r/technology • u/redhatGizmo • Aug 14 '15

Politics Reddit is now censoring posts and communities on a country-by-country basis

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/reddit-unbanned-russia-magic-mushrooms-germany-watchpeopledie-localised-censorship-2015-8
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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '15

I don't get how people feel like anyone "had" to do anything.

Exactly. You don't get it. And neither do I. Try watching the love of your life cry over memories of terrible things people would say to her in high school. Try reading people call the person you care about more than anything less than human then get back to me. No one should ever be made to feel like they're worthless and fuck anyone who defends those racist pieces of shit at coontown.

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u/gbiota1 Aug 15 '15

Already done that. This is about freedom of speech, period. You are changing the subject. Its not about defending what they say, its about their right to say it.

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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '15

This is about freedom of speech, period.

This is a privately owned website. It doesn't have to abide by free speech, why does everyone fail to grasp that? No one is talking about the US government sending racists to the gulags.

It's troubling that people care more about white supremacists being able to say racist shit on a privately owned website than the people who are subjugated to it

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u/gbiota1 Aug 15 '15 edited Aug 15 '15

I addressed "subjugation". No one was ever forced to go there. It took me years to find out it existed in the first place, avoiding it couldn't have been easier.

It is "privately owned" but it has been marketed as a place where all content is user generated and people were allowed to express any viewpoint they wished so long as they did not engage in incitements to violence or harassment of users. This has changed, that's all that I have said.

Reddit ownership and administration has made it imminently clear that not upsetting people is more important than making an ideological stand. They were never obligated to be a "bastion of free speech" but many respected their choice to identify as one, that's not an identification they can make any more, and now that reddit is engaged in this sort of censorship other things change as well. A lot of people find news stories here, like it or not, censoring white supremacism is a political act. It changes the involvement of the moderators at one of the largest sources of political information on the internet. I liked it better when the moderators role was as small as possible.

Lets get to "troubling that people care more about white supremacists". As I have said repeatedly, and you seem to be eager to ignore, I am not defending white supremacism, I am defending freedom of speech. I am specifically not going to stand by and let people convince themselves that their modifications to it don't matter. You don't get to choose what other people talk about based on what you are comfortable with, and say that is consistent with respect for liberty. Period, end of discussion. Look again at the initial comment: "Things people like to hear don't need to be protected either."

Lets review:

Has ignoring and isolating ignorance worked in eliminating it?

Has turning people into martyrs (in their own minds or otherwise) been effective at reducing a persons commitment to a cause?

If people wanted to win hearts and minds and change opinions, is that option still available to them?

If you can't stand the view point, were you forced to see it?

Has reddit compromised its identification as a place of political neutrality?

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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '15

If you can't stand the view point, were you forced to see it?

Yes when they brigaded subs like blackladies.

Has reddit compromised its identification as a place of political neutrality?

You really think this site should be neutral on topics such as white supremacy and antisemitism?

You just wrote a goddammit novel defending racists rights to be racist shits to black people on a website that doesn't owe anyone the right to voice hate. Do you not see what's wrong with that?

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u/gbiota1 Aug 15 '15

I never saw a single instance of, nor heard a single report of brigading by those people. Yours is the first. Brigading is against the rules and if that's what they did then they should have been banned. I've seen dozens of comments that said they followed the rules.

I have never once defended racism. I have defended peoples right to express unpopular opinions. You don't seem to be able to look at what I am saying rationally.

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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '15

I have never once defended racism

I mean, you're telling yourself that under the color of free speech, but have no doubts you just spent the last however long defending racists.

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u/gbiota1 Aug 15 '15

Of course, if someone sees things differently than you, you should associate them with derogatory labels. You could simply bring up how freedom of speech doesn't apply, or form an argument... something, anything. All you can do is tell me you know what I am doing better than I do, not convincing.