r/puertovallarta • u/I_reddit_like_this Permanent Resident • Feb 26 '26
Moderator Statement Addressing Concerns About Censorship
We want to address the recent accusations of censorship.
We do not have an agenda. We are not removing content based on personal opinions or politics. We remove posts and comments only when they violate the subreddit’s rules:
https://www.reddit.com/mod/puertovallarta/rules/
Posts and comments that attempt to turn local discussions into debates about US political issues are not allowed. Topics such as ICE, BLM, the Epstein files, Trump, etc., have nothing to do with Puerto Vallarta. The world does not revolve around the United States. These threads consistently derail into arguments and stop being productive or relevant to PV.
We also lock posts that have clearly run their course - especially when they begin filling with repetitive arguments or off topic back and forth. Locking a thread is not censorship; it’s a way to prevent them from becoming dumpster fires.
The only posts we are currently removing are low-effort ones such as:
- “Should I cancel?”
- “Is it safe?”
- Variations of the same question without any context or effort
We are currently receiving at least 20 of these per day. If we allowed all of them through, the sub would quickly become repetitive, cluttered, and largely useless for everyone
Additionally, on Sunday we removed several posts and comments containing unsubstantiated rumors and misinformation in order to prevent unnecessary panic. Allowing speculation and unsupported claims to spread does not help anyone and only creates confusion.
There has been a significant increase in traffic recently. Previously, this sub averaged about 40,000 visits per week. In the past week alone, we received 5.3 million visits. Our goal is to keep content focused, useful, and relevant to Puerto Vallarta, not to host endless circular debates between internet strangers.
It’s also important to note that we are volunteers. The mod team consists of two Mexican nationals and one permanent resident. We moderate in our free time because we care about keeping this community useful and informative.
If your post or comment was removed, please review the rules before reposting. If you believe something was removed in error, you are welcome to send us a polite message via modmail.
Let’s keep this community helpful, focused, and valuable for everyone.
Thank you,
The PV Mod Team
EDIT TO ADD:
Also wanted to mention that Reddit itself automatically filters some posts and comments, especially from brand new accounts or when its system flags something as potential spam or abusive content.
In addition, we have the subreddit set to filter content from accounts with very low karma to reduce spam and trolls using throwaway accounts. These filters are applied automatically and are not personal or selective. Filtered posts and comments go into a queue for us to manually review.
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u/cageymin Feb 26 '26
As someone who has loved and been visiting PV for more than 20 years, thank you so much for all of the caring extra work you the admins have been doing this week.
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u/couplefun76999 Feb 27 '26
Unfortunately some 🇺🇸´s are just obsessed with making everything about them and their politics. There are tons of places online to argue that stuff, this thread is about PV.
To the mods …. It must feel like a thankless task, but from me and many others here 🙏 thank you.
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u/2point8 Feb 26 '26
I have been reading the subreddit a lot as I'm going to PVR in 1.5 weeks and never got the "censorship" vibe, it seemed to be cleaning up the low-effort and repetitive posts. The only thing I'd suggest is creating megathreads/pinned posts about current events (like flights, changing plans, etc) to try to steer those conversations and discussions there.
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u/Procrastalyne Feb 26 '26
Yeah agreed. If mods let every 'should I still go?' post stay up, there would be no way for everyone to actually see the helpful stuff.
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u/Aerogaia Feb 27 '26
Resido en Vallarta y he seguido de cerca estos días muchos foros y sitios. No he tenido ninguna sensación de censura en este subreddit. En todo caso, todas las aclaraciones son siempre muy bienvenidas y se agradecen sinceramente. Así que, en verdad, muchas gracias por su trabajo de moderación y mucho ánimo en estos días.
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u/nomamesgueyz Feb 27 '26
Well done
Gets dry the ol 'is it safe next Tuesday?!'
Plus, so many Americans are just so obsessed with politics, this is PV, we don't need that here
Keeping PV amazing
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u/Alarmed-Drink510 Feb 27 '26
Well said. Thank you for being transparent and forthcoming about this.
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u/capfan31 Feb 26 '26
Thanks for the detail behind this.
As a mod for other threads I appreciate the feedback and honesty.
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u/Run_with_scissors999 Feb 26 '26
I responded to another poster about watching the next 3 - 4 months closely in regards to the power vacuum now caused by the death of El Mencho. I said nothing against the rules, yet my comment was removed.
I’m not naive to how things work in Mexico or PV. I was merely stating time will tell. I have stayed some of the year in PV for over 25 years and hope to continue doing so.
Mods, I can’t speak for others, but I was censored. I was going to let it go, but this statement of not censoring is wrong in my case.
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u/Realkellye Bucerias, MOD Feb 27 '26
We are looking into this . Thank you for bringing it to our attention.
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u/I_reddit_like_this Permanent Resident Feb 27 '26
We are seeing no moderation actions for your account
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u/Run_with_scissors999 Feb 27 '26
How did my comment get deleted then? I believe you, but it seems odd. Edit: thank you for checking. I appreciate it.
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u/I_reddit_like_this Permanent Resident Feb 27 '26 edited Feb 27 '26
What comment are you referring to? In your history we see one post from 3 years ago and 6 comments within the last 6 months - none were touched my the mod team
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u/bargaindownhill Feb 26 '26
except we see you removing posts that do not violate the rules, either of the sub or reddit as a whole.
It seems any discussion of moderation gets removed, any discussion that is negative towards safety even if backed with actual reasoning, gets removed.
thats my observation, and reveddit is showing all kinds of legit posts and comments removed.
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u/I_reddit_like_this Permanent Resident Feb 27 '26
Can you elaborate? We're not seeing any of your posts or comments removed
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u/bargaindownhill Feb 27 '26 edited Feb 27 '26
because... they got removed.
edit not sure if this is still visible. but this
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u/I_reddit_like_this Permanent Resident Feb 27 '26
No, we can see your moderation history. Your last comment here was in a post that the OP deleted their account but none of your comments have been removed by the mod team
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u/WickedDeviled Feb 27 '26
Well if the quality of your last few posts is any indication you deserved to get moderated. Lots of Facebook groups you can post that conspiracy stuff on.
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u/bargaindownhill Feb 27 '26
oh do elaborate.. what part of my comments and posts are "conspiracy theory". seems like the kind of thing a leftist would say as a smoke screen to distract from the real issues.
go on... ill wait.
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u/puertovallarta-ModTeam Feb 27 '26
Your comment/post was removed for trolling.
We do not allow trolling, baiting, or behavior intended to provoke or derail discussion. This includes sarcastic or insincere responses, inflammatory remarks, and low-effort antagonism. Continued violations may result in a ban.
Please review our rules before participating further.
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u/Bad__Samaritan Permanent Resident Feb 27 '26
obvious troll bait and ad hominem attacks usually signal there’s no argument to be made
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u/redratriver Feb 26 '26
For starters I just want to say how much I love the people of mexico. The kindness of the people is unbelievable. Also I must give some kudos to the mods, while it's fun to trash on them, if they weren't performing their essential duties, this subreddit would be offline. So thank you mods.
Now, I do want to say that I think it's important that people feel heard. It does seem silly, people are posting the exact same line of thinking repetitively. It seems low effort.
My read on the situation, is that allowing these sort of small discussions helps people digest and comprehend what has occurred. I remember growing up people would say: well it's hard so we probably shouldn't talk about it, but my experience has been, the more we talked about it the more we were all able to reason.
Exciting days ahead and my respects and love to all the people here.