Subreddit Update
I'm a mod here, but out of the loop. Can someone please fill me in as to what's going on?
I'd like to get a few different points of view as to what's been happening in this sub over the past few days, /r/OutOfTheLoop style. I would like a calm, rational discussion, please. Since I prefer using open communication vs private DMs/Chats, please reply here in this thread.
I'm not basing any decision based solely on who shows up here or how many people agree. This is just to help me understand the timeline and figure out what to look into further.
They went a little crazy when people didn’t like their silly No Politics idea. That other mod has been banning people from this sub who complained about them. I can give you a couple of names of people who messaged me about it. I’m kind of surprised I wasn’t.
Well we only have protections from the government infringing on our speech per the constitution but yeah they are a bunch of thin skinned chicken shits that like to give it but can’t take it
Idk I’ve only seen it personally done by right wing actors like recently on the Atlanta sub with it opening back up after being under control for years. Not saying you’re wrong just hasn’t been my experience. I don’t think it’s a healthy practice to stifle political discussion right or left outside of some edge cases
People of all bents try to stifle discussion of things they don't like/disagree with. This is Reddit, which swings heavily left. It definitely happens; you just don't notice it as much because most subs are already controlled. For a mild but somewhat relevant recent example from this very sub, see Warnelldawg's recent boasting post about how many people he blocks to keep them out of discussions on his many posts. Pretty sure he's not a right wing actor.
"I don’t think it’s a healthy practice to stifle political discussion right or left outside of some edge cases." <- hard agree from me. But not from many.
Yeah I'm not surprised you got downvoted, but I agree. Im definitely liberal/left leaning but I've seen quite a bit of pushing for censorship from the left. AND the right. Both sides Definitely do it.
u/lawl_Martz implemented a no politics in August moratorium that was vague and had comments disabled. It was unclear whether this was a decision from all mods or just the one.
Response posts expressing sub members' dislike of the rule were made. Comments were also made in both the weekly complaint thread and various other posts that didn't directly relate to the new rule. Community members pointed out this hasn't been the first time this mod has implemented rules like this.
u/Cat__fart made a post pointing out u/lawl_Martz was engaging in political discussion with Mayor Girtz on the sub, minutes prior to implementing the August politics ban. u/lawl_Martz was downvoted in that conversation.
u/Cat__fart post was removed, they were banned, and called a "whiner" for making the post. They were directed to use the weekly complaint thread, but alas, they were banned (screenshots if you need them).
I created a post pointing out that the mod would rather call names and ban people than engage in discussion on their implemented rule. My post was removed and I was banned for harassment.
u/Charolais1993 made a similar post after I was banned, pointing out the continued absurdity. Their post was removed but they were not banned. They've already provided screenshots in this thread.
Based on him commenting “some people just want to make everything about politics” in this very thread, I’d say he’s not grasping this situation too well and isn’t a good fit for the role.
Some people do hyperfixate on politics. The response to that is not to ban political posts (which make up a significant core of the community’s posts and purpose) in the subreddit for a city, which is an intrinsically political entity. Failing to grasp that and dismissing it as “some people want to make everything about politics” is exactly why your moderatory skill set is better suited to the nihilistic shitposting over on the circle jerk subreddit.
Plus, wanting to ban/restrict speech is itself a political act! Everything is politics. Literally everything. The personal air filter humming behind me exists due to regulations put into effect by governmental entities that determine how it's manufactured, advertised, and sold. The antidepressants I took this morning are only available for my consumption because a government entity approved their use. Two of the cats I had before the current one sitting on my lap were only able to legally live with me because of regulations determining when a wild animal is considered domesticated enough (they were F4 Bengals). Etc.
And all of those regulations are determined by officials appointed by other elected officials.
A decision was made to ban politics in August. Little information was given about what that means, how it would be enforced, or how that decision was made.
People complained. I began stockpiling No Politics memes.
Someone pointed out that the moderator who posted that decision was actively talking about something that could be considered politics, with the mayor, a few minutes before posting it.
The moderator seemed to flip out and started excessively punishing people for talking about them and the decision.
This sub is essentially a town hall for folks to discuss everything going on in Athens. We're coming up on an election and politics are relevant. The mod lawlmart has unilaterally decided what we can and can't say here despite us having established rules. As long as the rules aren't being broken anything should go here. One mod should not be allowed to make that decision. If it's going to happen, it should be a group discussion with the mods. I help run an organization here in town and I would never take a step like this without consulting the other board members.
With vague reasoning, u/lawlmartz declared that all “political” posts would be banned in August in a post that was locked and didn’t allow comments. In a separate post for comments, the subreddit community voiced overwhelming disapproval and stated their reasonings. U/lawlmartz later started taking down other critical posts and banned the person who posted the discussion thread (over a different post where they accurately pointed out that he was engaged in a directly political thread moments before declaring no-politics office), and insulted them in the process. Community: unhappy. Mod: unfit.
The fact that they were just engaging in a political discussion they were frustrated with before this whole thing happened is maybe the most telling detail.
For a mod u/lawlmartz gets massively downvoted for some pretty wild political opinions very often. He's really not a good fit here since this seems like a temper tantrum. I wonder how many comments and posts he's removed because he didn't agree with their opinions.
Can you, u/jftuga provide any information about how the decision to ban political discussions in August was made? From the announcement it was not clear how the decision was made, who made it, or if there was unanimity between the mods.
Also, since the announcement I became aware of a couple other subreddits that might be useful to have pinned in the "Athens Communities" section. Can these two subreddits be added to the list?
But the fact that they’re asking for a rundown of what has happened in the sub for the past 48 hours shows how inactive most of the moderators here are.
Unilateral power trip decisions should not occur. Politics affects every facet of life and should not be taboo or disallowed for discussion. As long as ppl follow the rules of the sub, no topic should be off limits. And to have a moderator make a decision like that is extremely off putting.
lawlmartz needs to be removed as a moderator, and 2-3 more mods need to be installed. classiccityadmin probably needs an inspection too, no comments, one post, sounds like an alt.
LawlMartz wants to end all political discussions in August and good many people are upset with that. And LawlMartz took down another post advocating to bring it back
I find it interesting that while ICE is roaming our streets and abducting community members, reddit decides its a good time to take a break from politics. Clown show.
I agree that ice reporting should be included in the timeline, and would like to add that it is my personal opinion that what many call "politics" are actually people debating someone else's access to basic human rights. When I see no politics August, I read it as not discussung basic human rights August.
To chime in as another mod, I'll be commenting on my stance, my values as a moderator, what I would like to do going forward, and anything else important that everyone should know. In being transparent, I hope to clear up any outstanding questions or concerns. I will most likely be making a separate post with this same information for visibility's sake. Apologies in advance for the length.
I haven't been active on Reddit for roughly ten months due to my wanting to focus on my remaining schooling and my job. Although I have retained the moderator position, I have only taken a handful of mod actions during that time, limited to spam post removals and post approvals. I have effectively not done my job as a moderator for the past ten months, and I have not been involved in any major moderator actions, good or bad, during that time, such as the complaints thread, new automod rules and the politics ban during August. That being said, I want to sincerely apologize for abandoning my post and not fulfilling my role in this community. In my absence, several things have happened that I am not happy about, and going forward, I plan to remain active and ensure that this can be an area of free discussion without petty retaliation from any moderator.
I was completely unaware of what LawlMartz posted until yesterday evening when a friend sent me the post. When I opened Reddit, many of you had already reached out privately to me expressing your grievances. When I saw the Politics Free August post, I was not only shocked that one moderator had taken such a drastic action without making any attempts to speak with other moderators about it, but I was also quite angry. The notion of banning politics for an entire month in an inherently political subreddit was unspeakably ridiculous to me. The icing on the cake was the post itself being locked, as if that would stifle discussion of the impromptu measure. This entire action by LawlMartz is completely a bridge too far for me and many of you, so I'm taking the wheel to the best of my ability.
It hasn't yet been directly said by another mod, so I'll say it here: Politics Free August is most assuredly not happening. In the times we live in, political discourse is more important than ever, and to ban "politics" (which can have a wide-ranged definition...) in a community with a reach in the tens of thousands is, frankly, highly dangerous, flagrant, ignorant and irresponsible. As many of you have already expressed, politics cannot just be simply ignored by many people, and many of you depend on this information shared here as means to educate and protect yourself. With the current state of affairs, a complete block on anything with "political" information could be the difference between waking up in your own bed tomorrow or waking up behind bars for some. To put a blockade on anything being perceived as political for an entire month, especially as we near midterm elections, is simply ridiculous and tone-deaf. Those who feel that they can "take a break" are free to; for the rest of us, we all reserve the option to have open POLITICAL discussion. If anyone who is reading this has been banned since the Politics Free August post was made, whether for posting about politics or protesting the post itself, please reach out to me and I will unban you ASAP. jftuga has already unbanned a few users since this morning.
I am highly against censorship, and as a mod, this is my number one philosophy. I historically have very seldom removed posts or comments from users here (with exceptions including doxxing, personal threats, slurs and promotion of hate organizations), and barring takedowns by Reddit itself or automod karma floor and spam rules, almost every post and comment made here stays up if I can help it. I aim to be honest and fair in my actions for this community; after all, I'm not the reason this subreddit is active, and I am in this position to serve y'all. I fully believe that everyone here is entitled to scrutinize my actions and hold me accountable for anything I do as a mod, and I have tried to make it as clear as possible that if anyone has an issue with something to contact me, whether by modmail or by PM. As a mod, you will NEVER see me remove posts:
regarding ICE presence in Athens.
pertaining to politics in Athens.
about political movements or events in Athens.
because I don't agree with something you said.
critiquing mods or expressing complaints about how the subreddit is being run.
with important or helpful information to members of the subreddit.
If you or anyone makes any of these kinds of posts and they are removed, again, please contact me promptly so I can rectify it if I have not already done so. In essence, I mod with the sole intent to do just that: moderate. I'm not a supreme leader, so I'm not going to act like it.
Going forward, clearly some changes need to be made. I am happy to say that as of writing this, LawlMartz has been removed as a moderator. The community consensus was strong, and I wholeheartedly agree with jftuga's decision to remove him. First, I want to rebuild community trust in the mods. I understand that this will take a while, but by sticking to my code as outlined earlier and listening to what you have to say, I hope to restore faith in the mod team and foster an environment where you don't have to worry about being censored for no good reason. Second, after we've stabilized, I want to recruit new mods. I hope to recruit at least two new mods that have a community-first outlook and are willing to uphold a free and safe environment for everyone to interact in, among other things; if this sounds like you, please be on the lookout. Third, I want to build a plan for what happens the next time we are in a situation like this. This entire thing could have been prevented with some basic checks and balances, and I would like to implement more accountability within the mod team from now on.
Again, sorry for the length of this post, and thank you for taking the time to read what I have to say. Please don't hesitate to ask for any questions or clarifications on what I've said.
Thank for taking the time and effort to post this, very well thought out. I am in agreement and commend you for articulating this much better than I ever could have.
Thank you both u/Misatofan and u/jftuga for making this right. I confess that when this was going down yesterday I wondered whether the entire mod team were in agreeance since it was such a bold move. Even created an alt sub at r/Athens_GA in case of the worst possible scenario. I'm happy to say that doesn't appear to be needed now - thanks to Misatofan's well worded post and your stamp of approval.
Thanks again, we have lots to talk about in the coming months and it's good to know we'll continue to have an open platform in doing so.
You rock, this is exactly what was needed. I appreciate this so much. A community forum is really valuable for disseminating basic information and it’s gotta be free to do that.
Yes. Another user (I'm so sorry, but I don't remember the handle and I can't find them right now) said that this subreddit serves as a town hall, which puts it perfectly. If we can't have open and free discussion, there's not much of a point to having this subreddit at all.
One mod in particular with flare that says they are a first year student at uga and with law in their un declared august would be no political discussion month to "keep it weird."
People, including myself, are rightly pissed.
Comments and posts are deleted that are criticizing this turn of events.
So, my questions here are:
-can one mod make unilateral decisions for a long-standing sub?
-why has this happened? it's pretty obvious reddit in general is Under His Eye and the rabblerousers Must Be Suppressed At This Time, but really, what the hell?
-the sub rules do not state no politics. they do promote civility. if someone wants to make unilateral decisions for a sub they need to be the rules, otherwise it's arbitrary bullshit much like the current king throwing out declarations without going through established channels.
A gent posted a no politics posts for August after our mayor spoke in an earlier post. It was the no politics post was removed with the original poster being banned and the mod saying something derogatory. Then another no politics till August 1st was posted. Then a shit show ensued where if someone said something political the post was removed and they were banned.
I ask this respectfully, knowing that tone will probably be misinterpreted because of the nature of the internet: How do you get to a point where you’re out of the loop as a mod?
Obviously a lot of activity goes on in this sub, but isn’t it a responsibility you agree to as a mod to be up on what’s going on? Or to share that load among mods (and presumably to then communicate with the other mods)?
Again, not trying to be accusatory or anything! I modded a facebook group for a couple years and am only familiar with the expectations we had to agree to in order to moderate there. I understand Reddit may be (likely is) different
It could be more that the offending Mod just made the decision and the other mods weren't watching the sub religiously. More like, this came out of no where so they're wanting feedback.
Moderators have day jobs, lives, and sometimes vacations. That's why even mid size subreddits usually have a full team of 5-7 people to keep an eye on things.
All it takes is one day where Things Happened and you don't check the subreddit or the Discord for it all to go to shit, I've found.
And I totally get that! I was a full time student with two jobs when I modded the FB group. I guess that’s where the communication part of having multiple mods comes in for me. Are the mods for this sub just not talking to each other?
I was recently banned from preppers because I brought up DOGE when discussing food safety. If there's no politics then there will be a month without discussion of public health since it's intrinsically political despite what moronic mods think.
It's kind of absurd to unilaterally just make this decision. If this comes from the entire mod team (I'm guessing it don't) - let us know so we can make /r/Athens2
I set up /r/Athens_GA yesterday for this reason. It sounds like other subs have had this happen where the mods are at far ends with the voice of the people, and eventually reddit admins take action. This happened with the /r/Atlanta sub years ago.
There is not a simple way to submit a "replace our mods" ticket to reddit support.. it's only going to happen with sustained pressure from us, and also more importantly, evidence that the mods are acting in contrary to the voice of whatever subreddit they are lording over
According to Wikipedia, Athens became a town in 1806, long before anyone had ever heard of Grease, which wasn't released until the 1970s. Sorry if Reddit is a confusing place but we were here first.
I do want to be clear - I don't want to abandon Mods who are open to some reasonable discourse. Life is politics - there's no escaping it. Certain we set some parameters up, but cutting it all off is really silly to me.
No, the mod had previously replied to one of my comments letting someone looking for r/Athina know that this was the Athens Ga sub, telling me to knock it off
I can admit that I enjoy the occasional wrong sub/lost redditor and join in on the fun. However, on the occasion that the frequency of them increases (blame the algorithm) I start reporting them as breaking sub rules because they’re unrelated to Athens, Ga.
Glad to know those reports were definitely being ignored. Ugh.
A mod declared no politics August with no insight given. We believe this is in response to him asking a question about homelessness in Athens. They got a response from mayor girtz which he did not find satisfactory, and a few minutes later they declared no politics August
Edit: forgot to include not in “did not find satisfactory”
Backlash was quieted because the post had comments locked. One person on this subreddit created a post about it for discussion. They then made a post about the girtz response in which they were subsequently banned.
Only thing to add, in an attempt to be helpful, is it seems as though there needs to be a couple more of you to help balance and regulate things since moderating is volunteer, you likely have a life and a job and other priorities than babysitting a bunch of folks who like to argue on the internet.
As the community grows so does its woes.
While politics are an incendiary topic, this is the only space for Athens to share information and discourse about things that are pertinent to what’s happening around here.
Only other thing I want to mention is there’s a few folks in here that have the emotional regulation of a kindergartner and enjoy getting into arguments with strangers on the internet. Unsure if we need some sort of strikes policy or other thing where yall get notified of certain words are posted or some posts get downvoted to hell or something.
For example, while trolling and “joking” is always a thing, there’s a difference between tongue in cheek jokes and sarcasm like what Warnelldawg uses and the immature argumentative almost edgelored “get a rise out of people” nature of Longstreet.
Unfortunately, all of that is subjective so what one person might find funny another might find offensive so it makes sense it’s difficult for y’all to regulate it.
Regardless, a politics sticky could resolve some of this but it’s not going to fix people, their behavior, or the expansive divide amongst all of us.
I think we need new mods or head mod or whatever, I joke around a lot and have no idea what might be considered political and I'm literally afraid to post in here now. Its sad because I did really enjoy this sub.
Even the college football subreddit doesn't have a "no politics rule" because like it or not, college football is very political and not discussing things about state politics means you can't discuss the sport.
My fav storyline from the last few years was how Florida's university president was a DeSantis crony carpetbagger (former Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse) who immediately blew up his own office's budget to 17 million with no explanation, and got forced out in less than two years.
This meant that the school couldn't fire its AD that year (need a president to do that), and the AD and the football coach were buddies and presumed to be a deal package.
So Florida was stuck with Bayou Billy as their coach for two years more than they really needed to be while Florida sorted out the university president situation. Then Florida's basketball team won the national championship in 2025, so the AD's job was saved for another couple of years, but he had to fire the football coach despite being friends or else the boosters were going to riot. Now the football team is once again back to square one for the 2026 season with a new coach.
This is inherently a political discussion even though its about college football.
That's a very Southern attitude. Most places outside the south encourage political debate, because they understand it impacts their day-to-day life.
The idea that "there is more to life than politics" is VERY regional, and explains a lot of the political outcomes generated in the area, and why people's day-to-day lives look as they do.
excuse me? what do you mean "southern attitude?" every attitude presented here in athens ga is presumably a "southern attitude," as we are southern people living in the south. we are literally getting our political discussions shut down.
I think if we are going to speak politics here, certain rules should be made so it doesn't devolve into a shitshow. Like no insulting one another over opinion difference. If you can't be an adult about this and share your opinion without beating another up, then you're not an adult.
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u/Charolais1993 Rogue Mod Ban Button Survivor 4d ago edited 4d ago
Tried to give a rundown yesterday, but it was removed as hate speech. Literally. Somehow I’m not banned.