

Seemed a pretty fair representation of the argument you presented. I can see having it criticized has upset you, though, so...I'm sorry?

The argument I was presenting has nothing to do with people being a monolithic entity. If I am irritated it's because my mother language is not English and I'm tired, and you have no fucking idea how frustrating is, under this conditions, having to post at people who are doing their best to misunderstand the argument rather than get the general point that you are trying to make.

The general point that I am trying to make is that I predict that the reaction towards a corporation kicking people out of the "premises" is highly dependent on the popularity of said people. This is normal and it's the first reaction. But one has to think a bit further and realize that the arbitrary silencing that you like today could be applied to you tomorrow.

It's something that the governments have done for long with, for example, denying rights to terrorists. At first it's OK, then the definition of terrorist sorta keeps expanding. And no, I am not comparing this situation to Guantánamo, it's a simile so you get a better idea on the sort of shit that can come from accepting unfair treatment for people you don't like. It's just short-sighted.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

Value being subjective does not mean you must treat it all the same.

Well, as far as giving the public the ability to decide for themselves, then it should all be treated the same by the media. Let's say that the media decided that gay marriage was an abomination and decided not to cover any positive aspects of it. Hey, corporations have rights so I guess you'll just have to get that info from....oh wait, where does one get news if not from the media? The nosy old lady at the end of the block?

Well no I don't want the media trying to tell us about the positives of slavery and genocide. Maybe one day media will leave it up to us if we wish to celebrate the deaths of our nation's soldiets. I mean that is what being purely neutral on values gets you, no?

To me this looks like... well ignorance of the fact that right now ideas already don't get treated the same and we are fine with it. And we know some ideas will never be treated the same because society heavily weighs against them. We don't need this non-existent pure neutrality to save us from gay marriage being treated poorly.

You seem to believe this idea of neutrality is needed to protect us. I say it does not exist and the means to protection is social pressure. If you lack social support to a sufficient degree then all else won't save you. I think that is realistic and the idea that trying to play at being neutral will protect us is fantasy

 

[The Lunatic]

Value being subjective does not mean you must treat it all the same. That is the same foolish notion that leads people to think that if you believe morality is subjective you can never support one moral position over another. It has the bizarre implied belief that all subjective things must be treated the same. It simply isn't so.

Its really quite clear when you stop playing games when arguing. You can make judgements on their value then act accordingly instead of hand-wringing over how value is subjective so how can you possibly not treat them the same. Because we are not forced to be impartial beings.

Of course morality is subjective, if morality wasn't subjective different cultural norms would not exist. Our entirely path as a species is built upon our acceptance of certain morals over others and how that has changed over time. To not accept that is really rather daft.

Unless you believe in some notion of a divine morality and all others are the influence of some omnipresent evil, it's simply impossible not to accept that morality is subjective.

Who are you exactly to say that your morality is "Better" than any other? It just occurs more to be a sense of self-importance than anything else to assume that one's own value is higher than others based on the morals they hold.

I'm no better than any other man, regardless of what his views are. I'm no more or less of a person than a person from the middle-east who believes in the Islamic way of life. Even if those beliefs are counter to a lot of the things I stand for.

The key is acceptance. Now, I imagine you think yourself quite an accepting human being, after all, you're entirely happy to accept homosexuals, people who identify as transgendered, racial minority and so on and so forth. However, if you don't accept people of different views, different opinions and creeds, then I really don't see how you're any more accepting than those who you seem to despise so much.

Certainly, you don't have to like everyone. You can be vehemently opposed to people. But, to imply that they are lesser people because your views are more "Pure" is just a completely harmful opinion to ever hold, and is certainly one I hope to see the end of.

 

[Silvanus]

Well, I didn't say deported. I was drawing a direct parallel to "You could just go to a different internet community" and "You could just move to a different country". As I said, that feels like a weak argument for why one should just suck it up in the face of a possible censorship issue.

Secondly, sure, it's really easy to justify some topics being shut down when they're rubbish. But this logic is universal. If a site were to shut down the discussion of minority rights, or police abuse, or other more serious issues that SHOULD be talked about, the same logic would apply.

The same logic, if taken to absurd extremes, yes. My objection to your reasoning was one of perspective: changing site is obviously a tiny, ikkle sacrifice compared to changing country.

I feel it's totally fair for people to look at a site shutting down discussions for whatever reason and think "I don't think that's OK". But anytime the subject of possible censorship comes up on these forums, a hail of people come in with the "it's not possible to censor if it's not a government" and the like and the conversation rapidly swirls the drain.

To be more specifically topical, I think the notion of removing subreddits that violate the no-harassment policies and their moderation refuses to correct it is a decent idea, but I'm not yet sure it'll be handled deftly. Like all moderation issues, a lot of it is left to personal discretion, so it boils to the whims of who holds the stick about how much to tolerate.

That's kind of unavoidable. There will always be room for interpretation by necessity; otherwise the owners and moderators could only really ban specific words or phrases, regardless of context.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

The argument I was presenting has nothing to do with people being a monolithic entity. If I am irritated it's because my mother language is not English and I'm tired, and you have no fucking idea how frustrating is, under this conditions, having to post at people who are doing their best to misunderstand the argument rather than get the general point that you are trying to make.

I'm genuinely not trying to be a dick. There are literally scores of people who hear "people" say one thing and then "people" say another, and then call out "people" for hypocrisy. Some of them post of this forum. I had no idea if you were one of them or not, it's not like we talk all the time. So I asked. I was snarky about asking, but I'm snarky about everything.

The general point that I am trying to make is that I predict that the reaction towards a corporation kicking people out of the "premises" is highly dependent on the popularity of said people. This is normal and it's the first reaction. But one has to think a bit further and realize that the arbitrary silencing that you like today could be applied to you tomorrow.

Sure, it could be. People are capable of gauging that risk for themselves. We've gone down this same road on these forums when we've discussed "censorship" in video games. We've changed this one thing here, what's to stop the industry from being a grey, personality-free wasteland tomorrow?

It's slippery sloping. A+B+C+D might = E, but that doesn't mean A = E. And the "problem" in this case is ultimately self-correcting. Reddit does not supply an essential service, it's a website. A useful/fun website perhaps, but it serves a pretty non-essential purpose. If it turns tyrannical and is blitzing freedoms left and right, it will lose popularity and ultimately cease to exist. My level of concern about these vaguely defined hypothetical future scenarios is, understandably I think, rather low.

It's something that the governments have done for long with, for example, denying rights to terrorists. At first it's OK, then the definition of terrorist sorta keeps expanding. And no, I am not comparing this situation to Guantánamo, it's a simile so you get a better idea on the sort of shit that can come from accepting unfair treatment for people you don't like. It's just short-sighted.

You can argue it's short sighted. Someone could just as easily argue that your perception of events is alarmist. Let's keep the scope of what occurred in perspective. Reddit still exists. There are still scores of utterly disgusting subs for people to express utterly disgusting thoughts in if that's what floats their boat. You can worry, but you've got people in here talking about Corporations owning everything and the imminent arrival of the end times, and I don't think it's excessively jaded to suggest it's all a little bit twee.

 

[The Lunatic]

I should be surprised that people can't seem to tell the difference between getting rid of a subreddit for violating site rules and kicking a gay person out for being gay. I want to be surprised that people can't do this. But, of course, I'm not, because that would require me having some sort of expectation of people on the internet to be able to reason such simple distinctions out themselves.

Tell you what, if the restaurant or amusement park kicked out everyone for kissing, you know, kind of like how a certain site has rules against harassing that it recently enforced a little, then there's no real issue. Granted, it's a dumb rule to bar kissing, but then this is a poor analogy, where dumb things tend to thrive.

So, you're saying that freedom of association only applies in regards to things you don't like?


That seems a very selfish way to go about dealing with things.

If not based on this, where exactly is the line?