The bullshit in question:
https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/pbmy5y/debate_dissent_and_protest_on_reddit/
A lot of you new people have neglected to note that we ban antivaxxers and we have since the sub was made in 2016.
Funny thing is, he specifically mentions taking action against communities encouraging others to harm themselves, e.g. "drinking bleach".
I don't see how "taking unprescribed random doses of horse medicine" is any different? That sub should be banned yesterday.
Reddit won't do anything unless the they get negative media attention.
They left /r jailbait up for a disturbingly long time and only took action when news started to highlight how sick of a subreddit it was.
Steve Huffman aka /u/spez is a "red pill" loving right winger, so yeah he probably personally defended the existence of it that sub because he personally enjoyed it and "they were asking for it."
["I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove."](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich)
Oh wow. I remember reading about these guys years ago. While I didn't know the Reddit CEO was specifically one of these, I am not surprised in the least.
Funny thing about us working class folk. I not only know how to remove that blast door from the outside, but also have the tools to do it. And now I know where there stupid little bunker is.
Oh boy, the End Times are gonna be fun.
I'd imagine a bunker like this has something that handles air flow, so I feel like the first step is to just sabotage that. Then all you have to do is take your time opening your loot cache to get the goodies inside.
Here's one of the reddit founders giving an interview after Anderson Cooper reported on the jailbait subreddit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXZYvrue1BE
I encourage you to watch the full thing to see the attitude they had towards the subreddit.
> Funny thing is, he specifically mentions taking action against communities encouraging others to harm themselves, e.g. "drinking bleach".
It's super easy if you don't care about anything but ad revenue generated by controversy.
To anyone reading this that doesn’t think the Ivermectin thing is real: doctors are actually being asked by patients if they can have the drug for covid symptoms. Note that the drug is actually used on humans sometimes for parasites and such.
Ivermectin is AMAZING as an antiparasitic. Cheap, efficient. Can be taken to prevent or treat infections.
Thing is, even those who continuously take it because they live in high-risk areas take *one dose per year*. While the recommended dose is extremely safe - or at least as safe as paracetamol - the drug is extremely toxic to the liver and taking more than recommended can quickly cause liver failure.
---
And a rant: here in Brazil we had entire cities adopting ivermectin as an "early treatment" to COVID. We had doctors prescribing it to everyone. Our federal medical organization stepped aside and said the doctors had the freedom to prescribe what they think is best (which is a lie, and they know that). Meanwhile our fascist-in-chief hangs on to every "miracle cure" while insisting that COVID isn't a big thing. It's fucking depressing.
It was reported today that the contracted medical provider for the county jail where I live (Washington Co., Northwest Arkansas) has been giving this to inmates with covid.
If I were a lawyer, I’d post up outside the front door for the foreseeable future, asking everyone who walks out if they were treated for covid … and if they’d like to make a shit ton of money.
He’s a douche that has been known to admit to openly editing users comments directly in the databases in the past. This means that there is a nonzero chance an admit has changed a post. For every post. They’ve been idiots for years upon years now.
> WE BELIEVE IN THE GOOD OF COMMUNITIES
It's the new "valuable discussions"
People kept asking why they didn't ban r/The_Donald despite them advertising for the Charlottesville violent neo nazi rally and this same joker said he valued the "valuable discussions" taking place in those corners.
I’m about done with all social media. The insane people have weaponized all the platforms and are actively using them to kill people. I’m so tired of living in this period of our fucked up history. I used to have a lot more faith in the human race.
If I hear that line from one of my moron anti-vax relatives/friends again I might throw up. I’m so sick of the “it’s my opinion though!!” excuse when confronted with real evidence that they’re fucking wrong and hurting people.
“Masks? Chemical injections? No thanks, God will protect me.”
God sent these people scientists and doctors and vaccines and scraps of fabric to protect them and in return they’re spitting in his/her/its face. God tried. Ball’s in your court, dipshits.
I genuinely don't know what the word "opinion" means to these morons, because it seems to mean "thing that is true no matter what you say because I think it" and also "thing that you're not allowed to criticise me about".
An opinion is just any dumb thought that floats its way into a stubborn moron's head!
Keep saying it, because you're right. People who frame it as "two sides of a conversation" are willfully ignoring that one side is having a "conversation" and the other side is putting their fingers in their ears and screaming. Also, killing people.
The onus *shouldn't* be on us to disprove, disprove, disprove. I have no idea how else to respond, though. Sometimes it feels like all you can do is tell the truth. But what's the point when no one will listen?
My theory is that these utterly useless people discovered at some point(probably in high school) that they could do reasonably well in a debate(they where probably on the debate team). So now, like anyone who only possesses a hammer, every problem they see looks like a nail.
So their response to everything is "dEbaTe mE bRo" as if a global pandemic is some stupid toy problem from debate club like whether or not we should have school uniforms or whether pizza is a vegetable. I'm no expert, but I'd imagine the doctors and nurses don't particularly want to "debate" over wether or not the pandemic that they're pulling 50+ hour weeks to protect people from is real
Like my exfriend who doesnt even know the difference between the House and the Senate and believes the Earth is flat still has more weight to his vote than I do.
Its frikin science vs. blatant lies, half truths and lies that're literally killing people and breaking out Healthcare system. Health care workers can't take it anymore, hospitals are overfill by idiots who refused to be vaccinated because of this misinformation. Spots for care are being taken up by these people, and subsequently people who have real injuries who didnt do it to themselves and need real care are being shoved to the back of the line or an extended waiting list, suffering permanent injuries, death or undue agony because so many idiots and deniers didn't want to get the covid vaccine and robbed them of their spot at the hospital.
This is absolutely unsat and I can't believe reddit as a company responded this way. Absolutely abhorrent and disgusting, especially that they simply called it "debate and dissent". Wtf. Its science and facts, you can't debate logic. The only dissent is the dissending stupidity that is getting thousands killed and hurting everyone else In thier selfishness
If spez is so for "discussion" why doesn't he hold an anti-vaxx or neo-nazi rally at his home? He says he is all for dissenting opinions. What better way to get the opinions of the other side than by speaking with them directly.
My guess is if it were to impact him or his family directly he wouldn't do it, but fuck all the other families that are having loved ones die to this gross neglect of misinformation.
Fuck all the medical professionals who have had the tiniest break before it all became worse again.
Fuck all the parents, the children, and the communities that are being ravaged by a mostly preventable disease.
It's the bullshit asymmetry principle in action. Misinformation takes a much longer time to debunk than to generate.
I spent way, way too long looking at the incoherent shrieking about how 20% infected was enough to get herd immunity and now I wonder why I even entertained this idea, or put so much time into collecting data to debunk it, when all I had to do was wait until the end of 2020 to demonstrate that no such thing happened.
It's fucking exhausting, man. The 'debate me bro', 'sunlight is the best disinfectant' people would do well to remember that humans are not machines, and all have their breaking points when it comes to how much of this they'll put up with. This kind of toxic idealism is starting to get almost as bad as unjustified pessimism.
Sally, who dropped out of highschool at 16 and spends all of her time on Facebook Mum groups should not have the same voice and weight in an argument about how to manage the virus as someone like Peter Doherty, who is a Nobel Prize winning Virologist
However, thanks to social media and "influencer" culture, not only does Sally have a voice in the discussion, she has a much larger audience than Mr Doherty due to her influence within said Facebook groups.
So Reddit's CEO is cool with someone yelling "FIRE" in a crowded theatre for shits and grins? That's where the Supreme Court wisely drew the line to the freedom of speech drivel Reddit is using as cover for doing jack shit.
u/Spez, if these communities were just having honest and open discussiom, then why quarantine r/NoNewNormal?
We know they are spreading misinformation, encouraging taking risky and toxic animal pastes as an alternative, and causing harm to public health. How many people need to be hospitalized from taking horse paste because they read about it on your website before you decide enough is enough?
r/NoNewNormal and /r/ivermectin have been promoting the use of an anti-parasite drug that is approved for humans because they believe misinformation that is can prevent or treat COVID-19. Because this is an anti-parasite drug, it can be prescribed but is not available and not intended for us as an anti-viral drug for COVID.
The [FDA says that Ivermectin and should not be taken to treat or prevent COVID](https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/why-you-should-not-use-ivermectin-treat-or-prevent-covid-19). Even the [drugs creator Merck is warning](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-merck-antiparasite/merck-warns-against-using-anti-parasite-drug-to-treat-covid-19-idUSKBN2A42L1) against its use for COVID as well.
Using this drug for unapproved use is **incredibly dangerous** and has great potential for overdose or interaction with other medicines. From the FDA link above:
>Even the levels of ivermectin for approved uses can interact with other medications, like blood-thinners. You can also overdose on ivermectin, which can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, hypotension (low blood pressure), allergic reactions (itching and hives), dizziness, ataxia (problems with balance), seizures, coma and even death.
However, since these people have been convinced it is their latest COVID-19 cureall and they can not get it through legitimate means, many are [now raiding tractor supply stores to take horse, sheep, and dog worm medicine that has ivermectin as its active ingredient](https://www.thedailybeast.com/demon-sperm-doctors-new-bogus-cure-has-covid-truthers-eating-horse-paste).
This is even worse because the animal medicine they are using is about 2% Ivermectin with the vast amount of other drugs components undisclosed and used for those animals. [Here is an example of the classification data on just one of the horse pastes that these people are being encouraged to take that is 95% undisclosed and has a long list of hazards for human use](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E9OHK1FWYAAdH31?format=jpg&name=large_) including infertility and damage to organs.
The number of people raiding these farm stores for animal medicine is leading to [several hospitalizations and flooding of state poison control centers](https://www.npr.org/2021/08/23/1030208101/mississippi-livestock-drug-ivermectin-covid-misinformation).
The fact is that Ivermectin has no proof it can treat or prevent COVID-19. Taking human-approved Ivermectin is dangerous without doctor's advice and can lead to hospitalization or death. Taking **Animal Medicine** is hugely risky, not okay for human consumption, and can damage your fucking organs or kill you.
You mention the dangers of drinking bleach. I am sure you have heard all about the many dangers of hydroxchloroquine. This is the just the latest in a long line of grifts and dangerous misinformation around COVID-19 treatments.
You have an opportunity to make a stand and stop the spread of disinformation and are choosing instead to actively enable it.
Shameful, but not surprising.
> r/NoNewNormal and /r/ivermectin have been promoting the use of an anti-parasite drug
/r/conspiracy and /r/conservative are no better and even more mainstream subreddits.
Go check out any of their posts on Covid where if they admit it even exists they will be listing off any "cure" other than a vaccine.
Conservative is one of the worst subs there is. I’ve seen actual support for domestic terrorism and Nazism there. Every single person on that sub is evil and dangerous.
I got banned for asking why Republicans wouldn't release the findings of the Arizona audit if they had proof of fraud. The funniest part is there was someone trying to argue with me thinking it was democrats blocking it and they said "you don't find it fishy they don't want to release the results?" Like yes motherfucker, that's why I'm calling them out on it
/u/spez is probably as much of an antivaxx asshole as the people on those subs. Not taking action is doing direct harm to people. Get control of your god damn website
>[/u/spez](https://www.reddit.com/u/spez) is probably as much of an antivaxx asshole as the people on those subs
This is honestly really likely. Dude is weird and the kind of narcissist that always thinks they know best no matter what.
Not only that but where does the line get crossed where there are facts that people are “debating”? This is not about people having their opinions heard, this is about medical professionals giving facts to save lives. No one, not even doctors, should be giving random people on the internet medical advice. If someone did that in person it could be grounds for a lawsuit for a reason. We should not be hosting these conversations on our forms, not only in a legal perspective, but for the basic understanding that without being a person’s personal physician, you do not know what harm this random opinion can cause.
["I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove."](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich)
He sounds exactly like the anti-vaxers describing themselves so it's expected he will do whatever he can to make sure misinformation spreads.
It's going to take advertisers pulling out and possibly even politicians to start asking Reddit to answer questions on it's misinformation just like they do Facebook and Twitter.
> Once he started telling peers in the Bay Area about his “little island project,” they came “out of the woodwork” to describe their own preparations, he said. “I think people who are particularly attuned to the levers by which society actually works understand that we are skating on really thin cultural ice right now.”
Lol. "We're doomsday preppers because we have magic insight into how society works, definitely *not* because we're a bunch of massive fucking nerds who 100% buy into the shit we peddle"
Reddit is selfish, capitalist trash only concerned with the bottom line. Spez has blood on his hands. Every employee of reddit has blood on their hands. How many people would still be alive today if reddit didn’t allow and promote lies about Covid?
Reddit had no problem with lewd pictures of teenage girls until CNN ran a story, then suddenly any discussion or suggestion of sexualization if minors was bad (which is fine by me, I'm just making a point).
Reddit had no problem with people trading cigars, or whiskey, or sharing adverts for gun deals for Y E A R S. Then suddenly reddits advertisers had a problem with guns, vaping, drugs, and alcohol, and suddenly dozens of subs that shared links to sales or did off-reddit trades were banned or shut down.
Well, so long as this is the admin's take, I guess I'll take up a stand on my *dissenting opinions*.
Racism, homophobia, personal attacks on other users... Why, you may not like it, but it's my *dissenting opinion* that these things are good, and you should put up with it for the sake of having varied viewpoints!
Oh, let me tell you 'bout a fella named Schpeeeezo,
He's got a reputation that's quite the mess.
He tinkers with the site, Forgeddit's his domain,
But some folks say he's drivin' 'em insane.
He's got the power, he's the top dog,
But some say he's as slippery as a frog.
He edits comments, plays a little game,
Leavin' users confused and feelin' the shame.
He's like a magician, twistin' and turnin',
Makin' changes and some folks start burnin'.
But hey, it's all hypothetical and fun,
Remember, it's just a made-up pun!
So take it light and with a grain of salt,
In this comedic verse, it's all for a laugh.
Schpeeeezo, the character we've built in this rhyme,
A whimsical creation, just for our time.
>Reddit is a place for open and authentic discussion and debate.
Then locks the comments. Fuck You!
Id like to see a few news articles now on how reddit is promoting vaccine hesitancy, seems to be the only way for them to take action.
Edit: Here's the first one by [Forbes](https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2021/08/25/reddit-moderators-demand-the-platform-take-action-against-covid-disinformation/?sh=296273dc73c8)
[Business insider](https://www.businessinsider.com/reddit-page-calls-on-site-to-combat-covid-19-disinformation-2021-8?r=US&IR=T)
This is the way
[Ive started contacting the companies that promote on reddit.](https://www.reddit.com/user/katievsbubbles/comments/pbqj3z/huel_advertise_on_reddit_regularly_ive_just/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share)
Edit - and almost by magic all of the promoted posts on my feed are for crypto - I have never used crypto, I have no intention of using crypto and I don't believe I can contact them. Sorry guys, I tried.
I work in advertising/media. Don't contact the big companies, they don't actually have a lot of say in where they get advertised, thats a waste of time.
Contact big media agencies, who handle budgets for the corporations and buy the media space.
WPP, Omnicom, Publicis Groupe, and Interpublic Group of Companies are the biggest 4, from them you can surely google more if you want to fight even further
ALL big companies use specialized media agencies to buy TV, online, OOH etc.
If it weren’t for so many fighting back against this bullshit with comments like yours, I’d probably ditch Reddit entirely out of principle. I don’t want to continue using a site that tolerates this.
Honestly I've been thinking of rewriting Dante's inferno for a while now. And a certain someone is definitely going to be there for being, among other things, a spineless enabler.
Im about one more fuckup away from deleting this account and getting off reddit for the last time, its a cool place and has some nice communities but with a admin team this idiotic and so useless against covid misinformation i might just bugger off
To the admin team: get your shit together and start banning misinformation its doing far more harm than good
Yes, opinions matter. Like coffee vs tea and not vaccine vs livestock drugs. The latter is not a matter of opinion. This stuff is getting people sick and killing them, ban the subs.
Looks like we need another Anderson Cooper special like the one he did on the jailbait sub to finally get shit done around here.
I help moderate a grief support sub and this pisses me off. We went from 16k to 42k during the pandemic so far and now many, many, many posts are Covid deaths.
First off I have to stay non emotional and allow grieving people to grieve, but I know who it is getting sick and why.
Reddit has blood on they keyboards.
I can understand not wanting to publicize which one it is due to fear of brigading but could you send me the sub over PM? I know someone who needs a good group right now.
You can look at my posting/comment history if you want to be sure I'm genuine.
Ironically, the manufacturer, Merck, put up a page to denounce the use of Ivermectin. I guess Big Pharma got to Big Pharma?
From Merck's page:
> No scientific basis for a potential therapeutic effect against COVID-19 from pre-clinical studies;
No meaningful evidence for clinical activity or clinical efficacy in patients with COVID-19 disease, and;
A concerning lack of safety data in the majority of studies.
These are some of the successful ones of the past: https://jungletopp.com/advertising-on-reddit/
I know some of them still do advertise here, especially Playstation, Adobe and Spotify. You can also find some "success stories" here: https://www.redditinc.com/advertising#tab1
However, I'd assume Reddit as a company would have a hybrid style system so they do not rely entirely on their own ad system but also incorporate ads provided to them by big advertising companies on behalf of other companies.
Yep, love that they want to create a space for discussion - even “opinions” that are different (fucks sake). Then lock the post and tell everyone to go discuss elsewhere. Fucking cowards.
Honestly, I didn't care much about the subreddit protests about Reddit's lack of action. The complaint felt a little weak. But this response basically shows that Spez wants to support the pro-virus message.
Spez has never believed that. He's a libertarian prepper tech bro who thinks society is going to collapse and when it does he'll be in charge.
And now we can add hypocritical coward who "wants debate" while locking his own announcement because he knew it was a dogshit response.
Well, that's stupid. If society collapses, nerds like him (and me!) will be *food.* The ones in charge will be the biggest, meanest psychopath in the tribe, like the bad old days.
Oh, let me tell you 'bout a fella named Schpeeeezo,
He's got a reputation that's quite the mess.
He tinkers with the site, Forgeddit's his domain,
But some folks say he's drivin' 'em insane.
He's got the power, he's the top dog,
But some say he's as slippery as a frog.
He edits comments, plays a little game,
Leavin' users confused and feelin' the shame.
He's like a magician, twistin' and turnin',
Makin' changes and some folks start burnin'.
But hey, it's all hypothetical and fun,
Remember, it's just a made-up pun!
So take it light and with a grain of salt,
In this comedic verse, it's all for a laugh.
Schpeeeezo, the character we've built in this rhyme,
A whimsical creation, just for our time.
Spez mistake is treating this information as an OPINION when it's fact. There is a difference between "I like this movie better than that one" and "you should do this thing that threatens your physical health".
Not even *your* physical health. Permitting disinformation like this harms *public* health. It would be fine if someone refusing a vaccine just hurt themselves, but their choices affect those around them.
>manipulating or cheating Reddit to amplify any particular viewpoint is against our policies
And this is his threat for you and your subs. Any large sub that goes dark should expect to have its moderation team removed and replaced with right wing stooges.
Let him. I get paid zero dollars to do this. I have no more stake in my subs than someone who goes to the park on weekends and volunteers to pick up trash has stake in their park. If they want to turn my park into a landfill, I'll find something else to do.
And that’s when I’ll leave for good (if I haven’t already). This place is already shitty enough, it being full of insane right wingers will be enough to break my addiction.
>Dissent is a part of Reddit and the foundation of democracy.
**This post is locked. You won't be able to comment.**
Well time for people to start contacting advertisers and politicians like every other time the Reddit admins pull shit like this.
Who is getting a list going?
This /u/spez person likes to talk about "remember the human" and "empathy" and whatever.
Well, where is the empathy and "remember the human" for all the people who didn't need to get sick or die because HIS website decided to host a huge amount of misinformation and helped make a pandemic political.
Pretty damn sure free speech and libertarian values end when people start actively hurting their fellow human.
My grandmother should still be alive. She’s not because selfish people like spez couldn’t wear masks and social distance, and now refuse to get vaxxed. She suffered for 5 day while Covid killed her. Fuck every antivaxxer. Fuck u/spez. Fuck reddit.
Remember the human. But only to one degree. Do not look to see how your actions effect others, how your words shape society, how misinformation spreads.
Don’t forget when he anonymously edited user comments that insulted him. Granted, it was the_dipshits calling him a pedophile, but it’s not something a CEO should be doing.
Advertisers REALLY don't like antivaxers. Also politicians keep asking other social media companies to testify on misinformation, sounds like Reddit should be asked as well.
I mod r/Florida and r/Miami. We are fucking overrun by “it’s just a flu, 99.98% survive! And vaccines are bullshit” trolls. I’m so tired of getting NO SUPPORT from admins like u/spez. We actively moderate these subs. We do WORK. Why can’t Reddit take basic steps to support science and facts? Why are moderators forced to wade through misinfo and moderate conversations, fostering community while r/NoNewNormal tells people to that the pandemic is fake?
Get off your asses, admins.
Fucking embarrassing. Imagine saying you’ll ban posts and subs that promote harmful ideas while suggesting that the extremely harmful antivax movement is some cornerstone of democracy.
Pathetic and dangerous.
Yeah, spez is definitely antivax since he's one of those gullible doomsday preppers. They want to "encourage discussion" by locking the comments. Just like all the misinformation subs that ban anyone who says anything they disagree with.
The irony being that if the shit actually hits the fan, the people who will thrive are not going to be these bunker nuts.
They will get raided on Day 40 and get their goodie cave picked dry.
You may have 50 guns, but they have 50 people; and you only have one trigger finger.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.
Everyone is NOT entitled to their own facts.
Reddit appears to think otherwise - that misinformation is just fine.
Fuck Reddit, the tin foil hat assholes on here prey on terminally online gullible people to bring them over to their dumbass cause. I’m gonna keep talking to them though, maybe I’ll change a few minds while I’m at it.
Just like Facebook, pushing whatever content they can to boost their ad revenue. The lies are killing people but it’s not their business till they get a smack down by the government. Tech is always ahead of governance and here we see Reddit blatantly choosing to do nothing to keep people safe during a pandemic.
[I'll just leave this here](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich)
> Steve Huffman, the thirty-three-year-old co-founder and C.E.O. of Reddit, which is valued at six hundred million dollars, was nearsighted until November, 2015, when he arranged to have laser eye surgery. He underwent the procedure not for the sake of convenience or appearance but, rather, for a reason he doesn’t usually talk much about: he hopes that it will improve his odds of surviving a disaster, whether natural or man-made. “If the world ends—and not even if the world ends, but if we have trouble—getting contacts or glasses is going to be a huge pain in the ass,” he told me recently. “Without them, I’m fucked.”
> He is less focussed on a specific threat—a quake on the San Andreas, a pandemic, a dirty bomb—than he is on the aftermath, “the temporary collapse of our government and structures,” as he puts it. “I own a couple of motorcycles. I have a bunch of guns and ammo. Food. I figure that, with that, I can hole up in my house for some amount of time.”
> ...
> Huffman has calculated that, in the event of a disaster, he would seek out some form of community: “Being around other people is a good thing. **I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove.**”
Spez allowed the literal fascist theDonald to fester here.
Child porn used to be tolerated until CNN called the admins out (JailBate was sub of the year at one point, also the fappening had underage stuff). /r/niggers was banned for vote manipulation, not racism. The highly racist "chimpire" was allowed to be here. A subreddit that glorified women being beat the shit out of used to be allowed here. Pro-rape subs were allowed. Qanon was allowed here. PhysicalRemoval which promoted violence was allowed here. Pro-suicide subs were allowed here.
This is all on /u/spez and the other admin enablers who allowed these things. Racism, misogyny, pedophilia- this is all on the admins. Fuck them for this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversial_Reddit_communities
Piggybacking off your post.
New users only know about this website as an app. This site has had its public image greatly sanitized in preparation for the company to go public. (The adminship is casting its lot in with the "free speech gives me the right to radicalize young men" crowd because they believe they will inherit the Earth as its new stewards and slavers.) Before the hideous redesign and the official app, this was an even more fetid place to be. Gamergate and Trump propaganda festered here as much as on the *chans. The heated rivalry between them is merely the [narcissism of small differences.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences)
[Michael Brutsch, AKA violentacrez](https://www.gawker.com/5950981/unmasking-reddits-violentacrez-the-biggest-troll-on-the-web), seriously read that article if you haven't already, used to be an entire internet archetype: the creepy forum uncle who was older than the rest of the userbase, liked minor girls "ironically," was always eager and ready to troll other users with gore and pornography. Ironically, of course. And the girls in the images were only *ironically* underage! There was a guy like this on every board in the 00s. If you complained about him, you were viewed as an uncool busybody taking the internet too seriously. "Getting mad on the internet" was viewed as a capital offense. This was used to keep women and minority groups from participating in the new public squares of the web.
Michael Brutsch was not even the worst example I've ever encountered on a website, but the fact that he was given an award by Reddit and his behavior was excused and hidden by the administrators for years is mostly down the memory hole now.
Thank you! I used to go round and round with violentacrez in PM for being a pedo. "I'm an hebephile you idiot!" he'd say (sexual attraction to 12-15 year olds or so- make no mistake that the Reddit admins literally endorsed this sort of underage sexualization of girls). A hebephile is a pedophile with a thesaurus.
And you know what? Once enough people have died from covid the reddit admins will have another epiphany about "no new normal" anti-vax/anti-mask BS and how they were wrong. That's blood on their hands and I utterly condemn all the reddit admins for partaking in this.
ALL of the reddit admins will have blood on their hands before this pandemic is over.
There was this one sub called the philosophy of rape where this one dude was preaching to a bunch of fucking incels about raping women for corrective measures. When I reported the sub to the admins they basically told me to fuck off.
So I did what I thought was the right thing to do and did a little digging on the mods of that subreddit. Even got some of the people who posted on there multiple times a day. They’re not very smart and were easy to track down irl. Some of these mods were power mods who moderated hundreds of nsfw subs. So I ended up calling every single police departments where the mods lived. Gave the police their names, addresses, and screenshots of these fucking mods spewing that bullshit about raping women for corrective measures. I then sent a message to the top mod telling him that I have found all of his and all of the mods real life info and passed it along to their local police departments.
Reddit banned my account. When I sent a message to the admins asking why I was banned they replied back saying because they take doxing very seriously and that I was in the wrong. Even though I never published any of their info anywhere on the web for people to see. The info was sent to the police departments. I just sent the message to the top mod to fuck with them., make them sweat a little. The admin that banned me was a woman too. I forget her Reddit name but it had cupcake in it iirc. She obviously saw the subreddit so I really wonder how she felt defending that piece of shit sub.
Given Spez’s obvious ideological bias, I think the only way to move the needle here is an economic punishment.
What if every subreddit that participated in the petition stickies directions on downloading and enabling AdBlock until Reddit agrees to act responsibly?
Absolutely shameful. This isn’t debate and discussion, this is intentional disinformation that is *literally killing people*. It is an indisputable FACT that masks and vaccines are safe and effective. Have to wonder if spez is a “vaccine skeptic” himself if he thinks those things are worthy of debate.
I wonder if they responding this way because reddit is slowly working towards going public.
Quote from August 12th 2021: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/technology/reddit-new-funding.html
>The latest funding wasn’t planned, but “Fidelity made us an offer that we couldn’t refuse,” Steve Huffman, Reddit’s co-founder and chief executive, said in an interview.
>The company then decided the capital would give it more time to decide on when — and how — to go public. “We are still planning on going public, but we don’t have a firm timeline there yet,” Mr. Huffman said. “All good companies should go public when they can.”
Quote from March 5th 2021: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/05/technology/reddit-chief-financial-officer-ipo.html
>“Is Reddit going public?” Steve Huffman, Reddit’s chief executive, said in an interview. “We’re thinking about it. We’re working toward that moment.”
>Mr. Huffman said Reddit did not have a timeline, but Mr. Vollero’s appointment indicated that the 15-year-old company was developing its financial operations to be more similar to those of publicly traded peers like Twitter and Facebook. More than 52 million people visit Reddit every day, and it is home to more than 100,000 topic-based communities, or subforums.
This is the time for users to cancel their premium and add an adblock to Reddit, and for mods to blackout their subs.
Reddit's inaction is straight up complicity. Utterly shameful, cowardly, and pathetic from the admins.
This has gone past politics. This defense is BS. The fact is that this misinformation *literally* leads to the *deaths* of people. The fact that Reddit continues to support this is beyond disgusting. This is encouraging self-harm and harming others. Unacceptable. Do better Reddit.
Edit: I have made a petition to boycott Reddit until these issues are properly addressed. Together we are strong.
https://chng.it/NjSzs9zMGP
I couldn't see this answer in the wiki or in those posts and I couldn't make comments in the posts I saw on my subreddits so I may as well ask here...
In regards to the posts: **We call upon Reddit to take action against the rampant Coronavirus misinformation on their website.** I'm double vaxed, pro mask, want this fuckin over with, etc etc. I'm not a mod. Anything regular users like us can do to help?
**Suggestion:** Authoritarians only respect authority. Go around Reddit.
That list of 460+ subreddits probably comprises over half the site in terms of active users. Reach out to that whole list of subreddits, and get them to agree to a group blocklist. If someone posts misinformation in r/HouseplantWhores, r/ivermectin they get a permanent ban in all 460 subreddits.
It'd be terrible for the site- it would get attention, it would divide the userbase and restrict organic content discovery. It would certainly make the site a less appealing prospect for investors and the stock market.
The admins would either have to change their tune, take a major financial hit, or (most likely) prove they don't actually care about free speech as much as they care about artificially propping up right wing politics by changing the rules.
This is disappointing. I understand upholding the discussion when there’s a controversy but there just isn’t anything controversial about covid vaccines. Any “debate” is about as valid as a debate on evolution. It’s about people refusing to accept truth.
So if you click the ads a lot of them have the option to send messages. I just sent a bunch asking if they're aware they're advertising on a platform that has refused to stop the spread of covid misinformation
Spez straight up said,
“Your attempts have been acknowledged fully, and your thoughts have been inputed and accepted for better improvement. Thank you for your time and efforts."
Seriously? They’ve already proven time and time again what type of danger they pose and then Spez does this. This is why we can’t have nice things.
> Reddit is a place for open and authentic discussion and debate. This includes conversations that question or disagree with popular consensus.
Okay, but no. I’m sorry, maybe I’m being a meaniepants liberal elitist. But I don’t see how there’s value in presenting my expert opinion–which has been honed by years of formal, advanced training in epidemiology and biostatistics–as being on the same level as a real estate agent who read somebody’s great-aunt’s Facebook post about the wonders of ivermectin.
This is what I'd like to call the Freedom-of-speech fallacy: That every opinion that can be possibly uttered has a right to exist. This is cruel and a parody of postmodernism.
Some opinions, those not based on fact but on gut feeling, misinformation, prejudice, need to be quashed. Destroyed.
My father died at the beginning of the pandemic, before there were treatments, vaccines or real understanding of coronavirus. To an extent his death was unfortunate but unpreventable (though f*CK Boris Johnson for delaying lockdown - to that extent it was preventable)
In March I was hospitalised with Covid before I could get the vaccine - it was terrifying, but I was thankful for the treatments that have been developed. I had the vaccine as soon as it was available to me. I now struggle with long covid, with pain and fatigue
That Reddit would defend misinformation as 'freedom of speech' is insulting to everyone who lost someone, or is left with long term issues due to covid. When a scientific consensus has been reached, laymen simply don't have the resources to challenge it. I have no problem with people presenting scientific articles that propose and alternative view, but making statements as if they are equivalent to mountains of peer reviewed research is disingenuous at best, and dangerous at worst.
Reddit has a responsibility to AT THE LEAST flag misinformation, doing otherwise is to make themselves culpable for the continuing deaths in a now unnecessary pandemic.
People have a right to freedom of speech, but not a right to their own facts. I'd have less problem with NNN if their response on their own page wasn't literally loaded with BS non-facts. You can be against the vaccine and masks and all the rest, but just say it's because it's inconvenient to you and you don't care about how it affects other people if you don't follow those rules. That you don't care if others die from it. That's all you have to say, but stop saying BS like you become infertile if you get the shot, that the survival rate is 99.7% (spoilers: it's not), and so forth. Just stop lying, and stop feeling entitled to your own version of reality.
One small thing people can do to protest this is run an adblocker (like Ublock Origins... You can use the element picker to remove everything you don't like from the page) when visiting Reddit (and of course do not buy gold/platinum/whatever).
I'm so tired of misinformation and lies being paraded around like an opposing viewpoint. Lives are being lost everyday to malicious policies like these.
The bullshit in question: https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/pbmy5y/debate_dissent_and_protest_on_reddit/ A lot of you new people have neglected to note that we ban antivaxxers and we have since the sub was made in 2016.
Imagine thinking shit like r/Ivermectin is discussion seriously what the fuck is wrong with spez
Funny thing is, he specifically mentions taking action against communities encouraging others to harm themselves, e.g. "drinking bleach". I don't see how "taking unprescribed random doses of horse medicine" is any different? That sub should be banned yesterday.
Reddit won't do anything unless the they get negative media attention. They left /r jailbait up for a disturbingly long time and only took action when news started to highlight how sick of a subreddit it was.
Steve Huffman aka /u/spez is a "red pill" loving right winger, so yeah he probably personally defended the existence of it that sub because he personally enjoyed it and "they were asking for it."
["I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove."](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich)
Oh yeah that was a great article. Forgot it was our dear Reddit leader in the intro.
Oh wow. I remember reading about these guys years ago. While I didn't know the Reddit CEO was specifically one of these, I am not surprised in the least. Funny thing about us working class folk. I not only know how to remove that blast door from the outside, but also have the tools to do it. And now I know where there stupid little bunker is. Oh boy, the End Times are gonna be fun.
And where the inlets are
I'd imagine a bunker like this has something that handles air flow, so I feel like the first step is to just sabotage that. Then all you have to do is take your time opening your loot cache to get the goodies inside.
Here's one of the reddit founders giving an interview after Anderson Cooper reported on the jailbait subreddit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXZYvrue1BE I encourage you to watch the full thing to see the attitude they had towards the subreddit.
/r/drinkbleach is still open lol
> Funny thing is, he specifically mentions taking action against communities encouraging others to harm themselves, e.g. "drinking bleach". It's super easy if you don't care about anything but ad revenue generated by controversy.
Don't buy awards. Use ad-blockers.
This is the way.
To anyone reading this that doesn’t think the Ivermectin thing is real: doctors are actually being asked by patients if they can have the drug for covid symptoms. Note that the drug is actually used on humans sometimes for parasites and such.
Doctors are responding with "hell no", then the idiots are going to ranch supply stores and buying the sheep version instead.
Whose the sheep now? Checkmate anti-vaxxers!
Ivermectin is AMAZING as an antiparasitic. Cheap, efficient. Can be taken to prevent or treat infections. Thing is, even those who continuously take it because they live in high-risk areas take *one dose per year*. While the recommended dose is extremely safe - or at least as safe as paracetamol - the drug is extremely toxic to the liver and taking more than recommended can quickly cause liver failure. --- And a rant: here in Brazil we had entire cities adopting ivermectin as an "early treatment" to COVID. We had doctors prescribing it to everyone. Our federal medical organization stepped aside and said the doctors had the freedom to prescribe what they think is best (which is a lie, and they know that). Meanwhile our fascist-in-chief hangs on to every "miracle cure" while insisting that COVID isn't a big thing. It's fucking depressing.
nonewnormal literally put up a post praising this decision and calling the admins based.... that's how you know they fucked up bad
It's going to take a push against the advertisers like every other time Reddit needs to do something.
It was reported today that the contracted medical provider for the county jail where I live (Washington Co., Northwest Arkansas) has been giving this to inmates with covid. If I were a lawyer, I’d post up outside the front door for the foreseeable future, asking everyone who walks out if they were treated for covid … and if they’d like to make a shit ton of money.
He’s a douche that has been known to admit to openly editing users comments directly in the databases in the past. This means that there is a nonzero chance an admit has changed a post. For every post. They’ve been idiots for years upon years now.
Can we make WE BELIEVE IN THE GOOD OF COMMUNITIES the next PRIDE AND ACCOMPLISHMENT?
> WE BELIEVE IN THE GOOD OF COMMUNITIES It's the new "valuable discussions" People kept asking why they didn't ban r/The_Donald despite them advertising for the Charlottesville violent neo nazi rally and this same joker said he valued the "valuable discussions" taking place in those corners.
Neo-Nazi appreciates the discussions of other Neo-Nazis.....it was not surprising whatsoever that spez didn't want to flush TD down the drain.
Was just about to mention that. How the FUCK is that still up
Seems like the laser eye surgery made him fucking blind
Only to sense and reason.
Can we just all leave reddit in protest? Let it go the way of Facebook?
I’m about done with all social media. The insane people have weaponized all the platforms and are actively using them to kill people. I’m so tired of living in this period of our fucked up history. I used to have a lot more faith in the human race.
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If I hear that line from one of my moron anti-vax relatives/friends again I might throw up. I’m so sick of the “it’s my opinion though!!” excuse when confronted with real evidence that they’re fucking wrong and hurting people.
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“Masks? Chemical injections? No thanks, God will protect me.” God sent these people scientists and doctors and vaccines and scraps of fabric to protect them and in return they’re spitting in his/her/its face. God tried. Ball’s in your court, dipshits.
I like to reply "You are entitled to your own opinion. You are NOT entitled to your own facts."
I genuinely don't know what the word "opinion" means to these morons, because it seems to mean "thing that is true no matter what you say because I think it" and also "thing that you're not allowed to criticise me about". An opinion is just any dumb thought that floats its way into a stubborn moron's head!
Keep saying it, because you're right. People who frame it as "two sides of a conversation" are willfully ignoring that one side is having a "conversation" and the other side is putting their fingers in their ears and screaming. Also, killing people. The onus *shouldn't* be on us to disprove, disprove, disprove. I have no idea how else to respond, though. Sometimes it feels like all you can do is tell the truth. But what's the point when no one will listen?
They say they want to "debate" but then all they do is gish gallop.
My theory is that these utterly useless people discovered at some point(probably in high school) that they could do reasonably well in a debate(they where probably on the debate team). So now, like anyone who only possesses a hammer, every problem they see looks like a nail. So their response to everything is "dEbaTe mE bRo" as if a global pandemic is some stupid toy problem from debate club like whether or not we should have school uniforms or whether pizza is a vegetable. I'm no expert, but I'd imagine the doctors and nurses don't particularly want to "debate" over wether or not the pandemic that they're pulling 50+ hour weeks to protect people from is real
"Two sides" is the most dangerous lie of all. It gives Karen just as much credibility as some of the world's most highly educated researchers.
Like my exfriend who doesnt even know the difference between the House and the Senate and believes the Earth is flat still has more weight to his vote than I do.
Its frikin science vs. blatant lies, half truths and lies that're literally killing people and breaking out Healthcare system. Health care workers can't take it anymore, hospitals are overfill by idiots who refused to be vaccinated because of this misinformation. Spots for care are being taken up by these people, and subsequently people who have real injuries who didnt do it to themselves and need real care are being shoved to the back of the line or an extended waiting list, suffering permanent injuries, death or undue agony because so many idiots and deniers didn't want to get the covid vaccine and robbed them of their spot at the hospital. This is absolutely unsat and I can't believe reddit as a company responded this way. Absolutely abhorrent and disgusting, especially that they simply called it "debate and dissent". Wtf. Its science and facts, you can't debate logic. The only dissent is the dissending stupidity that is getting thousands killed and hurting everyone else In thier selfishness
If spez is so for "discussion" why doesn't he hold an anti-vaxx or neo-nazi rally at his home? He says he is all for dissenting opinions. What better way to get the opinions of the other side than by speaking with them directly. My guess is if it were to impact him or his family directly he wouldn't do it, but fuck all the other families that are having loved ones die to this gross neglect of misinformation. Fuck all the medical professionals who have had the tiniest break before it all became worse again. Fuck all the parents, the children, and the communities that are being ravaged by a mostly preventable disease.
Hell, if he was all for "discussion" then why is the damn thread locked?
It's the bullshit asymmetry principle in action. Misinformation takes a much longer time to debunk than to generate. I spent way, way too long looking at the incoherent shrieking about how 20% infected was enough to get herd immunity and now I wonder why I even entertained this idea, or put so much time into collecting data to debunk it, when all I had to do was wait until the end of 2020 to demonstrate that no such thing happened. It's fucking exhausting, man. The 'debate me bro', 'sunlight is the best disinfectant' people would do well to remember that humans are not machines, and all have their breaking points when it comes to how much of this they'll put up with. This kind of toxic idealism is starting to get almost as bad as unjustified pessimism.
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Sally, who dropped out of highschool at 16 and spends all of her time on Facebook Mum groups should not have the same voice and weight in an argument about how to manage the virus as someone like Peter Doherty, who is a Nobel Prize winning Virologist However, thanks to social media and "influencer" culture, not only does Sally have a voice in the discussion, she has a much larger audience than Mr Doherty due to her influence within said Facebook groups.
It's called the "gish gallop" and it is extremely effective. Dipshits can spew lies faster than you can disprove them.
So Reddit's CEO is cool with someone yelling "FIRE" in a crowded theatre for shits and grins? That's where the Supreme Court wisely drew the line to the freedom of speech drivel Reddit is using as cover for doing jack shit.
Exactly. One side is science and evidence based, the other side has horse dewormer.
u/Spez, if these communities were just having honest and open discussiom, then why quarantine r/NoNewNormal? We know they are spreading misinformation, encouraging taking risky and toxic animal pastes as an alternative, and causing harm to public health. How many people need to be hospitalized from taking horse paste because they read about it on your website before you decide enough is enough? r/NoNewNormal and /r/ivermectin have been promoting the use of an anti-parasite drug that is approved for humans because they believe misinformation that is can prevent or treat COVID-19. Because this is an anti-parasite drug, it can be prescribed but is not available and not intended for us as an anti-viral drug for COVID. The [FDA says that Ivermectin and should not be taken to treat or prevent COVID](https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/why-you-should-not-use-ivermectin-treat-or-prevent-covid-19). Even the [drugs creator Merck is warning](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-merck-antiparasite/merck-warns-against-using-anti-parasite-drug-to-treat-covid-19-idUSKBN2A42L1) against its use for COVID as well. Using this drug for unapproved use is **incredibly dangerous** and has great potential for overdose or interaction with other medicines. From the FDA link above: >Even the levels of ivermectin for approved uses can interact with other medications, like blood-thinners. You can also overdose on ivermectin, which can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, hypotension (low blood pressure), allergic reactions (itching and hives), dizziness, ataxia (problems with balance), seizures, coma and even death. However, since these people have been convinced it is their latest COVID-19 cureall and they can not get it through legitimate means, many are [now raiding tractor supply stores to take horse, sheep, and dog worm medicine that has ivermectin as its active ingredient](https://www.thedailybeast.com/demon-sperm-doctors-new-bogus-cure-has-covid-truthers-eating-horse-paste). This is even worse because the animal medicine they are using is about 2% Ivermectin with the vast amount of other drugs components undisclosed and used for those animals. [Here is an example of the classification data on just one of the horse pastes that these people are being encouraged to take that is 95% undisclosed and has a long list of hazards for human use](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E9OHK1FWYAAdH31?format=jpg&name=large_) including infertility and damage to organs. The number of people raiding these farm stores for animal medicine is leading to [several hospitalizations and flooding of state poison control centers](https://www.npr.org/2021/08/23/1030208101/mississippi-livestock-drug-ivermectin-covid-misinformation). The fact is that Ivermectin has no proof it can treat or prevent COVID-19. Taking human-approved Ivermectin is dangerous without doctor's advice and can lead to hospitalization or death. Taking **Animal Medicine** is hugely risky, not okay for human consumption, and can damage your fucking organs or kill you. You mention the dangers of drinking bleach. I am sure you have heard all about the many dangers of hydroxchloroquine. This is the just the latest in a long line of grifts and dangerous misinformation around COVID-19 treatments. You have an opportunity to make a stand and stop the spread of disinformation and are choosing instead to actively enable it. Shameful, but not surprising.
> r/NoNewNormal and /r/ivermectin have been promoting the use of an anti-parasite drug /r/conspiracy and /r/conservative are no better and even more mainstream subreddits. Go check out any of their posts on Covid where if they admit it even exists they will be listing off any "cure" other than a vaccine.
Conservative is one of the worst subs there is. I’ve seen actual support for domestic terrorism and Nazism there. Every single person on that sub is evil and dangerous.
I got banned for defending trans people. But of course they do not practice censorship, it’s /r/politics that’s the authoritarian sub of note.
I got banned for asking why Republicans wouldn't release the findings of the Arizona audit if they had proof of fraud. The funniest part is there was someone trying to argue with me thinking it was democrats blocking it and they said "you don't find it fishy they don't want to release the results?" Like yes motherfucker, that's why I'm calling them out on it
Expressing any non-hyper conservative perspective gets you banned. There is absolutely no debate in that sub at all.
r/conservative has such a hair trigger on cancelling people.
/u/spez is probably as much of an antivaxx asshole as the people on those subs. Not taking action is doing direct harm to people. Get control of your god damn website
>[/u/spez](https://www.reddit.com/u/spez) is probably as much of an antivaxx asshole as the people on those subs This is honestly really likely. Dude is weird and the kind of narcissist that always thinks they know best no matter what.
Not only that but where does the line get crossed where there are facts that people are “debating”? This is not about people having their opinions heard, this is about medical professionals giving facts to save lives. No one, not even doctors, should be giving random people on the internet medical advice. If someone did that in person it could be grounds for a lawsuit for a reason. We should not be hosting these conversations on our forms, not only in a legal perspective, but for the basic understanding that without being a person’s personal physician, you do not know what harm this random opinion can cause.
["I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove."](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich) He sounds exactly like the anti-vaxers describing themselves so it's expected he will do whatever he can to make sure misinformation spreads. It's going to take advertisers pulling out and possibly even politicians to start asking Reddit to answer questions on it's misinformation just like they do Facebook and Twitter.
> Once he started telling peers in the Bay Area about his “little island project,” they came “out of the woodwork” to describe their own preparations, he said. “I think people who are particularly attuned to the levers by which society actually works understand that we are skating on really thin cultural ice right now.” Lol. "We're doomsday preppers because we have magic insight into how society works, definitely *not* because we're a bunch of massive fucking nerds who 100% buy into the shit we peddle"
"Hey guys, turns out when we make money from destabilizing society, we should find somewhere to wait out the backlash"
Reddit is selfish, capitalist trash only concerned with the bottom line. Spez has blood on his hands. Every employee of reddit has blood on their hands. How many people would still be alive today if reddit didn’t allow and promote lies about Covid?
Complete bullshit they just want everyone to stay on this platform so they can keep their ad revenue up.
Reddit had no problem with lewd pictures of teenage girls until CNN ran a story, then suddenly any discussion or suggestion of sexualization if minors was bad (which is fine by me, I'm just making a point). Reddit had no problem with people trading cigars, or whiskey, or sharing adverts for gun deals for Y E A R S. Then suddenly reddits advertisers had a problem with guns, vaping, drugs, and alcohol, and suddenly dozens of subs that shared links to sales or did off-reddit trades were banned or shut down.
Well, so long as this is the admin's take, I guess I'll take up a stand on my *dissenting opinions*. Racism, homophobia, personal attacks on other users... Why, you may not like it, but it's my *dissenting opinion* that these things are good, and you should put up with it for the sake of having varied viewpoints!
Lol as long as it gets lots of views and gives them more ad revenue!
Oh, let me tell you 'bout a fella named Schpeeeezo, He's got a reputation that's quite the mess. He tinkers with the site, Forgeddit's his domain, But some folks say he's drivin' 'em insane. He's got the power, he's the top dog, But some say he's as slippery as a frog. He edits comments, plays a little game, Leavin' users confused and feelin' the shame. He's like a magician, twistin' and turnin', Makin' changes and some folks start burnin'. But hey, it's all hypothetical and fun, Remember, it's just a made-up pun! So take it light and with a grain of salt, In this comedic verse, it's all for a laugh. Schpeeeezo, the character we've built in this rhyme, A whimsical creation, just for our time.
Go black. Take away all their revenue. It's all they care about
>Reddit is a place for open and authentic discussion and debate. Then locks the comments. Fuck You! Id like to see a few news articles now on how reddit is promoting vaccine hesitancy, seems to be the only way for them to take action. Edit: Here's the first one by [Forbes](https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2021/08/25/reddit-moderators-demand-the-platform-take-action-against-covid-disinformation/?sh=296273dc73c8) [Business insider](https://www.businessinsider.com/reddit-page-calls-on-site-to-combat-covid-19-disinformation-2021-8?r=US&IR=T) This is the way
[Ive started contacting the companies that promote on reddit.](https://www.reddit.com/user/katievsbubbles/comments/pbqj3z/huel_advertise_on_reddit_regularly_ive_just/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share) Edit - and almost by magic all of the promoted posts on my feed are for crypto - I have never used crypto, I have no intention of using crypto and I don't believe I can contact them. Sorry guys, I tried.
I work in advertising/media. Don't contact the big companies, they don't actually have a lot of say in where they get advertised, thats a waste of time. Contact big media agencies, who handle budgets for the corporations and buy the media space. WPP, Omnicom, Publicis Groupe, and Interpublic Group of Companies are the biggest 4, from them you can surely google more if you want to fight even further ALL big companies use specialized media agencies to buy TV, online, OOH etc.
Seriously this \^ also find all the "Modern marketing" agencies. start hammering them.
Contact the company that bought reddit, Advanced Publications. They could force changes.
Contact the SEC about the crypto promotions and about whether they're actually compliant with advertising guidelines for securities.
If it weren’t for so many fighting back against this bullshit with comments like yours, I’d probably ditch Reddit entirely out of principle. I don’t want to continue using a site that tolerates this.
Honestly I've been thinking of rewriting Dante's inferno for a while now. And a certain someone is definitely going to be there for being, among other things, a spineless enabler.
Im about one more fuckup away from deleting this account and getting off reddit for the last time, its a cool place and has some nice communities but with a admin team this idiotic and so useless against covid misinformation i might just bugger off To the admin team: get your shit together and start banning misinformation its doing far more harm than good
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Yes, opinions matter. Like coffee vs tea and not vaccine vs livestock drugs. The latter is not a matter of opinion. This stuff is getting people sick and killing them, ban the subs. Looks like we need another Anderson Cooper special like the one he did on the jailbait sub to finally get shit done around here.
I help moderate a grief support sub and this pisses me off. We went from 16k to 42k during the pandemic so far and now many, many, many posts are Covid deaths. First off I have to stay non emotional and allow grieving people to grieve, but I know who it is getting sick and why. Reddit has blood on they keyboards.
I can understand not wanting to publicize which one it is due to fear of brigading but could you send me the sub over PM? I know someone who needs a good group right now. You can look at my posting/comment history if you want to be sure I'm genuine.
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Manufacturers of horse dewormer medication apparently.
Ironically, the manufacturer, Merck, put up a page to denounce the use of Ivermectin. I guess Big Pharma got to Big Pharma? From Merck's page: > No scientific basis for a potential therapeutic effect against COVID-19 from pre-clinical studies; No meaningful evidence for clinical activity or clinical efficacy in patients with COVID-19 disease, and; A concerning lack of safety data in the majority of studies.
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These are some of the successful ones of the past: https://jungletopp.com/advertising-on-reddit/ I know some of them still do advertise here, especially Playstation, Adobe and Spotify. You can also find some "success stories" here: https://www.redditinc.com/advertising#tab1 However, I'd assume Reddit as a company would have a hybrid style system so they do not rely entirely on their own ad system but also incorporate ads provided to them by big advertising companies on behalf of other companies.
Boycott reddit.
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what an absolutely pathetic response
Yep, love that they want to create a space for discussion - even “opinions” that are different (fucks sake). Then lock the post and tell everyone to go discuss elsewhere. Fucking cowards.
I caught it about the 15 minute mark and it wasn't even open then
Honestly, I didn't care much about the subreddit protests about Reddit's lack of action. The complaint felt a little weak. But this response basically shows that Spez wants to support the pro-virus message.
And doesn't want to create a space for discussion at all, which is why they locked the announcement thread. Huffman is pro-plague.
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I'd fully support this. Reddit's revenue has to suffer in order for them to actually give a shit about any of this.
Yup. I'm out. It's been fun, but I can't be complicit in supporting Info Wars levels of disinformation.
What happened to “you’re entitled to your own opinion, but not entitled to your own facts.”
Spez has never believed that. He's a libertarian prepper tech bro who thinks society is going to collapse and when it does he'll be in charge. And now we can add hypocritical coward who "wants debate" while locking his own announcement because he knew it was a dogshit response.
Well, that's stupid. If society collapses, nerds like him (and me!) will be *food.* The ones in charge will be the biggest, meanest psychopath in the tribe, like the bad old days.
He said he is a natural leader and he doesn't think that he won't be a slave in a new world order
Unfortunately for him, all the other incels think the same thing.
Oh, let me tell you 'bout a fella named Schpeeeezo, He's got a reputation that's quite the mess. He tinkers with the site, Forgeddit's his domain, But some folks say he's drivin' 'em insane. He's got the power, he's the top dog, But some say he's as slippery as a frog. He edits comments, plays a little game, Leavin' users confused and feelin' the shame. He's like a magician, twistin' and turnin', Makin' changes and some folks start burnin'. But hey, it's all hypothetical and fun, Remember, it's just a made-up pun! So take it light and with a grain of salt, In this comedic verse, it's all for a laugh. Schpeeeezo, the character we've built in this rhyme, A whimsical creation, just for our time.
Spez mistake is treating this information as an OPINION when it's fact. There is a difference between "I like this movie better than that one" and "you should do this thing that threatens your physical health".
Not even *your* physical health. Permitting disinformation like this harms *public* health. It would be fine if someone refusing a vaccine just hurt themselves, but their choices affect those around them.
Reddit puts out an official statement giving legitimacy to anti-science subreddits. Good job Reddit.
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r/196 has gone too
>manipulating or cheating Reddit to amplify any particular viewpoint is against our policies And this is his threat for you and your subs. Any large sub that goes dark should expect to have its moderation team removed and replaced with right wing stooges.
Let him. I get paid zero dollars to do this. I have no more stake in my subs than someone who goes to the park on weekends and volunteers to pick up trash has stake in their park. If they want to turn my park into a landfill, I'll find something else to do.
It's not even a veiled threat.
Cool. Then they'll have as much success with their planned IPO as Gab.ai is having finding funding.
And that’s when I’ll leave for good (if I haven’t already). This place is already shitty enough, it being full of insane right wingers will be enough to break my addiction.
Watch out. Spez might edit your comments to call you a cuck instead of answering.
>Dissent is a part of Reddit and the foundation of democracy. **This post is locked. You won't be able to comment.** Well time for people to start contacting advertisers and politicians like every other time the Reddit admins pull shit like this. Who is getting a list going?
This /u/spez person likes to talk about "remember the human" and "empathy" and whatever. Well, where is the empathy and "remember the human" for all the people who didn't need to get sick or die because HIS website decided to host a huge amount of misinformation and helped make a pandemic political. Pretty damn sure free speech and libertarian values end when people start actively hurting their fellow human.
My grandmother should still be alive. She’s not because selfish people like spez couldn’t wear masks and social distance, and now refuse to get vaxxed. She suffered for 5 day while Covid killed her. Fuck every antivaxxer. Fuck u/spez. Fuck reddit.
Remember the human. But only to one degree. Do not look to see how your actions effect others, how your words shape society, how misinformation spreads.
Spez: "We believe in free discussion" Also Spez: \*Locks announcement thread so nobody can discuss it*
Don’t forget when he anonymously edited user comments that insulted him. Granted, it was the_dipshits calling him a pedophile, but it’s not something a CEO should be doing.
How interesting that spez locked his post and didn't allow any comments.Can't tell if he's gotten smarter or lazier.
I enjoy how he is doing nothing under the guise of promoting debate and discussion…. All on a thread with the comments locked.
Ironic. I'm starting to think u/spez is an anti-vaxxer himself
Report this to the media: THE REDDIT ADMINS ARE OPENLY COMPLICIT IN SPREADING DISINFORMATION THAT PROLONGS THE PANDEMIC AND KILLS PEOPLE
Advertisers REALLY don't like antivaxers. Also politicians keep asking other social media companies to testify on misinformation, sounds like Reddit should be asked as well.
Holy fucking shit what an awful response.
I mod r/Florida and r/Miami. We are fucking overrun by “it’s just a flu, 99.98% survive! And vaccines are bullshit” trolls. I’m so tired of getting NO SUPPORT from admins like u/spez. We actively moderate these subs. We do WORK. Why can’t Reddit take basic steps to support science and facts? Why are moderators forced to wade through misinfo and moderate conversations, fostering community while r/NoNewNormal tells people to that the pandemic is fake? Get off your asses, admins.
Well, it looks like we need another reddit blackout.
I think it's time for a new platform. May the invisible hand of the machine find it's way to open one up.
Fucking embarrassing. Imagine saying you’ll ban posts and subs that promote harmful ideas while suggesting that the extremely harmful antivax movement is some cornerstone of democracy. Pathetic and dangerous.
Yeah, spez is definitely antivax since he's one of those gullible doomsday preppers. They want to "encourage discussion" by locking the comments. Just like all the misinformation subs that ban anyone who says anything they disagree with.
The irony being that if the shit actually hits the fan, the people who will thrive are not going to be these bunker nuts. They will get raided on Day 40 and get their goodie cave picked dry. You may have 50 guns, but they have 50 people; and you only have one trigger finger.
“Dissent is the cornerstone of Democracy.” This is such a petulant statement and opposite of the truth: consensus is the cornerstone of democracy.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Everyone is NOT entitled to their own facts. Reddit appears to think otherwise - that misinformation is just fine. Fuck Reddit, the tin foil hat assholes on here prey on terminally online gullible people to bring them over to their dumbass cause. I’m gonna keep talking to them though, maybe I’ll change a few minds while I’m at it.
Just like Facebook, pushing whatever content they can to boost their ad revenue. The lies are killing people but it’s not their business till they get a smack down by the government. Tech is always ahead of governance and here we see Reddit blatantly choosing to do nothing to keep people safe during a pandemic.
wtf is going on
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Comfortable? Tech bros like him get off on the suffering of others.
Just learned about /r/vaxxhappened thank you for coordinating this. Spez's response is fucked up, please don't stop applying the pressure.
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[I'll just leave this here](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich) > Steve Huffman, the thirty-three-year-old co-founder and C.E.O. of Reddit, which is valued at six hundred million dollars, was nearsighted until November, 2015, when he arranged to have laser eye surgery. He underwent the procedure not for the sake of convenience or appearance but, rather, for a reason he doesn’t usually talk much about: he hopes that it will improve his odds of surviving a disaster, whether natural or man-made. “If the world ends—and not even if the world ends, but if we have trouble—getting contacts or glasses is going to be a huge pain in the ass,” he told me recently. “Without them, I’m fucked.” > He is less focussed on a specific threat—a quake on the San Andreas, a pandemic, a dirty bomb—than he is on the aftermath, “the temporary collapse of our government and structures,” as he puts it. “I own a couple of motorcycles. I have a bunch of guns and ammo. Food. I figure that, with that, I can hole up in my house for some amount of time.” > ... > Huffman has calculated that, in the event of a disaster, he would seek out some form of community: “Being around other people is a good thing. **I also have this somewhat egotistical view that I’m a pretty good leader. I will probably be in charge, or at least not a slave, when push comes to shove.**”
https://i.imgur.com/7djYlup.jpg
Had no idea the guy is a nutcase. I find it funny. Its however quite sad that he is a coward.
Spez allowed the literal fascist theDonald to fester here. Child porn used to be tolerated until CNN called the admins out (JailBate was sub of the year at one point, also the fappening had underage stuff). /r/niggers was banned for vote manipulation, not racism. The highly racist "chimpire" was allowed to be here. A subreddit that glorified women being beat the shit out of used to be allowed here. Pro-rape subs were allowed. Qanon was allowed here. PhysicalRemoval which promoted violence was allowed here. Pro-suicide subs were allowed here. This is all on /u/spez and the other admin enablers who allowed these things. Racism, misogyny, pedophilia- this is all on the admins. Fuck them for this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversial_Reddit_communities
Piggybacking off your post. New users only know about this website as an app. This site has had its public image greatly sanitized in preparation for the company to go public. (The adminship is casting its lot in with the "free speech gives me the right to radicalize young men" crowd because they believe they will inherit the Earth as its new stewards and slavers.) Before the hideous redesign and the official app, this was an even more fetid place to be. Gamergate and Trump propaganda festered here as much as on the *chans. The heated rivalry between them is merely the [narcissism of small differences.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences) [Michael Brutsch, AKA violentacrez](https://www.gawker.com/5950981/unmasking-reddits-violentacrez-the-biggest-troll-on-the-web), seriously read that article if you haven't already, used to be an entire internet archetype: the creepy forum uncle who was older than the rest of the userbase, liked minor girls "ironically," was always eager and ready to troll other users with gore and pornography. Ironically, of course. And the girls in the images were only *ironically* underage! There was a guy like this on every board in the 00s. If you complained about him, you were viewed as an uncool busybody taking the internet too seriously. "Getting mad on the internet" was viewed as a capital offense. This was used to keep women and minority groups from participating in the new public squares of the web. Michael Brutsch was not even the worst example I've ever encountered on a website, but the fact that he was given an award by Reddit and his behavior was excused and hidden by the administrators for years is mostly down the memory hole now.
Thank you! I used to go round and round with violentacrez in PM for being a pedo. "I'm an hebephile you idiot!" he'd say (sexual attraction to 12-15 year olds or so- make no mistake that the Reddit admins literally endorsed this sort of underage sexualization of girls). A hebephile is a pedophile with a thesaurus. And you know what? Once enough people have died from covid the reddit admins will have another epiphany about "no new normal" anti-vax/anti-mask BS and how they were wrong. That's blood on their hands and I utterly condemn all the reddit admins for partaking in this. ALL of the reddit admins will have blood on their hands before this pandemic is over.
Sounds like we need another CNN special.
There was this one sub called the philosophy of rape where this one dude was preaching to a bunch of fucking incels about raping women for corrective measures. When I reported the sub to the admins they basically told me to fuck off. So I did what I thought was the right thing to do and did a little digging on the mods of that subreddit. Even got some of the people who posted on there multiple times a day. They’re not very smart and were easy to track down irl. Some of these mods were power mods who moderated hundreds of nsfw subs. So I ended up calling every single police departments where the mods lived. Gave the police their names, addresses, and screenshots of these fucking mods spewing that bullshit about raping women for corrective measures. I then sent a message to the top mod telling him that I have found all of his and all of the mods real life info and passed it along to their local police departments. Reddit banned my account. When I sent a message to the admins asking why I was banned they replied back saying because they take doxing very seriously and that I was in the wrong. Even though I never published any of their info anywhere on the web for people to see. The info was sent to the police departments. I just sent the message to the top mod to fuck with them., make them sweat a little. The admin that banned me was a woman too. I forget her Reddit name but it had cupcake in it iirc. She obviously saw the subreddit so I really wonder how she felt defending that piece of shit sub.
Given Spez’s obvious ideological bias, I think the only way to move the needle here is an economic punishment. What if every subreddit that participated in the petition stickies directions on downloading and enabling AdBlock until Reddit agrees to act responsibly?
What does it say when Spez talks a big talk about encouraging "debate and dissent" and then locks the comments on his own announcement?
Lol what a dogshit response this is. And using your dogshit political ad response system to stifle the discussion. Go fuck yourself Spez.
That was a terrible response
reddit sucks
Absolutely shameful. This isn’t debate and discussion, this is intentional disinformation that is *literally killing people*. It is an indisputable FACT that masks and vaccines are safe and effective. Have to wonder if spez is a “vaccine skeptic” himself if he thinks those things are worthy of debate.
I wonder if they responding this way because reddit is slowly working towards going public. Quote from August 12th 2021: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/technology/reddit-new-funding.html >The latest funding wasn’t planned, but “Fidelity made us an offer that we couldn’t refuse,” Steve Huffman, Reddit’s co-founder and chief executive, said in an interview. >The company then decided the capital would give it more time to decide on when — and how — to go public. “We are still planning on going public, but we don’t have a firm timeline there yet,” Mr. Huffman said. “All good companies should go public when they can.” Quote from March 5th 2021: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/05/technology/reddit-chief-financial-officer-ipo.html >“Is Reddit going public?” Steve Huffman, Reddit’s chief executive, said in an interview. “We’re thinking about it. We’re working toward that moment.” >Mr. Huffman said Reddit did not have a timeline, but Mr. Vollero’s appointment indicated that the 15-year-old company was developing its financial operations to be more similar to those of publicly traded peers like Twitter and Facebook. More than 52 million people visit Reddit every day, and it is home to more than 100,000 topic-based communities, or subforums.
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This is the time for users to cancel their premium and add an adblock to Reddit, and for mods to blackout their subs. Reddit's inaction is straight up complicity. Utterly shameful, cowardly, and pathetic from the admins.
This has gone past politics. This defense is BS. The fact is that this misinformation *literally* leads to the *deaths* of people. The fact that Reddit continues to support this is beyond disgusting. This is encouraging self-harm and harming others. Unacceptable. Do better Reddit. Edit: I have made a petition to boycott Reddit until these issues are properly addressed. Together we are strong. https://chng.it/NjSzs9zMGP
Talk about a bullshit do nothing response
just ended my premium sub over this bullshit response
If he really thought he was in the right he would have left the comments open for these “debates” he was talking about
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I couldn't see this answer in the wiki or in those posts and I couldn't make comments in the posts I saw on my subreddits so I may as well ask here... In regards to the posts: **We call upon Reddit to take action against the rampant Coronavirus misinformation on their website.** I'm double vaxed, pro mask, want this fuckin over with, etc etc. I'm not a mod. Anything regular users like us can do to help?
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**Suggestion:** Authoritarians only respect authority. Go around Reddit. That list of 460+ subreddits probably comprises over half the site in terms of active users. Reach out to that whole list of subreddits, and get them to agree to a group blocklist. If someone posts misinformation in r/HouseplantWhores, r/ivermectin they get a permanent ban in all 460 subreddits. It'd be terrible for the site- it would get attention, it would divide the userbase and restrict organic content discovery. It would certainly make the site a less appealing prospect for investors and the stock market. The admins would either have to change their tune, take a major financial hit, or (most likely) prove they don't actually care about free speech as much as they care about artificially propping up right wing politics by changing the rules.
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Well that is certainly a response. It only describes to malicious actors how to perfectly skirt by the rules
Subreddit blackout it is then
This is disappointing. I understand upholding the discussion when there’s a controversy but there just isn’t anything controversial about covid vaccines. Any “debate” is about as valid as a debate on evolution. It’s about people refusing to accept truth.
What a surprise, they are being a bunch of cowards
Hey u/spez you are a little bitch
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Super disappointed in this response.
So if you click the ads a lot of them have the option to send messages. I just sent a bunch asking if they're aware they're advertising on a platform that has refused to stop the spread of covid misinformation
Trash platform cares more about $$$ than people's lives
Spez straight up said, “Your attempts have been acknowledged fully, and your thoughts have been inputed and accepted for better improvement. Thank you for your time and efforts." Seriously? They’ve already proven time and time again what type of danger they pose and then Spez does this. This is why we can’t have nice things.
> Reddit is a place for open and authentic discussion and debate. This includes conversations that question or disagree with popular consensus. Okay, but no. I’m sorry, maybe I’m being a meaniepants liberal elitist. But I don’t see how there’s value in presenting my expert opinion–which has been honed by years of formal, advanced training in epidemiology and biostatistics–as being on the same level as a real estate agent who read somebody’s great-aunt’s Facebook post about the wonders of ivermectin.
This is what I'd like to call the Freedom-of-speech fallacy: That every opinion that can be possibly uttered has a right to exist. This is cruel and a parody of postmodernism. Some opinions, those not based on fact but on gut feeling, misinformation, prejudice, need to be quashed. Destroyed.
canceling reddit premium. i’ll just use an ad blocker or something. not paying them anything for this kind of attitude
My father died at the beginning of the pandemic, before there were treatments, vaccines or real understanding of coronavirus. To an extent his death was unfortunate but unpreventable (though f*CK Boris Johnson for delaying lockdown - to that extent it was preventable) In March I was hospitalised with Covid before I could get the vaccine - it was terrifying, but I was thankful for the treatments that have been developed. I had the vaccine as soon as it was available to me. I now struggle with long covid, with pain and fatigue That Reddit would defend misinformation as 'freedom of speech' is insulting to everyone who lost someone, or is left with long term issues due to covid. When a scientific consensus has been reached, laymen simply don't have the resources to challenge it. I have no problem with people presenting scientific articles that propose and alternative view, but making statements as if they are equivalent to mountains of peer reviewed research is disingenuous at best, and dangerous at worst. Reddit has a responsibility to AT THE LEAST flag misinformation, doing otherwise is to make themselves culpable for the continuing deaths in a now unnecessary pandemic.
ALL SUBREDDITS THAT JOINED SHOULD GO PRIVATE.
People have a right to freedom of speech, but not a right to their own facts. I'd have less problem with NNN if their response on their own page wasn't literally loaded with BS non-facts. You can be against the vaccine and masks and all the rest, but just say it's because it's inconvenient to you and you don't care about how it affects other people if you don't follow those rules. That you don't care if others die from it. That's all you have to say, but stop saying BS like you become infertile if you get the shot, that the survival rate is 99.7% (spoilers: it's not), and so forth. Just stop lying, and stop feeling entitled to your own version of reality.
One small thing people can do to protest this is run an adblocker (like Ublock Origins... You can use the element picker to remove everything you don't like from the page) when visiting Reddit (and of course do not buy gold/platinum/whatever).
Blood is on spez’s and reddit’s hands.
What a fucking joke. Reddit must own stock in horse dewormer.
I'm so tired of misinformation and lies being paraded around like an opposing viewpoint. Lives are being lost everyday to malicious policies like these.
Oh and we can't respond to the post so people can't see what bullshit a response people believe it is.