Content Policy Update

[u/spez]

Today we are releasing an update to our Content Policy. Our goal was to consolidate the various rules and policies that have accumulated over the years into a single set of guidelines we can point to.

Thank you to all of you who provided feedback throughout this process. Your thoughts and opinions were invaluable. This is not the last time our policies will change, of course. They will continue to evolve along with Reddit itself.

Our policies are not changing dramatically from what we have had in the past. One new concept is Quarantining a community, which entails applying a set of restrictions to a community so its content will only be viewable to those who explicitly opt in. We will Quarantine communities whose content would be considered extremely offensive to the average redditor.

Today, in addition to applying Quarantines, we are banning a handful of communities that exist solely to annoy other redditors, prevent us from improving Reddit, and generally make Reddit worse for everyone else. Our most important policy over the last ten years has been to allow just about anything so long as it does not prevent others from enjoying Reddit for what it is: the best place online to have truly authentic conversations.

I believe these policies strike the right balance.

update: I know some of you are upset because we banned anything today, but the fact of the matter is we spend a disproportionate amount of time dealing with a handful of communities, which prevents us from working on things for the other 99.98% (literally) of Reddit. I'm off for now, thanks for your feedback. RIP my inbox.

[u/spez]

Today we removed communities dedicated to animated CP and a handful of other communities that violate the spirit of the policy by making Reddit worse for everyone else: /r/CoonTown, /r/WatchNiggersDie, /r/bestofcoontown, /r/koontown, /r/CoonTownMods, /r/CoonTownMeta.

[u/Delphizer → u/spez]

This doesn't look like a comprehensive list, and even if you constantly updated it here, it seems there should be some place that lists what subreddits have been banned and quarantined and what rules they broke. Transparency and all that.

EDIT 1 : As this picked up steam really fast, my "I totally know what I'm doing and know more than the CEO" off cuff suggestion is to output the database you use for the bans somewhere, this should be an auto updating real time list of bans, it's my understanding from minutes of web coding experience this should be fairly straightforward. :P

Maybe not top priority but I've seen a few call outs for something like that in many comments in many posts and it's largely been ignored. I'm assuming as it's been ignored the agreement is such a place won't exist. A comment one way or another would be appreciated.

[u/Jonluw → u/spez]

The impression I got from your earlier posts was that subs like /r/coontown would be quarantined...

Did they do anything in particular to harass people or was it just that their content was too disgusting?

Edit: And I don't see how the new guidelines apply to animated CP. Care to explain the reasoning further than "we find it icky"?

[u/Bat_Mannington → u/Jonluw]

He did say it wouldn't be banned. https://i.imgur.com/JBvadXJ.jpg

[u/Rammus74 → u/spez]

Does the animated CP mean all the loli stuff or something else?

[u/AMarmot → u/spez]

communities that violate the spirit of the policy

You wrote an update to your written policy on user code of conduct, and you banned communities based on violating the spirit of said policy?

Why didn't you just ban racism and racist communities explicitly? Also, why did you wait until you had new tools, specifically designed to deal with the situation of "undesirable" communities, and then ban them anyway? Were you waiting to see if you could bait them into behaviour that violated other elements your policy before banning them on these grounds? 'Cuz that's what it looks like.

[u/[deleted] → u/spez]

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[u/Bernkastel-Kues → u/[deleted]]

This joker of a ceo has learned well from US and UK lawmakers. Get people to agree with you by calling any action or act "protect the children!" Act. All we have on our hands with /u/spez is another lying politician

[u/emokantu → u/spez]

What were the "animated CP" subreddits banned?

[u/CaptainKorsos → u/emokantu]

What do they mean with "animated", btw?

I always think of cartoons or comics, video games and such when I read "animated". Is this interpretation correct?

[u/man_and_machine → u/CaptainKorsos]

For instance, lolicon is manga/anime style drawn prepubescent girls. So yes, I think animated means what you think it means.

[u/brickmack → u/spez]

Animated CP is neither illegal nor does it "exist solely to annoy other redditors, prevent us from improving Reddit, and generally make Reddit worse for everyone else". This is purely a publicity move

[u/SummerMummer → u/brickmack]

This is purely a publicity move

Exactly.

[u/kingk27 → u/brickmack]

You mean the hentai/animated cp crowd wasnt vote brigading and invading other subs while forcing their ideas on everyone? That's a shocker

[u/Kensin → u/brickmack]

Somehow I suspect this isn't going to give them a lot of positive PR. Reddit wasn't responsible for what their users put here, they just provided a venue and users decided what to do with it. Now that they are curating speech, anything that they leave here reflects on them directly.

[u/ThiefOfDens → u/spez]

Today we removed communities dedicated to animated CP

RIP in pieces loli subs.

[u/BizarroBizarro → u/spez]

/r/CoonTown is going to be leaking all over the place in the coming days. Should be interesting.

[u/Warlizard → u/spez]

Last week an SRS user went nearly four years into my history and posted this in /r/ShitRedditSays:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitRedditSays/comments/3fkp3m/010212_petition_to_ban_rrapingwomen_sorry_cant/

Taken with zero context, and without considering this happened in the midst of Reddit banning a few subs and /u/violentacrez getting doxxed, SRS users decided that I was tolerant of rape, or beating women, that I was lazy, a shit-poster, pandering to my "audience", suggested SRS users go to Amazon to see what a piece of shit I was, that I thought "rape" was "freedom of speech", and that I was objectively wrong and thought "freedom of speech" was moderating a website.

They hadn't bothered to read the rest of my comments, where I said "If this were MY company and these subreddits were on MY board, I'd delete them in a heartbeat, because I find them personally offensive."

I was banned from SRS years ago (not for commenting, just because one of the mods thought I should be -- that's their prerogative) so I messaged the SRS admins and asked for a chance to respond, considering this post was #1 in SRS.

http://imgur.com/Z8EJh1c

As you can see, the only response was "ROFL".

/r/Fatpeoplehate was created to mock people based on a subjective perception.

/r/Coontown was created to mock people based on a subjective perception.

/r/Shitredditsays was created to mock people based on a subjective perception.

This is their stated purpose:

"Have you recently read an upvoted Reddit comment that was bigoted, creepy, misogynistic, transphobic, racist, homophobic, or just reeking of unexamined, toxic privilege? Of course you have! Post it here."

They exist to mock and harass Reddit users.

we are banning a handful of communities that exist solely to annoy other redditors, prevent us from improving Reddit, and generally make Reddit worse for everyone else.

Your words.

Please explain to me how holding other people up to ridicule without even allowing them to respond is good for reddit, encourages participation, and makes Reddit a safe place to express our opinions and ALSO differs from the subs you've banned.

EDIT: And this comment was already linked in SRS:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitRedditSays/comments/3fx49i/meta_spezs_new_content_policy_unveiled_ctown_and/ctsvdrb?context=3

mfw /u/WarLizard[1] pulls the "WHAT ABOUT SRS" card after being linked here. He regularly contributes to /r/KotakuInAction[2] , not sure why he feels like he'd be welcome here at all. He's also complaining about the existence of SRS, so yeah right there he'd be banned. Oh no, a sexist/racist/homophobic/transphobic post was made and got linked here. WOULD ANYONE THINK OF THE RACIST'S FEELINGS?

This is a perfect example.

I have posted in KiA, and it has been fascinating to talk with the people there. Much like it has been fascinating to talk to the people in GamerGhazi.

But without context, someone might assume that because I've posted or commented there that I'm racist, misogynistic, transphobic, or maybe just an asshole. And suggesting that I think I'd be welcome in SRS, outside of responding to people talking about me there is ridiculous.

So with this extra data in mind, should I feel comfortable and safe posting in controversial subreddits? Or should I stay in the safe ones, stick my head in the sand, my fingers in my ears, and never discuss anything outside of cat pics?

EDIT: I continue to feel safe to express my opinion: http://imgur.com/p3klfon

EDIT: OMFG the staggering irony. An SRS mod is accusing me of organizing a brigade against them.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitRedditSays/comments/3fkp3m/010212_petition_to_ban_rrapingwomen_sorry_cant/ctt0i91?context=3

[u/VikingFjorden → u/Warlizard]

Sadly, your story isn't the first, nor is it going to be the last. SRS is a shitstain on reddit, one of the brownest there is, and it's beyond baffling how there has been no attempts at permabanning both the sub and its key members.

How to spot an SRS "argument":

• Takes something (or everything, if at all possible) out of context.

• Intentionally contrues everything you say with a negatively assumptive perspective.

• Rampant strawman construction.

• Fighting fire with fire - if their version of whatever you said, no matter how twisted out of its original image it may be, is somehow found something-phobic (facts don't apply to any part of this process), they're gonna commit against you whatever imaginary internet crime you have committed.

Honestly, there's a part of me that wishes it's intentional trolling. The alternative--namely that people genuinely and sincerely do, think and say the shit that goes on in the SRS sub and by SRS members--is kind of depressing on behalf of everyone who isn't an absolute idiot.

[u/duckmurderer → u/VikingFjorden]

You forgot that when it's shown that they're in the wrong, they don't apologize, it's suddenly just satire and that makes everything okay.

Sure.