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Reddit is changing. It's currently in a renewed and stronger Eternal September. Bastion subreddits like /r/AskScience and /r/Truereddit are reduced to junk and

• neutronicus 15y ago
  /r/ShitRedditSays is entirely sincere. I've been reading it for a while, and they mean what they say.
  • Locke1689 15y ago
    This is 100% true. However, they are primarily concerned about the content for the content's sake (as you can see from their ban policy). Reddit is not concerned about the content, only the legal liability associated with the content (otherwise a whole bunch of other subreddits would be on the chopping block).
    • neutronicus 15y ago
      Yeah, I just wanted to dispel the idea that they're trolls faking a sense of outrage just for the opportunity to kick Reddit's sand castle.
  • bragh 15y ago
    The community which had 'we cum when we kill men' as their slogan for a good while? Really?
• deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
• showerst 15y ago
  Remember, slippery slope is a fallacy. I think the admins are sending the right message - This subject is blanket banned because it's too hard to sort out the shades of gray, and it brings a unique risk to the community that other things (drugs, racism, etc) just don't. I agree that they'll be playing 'ban the sub' whack a mole, but that will happen to any UGC site of scale, the important thing is (ironically) not to let a community coalesce around the subject that's big enough to get reddit targeted by the media or some zealous prosecutor trying to score political points (See craiglist's adult section...) It would be nice to see them lay down some firm rules that say "OK: These things are blanket banned, these things are fair game just don't break US laws; these things are open season". It would be doable to segregate Jailbait / Trees / Atheism along those lines and remove some fears. * Edited for grammar, typos, wording of first sentence.
  • kijin 15y ago
    > a false fallacy The philosophy degree in me screams that there's something wrong with that phrase.
    • showerst 15y ago
      That's what I learned it as years ago, in hindsight it is an odd phrase. Wiki calls them 'Conditional or questionable fallacies', which is a bit less punchy. Do you have a better name?
      • kijin 15y ago
        Just "fallacy".
  • FJim 15y ago
    http://theoatmeal.com/comics/semicolon http://theoatmeal.com/comics/semicolon
  • learc83 15y ago
    >Remember, slippery slope is a fallacy. Not arguing with you on the merits of the OPs argument, but a slippery slope argument is not necessarily a fallacy. It's only a fallacy if one doesn't logically connect the first event with each subsequent event in the chain. You can check wikipedia if you'd like some examples of fallacious and non-fallacious slippery slope arguments.
• blhack 15y ago
  Oh for crying out loud... The stuff that was allowed on reddit would get you an instant, permanent ban on pretty much every website on the internet. Do you even know what SOPA, PIPA or ACTA do? Reddit has voluntarily taken the stance they won't allow the trade and index of child pornography on their website. That has got nothing to do with DNS takedowns for linking to copyrighted material. It was a private decision made by a private company. And good. The idea that people would support the exploitation of children because they have somehow wrapped it up inside of "free speech" is completely disgusting and embarrassing. Yes, you have the right to free speech, so long as it does not infringe on the liberties of others.
  • Anderkent 15y ago
    He mentioned SOPA PIPA and ACTA because somethingawfuls stance of these reflects its general trustworthiness. No one argues that illegal content should not be removed, and uploaders banned. Which was already being done. Child pornography was never allowed on reddit, and was removed as it was reported. This is not preventing 'exploitation of children', it's just a majority censoring topics it finds inconvenient/disturbing.
    • blhack 15y ago
      >This is not preventing 'exploitation of children' It's preventing the trade of child pornography. How on earth do you not see this as exploitative? >It's weird how reddit was a bastion for resisting SOPA/ACTA but fear mongering in US can take over a site. That has nothing to do with SA.
      • Anderkent 15y ago
        >It's preventing the trade of child pornography. How on earth do you not see this as exploitative? Production of child pornography is exploitative for sure. Trade? Not really, but I accept it should be illegal because it provides incentive for production. However this is not about explicit child pornography, which was never allowed on reddit and was being removed as soon as someone noticed it. Nothing changed there - it will still be banned as soon as someone will notice it. No gain from the change of stance. What has changed, however, is the banning of content that is not illegal, but that some people find disgusting/creepy.
• kijin 15y ago
  Exchanging child pornography is illegal in the United States (as well as in many other countries). There's nothing unreasonable about stating in your TOS that you can't have a subreddit the very existence of which breaks the law. Sure, people can try to reopen these subreddits under different names, but once the rule is in the TOS, they can be reported on and shut down as a matter of routine. The same applies to warez. Like it or not, you can't operate in the U.S. while allowing your users to post links to warez. /r/trees is not the same, and I hate slippery-slope arguments predicting its demise. Exchanging actual marijuana is illegal in many parts of the United States. Exchanging information about marijuana is not. You could download kiddie porn on /r/jailbait, and the fact that those images are actually hosted on imgur is unlikely to convince any court. But you wouldn't download marijuana on /r/trees, would you? If /r/trees or /r/atheism ever gets banned, it will be the result of a completely different kind of pressure. It won't be a straightforward extension of reddit's current policy on kiddie porn. Reddit may or may not be dying, but its latest change of policy on kiddie porn will probably have little to do with its fate.
  • alecco 15y ago
    What are you talking about? Reddit had a very strong stance aginst CP already. And there's a lot of rules broken on /r/trees so it's far from safe. Like meetups to exchange or people giving tips. That's not legal in US and happens quite often there. Same with /r/atheism, a lot of their content can be labeled hate speech under US law. (IANAL)
    • tptacek 15y ago
      There's no such thing as "hate speech" under US law. You can, for instance, proudly march down the streets of Skokie in Klan regalia bellowing about the need to "exterminate the Jews", safe in the knowledge that the First Amendment implications of doing so have already been litigated. There are (dubiously) "hate crime" laws, but they pertain to violent crime. In a similar vein, I'm not so sure about your legal analysis about "arranging meetups" and "providing tips" on marijuana forums. The reason mj forums don't want people arranging meetups probably has more to do with not creating an easy venue for sting operations. (Disclosure: it's sad it took Reddit this long to apply this rule, and more than a little repulsive to see people up in arms about it.)
• Fukkireta 15y ago
  You can't use a slippery slope argument that begins with child pornography in this situation without supporting child pornography. I'm not saying this to try and discredit your argument by association, it's simply a consequence of trying to hold freedom of speech so utterly sacrosanct that you can't breach it under any circumstances. Yes, it would be easier to not take a stance on things like this, because then we could argue from the superior position of "I've never censored anything (well except posting personal information...)," but that would make us complicit in the trading of child pornography. So, instead, I say we accept that we now have the harder job of drawing lines and judging what is and not allowable. Accept that the harder thing is to go "I am against SOPA/ACTA in all its forms, but am against being complicit against the trade of child pornography and will ~censor~ it if necessary" because life isn't about black and whites, and sometimes we have to make compromises for the greater good. (EDIT: spelling, grammar)
  • Anderkent 15y ago
    But you can use a slippery slope argument that begins with 'you can post whatever is legally allowed', and trends towards 'you cannot post anything that the majority finds disturbing'. Which is what is happening here - no one argues for allowing already illegal content.
  • alecco 15y ago
    I'm not saying you hate your mother, but...
    • Fukkireta 15y ago
      I posted my qualifier not because I thought it absolved me of the associations (it doesn't, the first paragraph 'poisoned the well' so to speak, there was little I could do about it without choose not to discuss it); I did it in an attempt to show I was making the argument in good faith. I don't think I was very successful however.
      • alecco 15y ago
        Public forums are getting overrun by people like you. You are very disingenuous and doing false accusations. It's like reverse cognitive-dissonance. Reason is lost with you. Goodbye.
• owenmarshall 15y ago
  As plenty of people have said plenty of other places, there's a huge difference between illegal content and distasteful but protected speech. Further, the legal definition for child pornography is, in many cases, not what people expect. The EFF has a primer that touches on this: https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/adult https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/adult If reddit begins cracking down on protected speech like you'd find in /r/trees and /r/atheism, you've got a point. But when reddit (finally) decides to crack down on something that is plainly not legal speech, you're fear mongering with the best of them.
  • squirrels 15y ago
    You're right, there is a huge difference between between illegal content and distasteful but protected speech. Yet you seem to be lumping them together in your post... Inside your link it says, for something to be considered "obscene": >The Miller test stems from Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15 (1973), in which the US Supreme Court held that material is obscene if each of the following factors is satisfied: >1) Whether the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest; >2) Whether the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable law; >3) Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. So, by law ALL THREE of the "obscene" criteria have to be met for it to be considered obscene. I want to focus in on #2, because I don't think pictures of children in bathing suits is sexual in nature. If it were, then taking your children out in public wearing said bathing suit would be illegal too... Now, people looking at those pictures may be sexualizing these images in the head, but the images themselves break no laws and show no nudity. So why exactly is reddit drawing the line there? Also, why is Toddlers in Tiaras fine? (there's a subreddit for that too). I don't understand what makes it so different to you (and to reddit admins). I kept reading and further down in your link it says: >Child pornography is any visual depiction, where "(A) the producing of such visual depiction involves the use of a minor [under 18] engaging in sexually explicit conduct; and (B) such visual depiction is of such conduct." 18 U.S.C. § 2252 The law prohibits knowingly possessing or transmitting (including by computer) child pornography. I'm positive that children in swimsuits does not constitute being sexually explicit, so I'm still not getting why you are considering it illegal... Finally, you say >when reddit (finally) decides to crack down on something that is plainly not legal speech Yet, based on the legal definition that you provided these subreddits, for the most part, are participating in legal, albeit creepy, speech. Anything illegal has been removed and delt with according to law. Not sure who the real fear monger is here, but calling pictures of children in bathing suits "not legal speech" is disingenuous at best.
• JonnieCache 15y ago
  > Bastion subreddits like /r/AskScience and /r/Truereddit are reduced to junk and fads. Check out http://www.reddit.com/r/depthhub http://www.reddit.com/r/depthhub where they take a different approach: it's a meta-reddit where they link high-quality discussions from the various niche subject-specific reddits. A random example that's on there right now: /r/ludology discusses the tension between plot and choice in games.
  • alecco 15y ago
    Sure, but for how long?
• ugh 15y ago
  Shit Reddit Says is pretty awesome and definitely on the right side of history. It’s not hard, it’s pretty simple.
  • scanr 15y ago
    Hi Ugh. How do you reconcile your view that this is a simple issue with the fact that it seems to be resulting in a large amount of discussion with a wide variety of views represented, some of which are diametrically opposed. I would contend that the evidence suggests that this is not a simple issue.
    • ugh 15y ago
      I don’t know. Weirdos scream the loudest, probably.
  • Locke1689 15y ago
    They're really not. They're for banning these subreddits because they don't like their content, not because they may represent a legal threat. They, at best, misunderstand the issue at hand.
  • neutronicus 15y ago
    I gotta say I agree with this. I mean, I've got my misgivings about SRS, but they did a pretty damn good job getting those subreddits shut down.
  • spindritf 15y ago
    Chasing (mostly) attempts at comedy that disagree with your sensibilities may be a fun pastime (seriously) but it has absolutely no part in any sort of struggle for moral improvement if such process is even taking place.
• iskander 15y ago
  There's a lot of dissonance between: > It's currently in a renewed and stronger Eternal September. >The top voted comments on threads about censorship are mostly 1 to 3 months old users. and >Sure, a lot of questionable/creepy subreddits shouldn't be there. But where's the line? And who draws it? The way to deal with a dilution of community quality is communicate and enforce stricter standards. Ban more stuff. Not because of a moral panic, but because the trolls, spammers, pornographers, etc.. can trash your site with force disproportionate to their numbers. You can't fight Eternal September unless you lay down some serious boundaries.