What a terribly written, poorly researched, ignorance laden article. Not that any of the other similar articles about this issue have been any better.
Yes, free speech is exactly about saying and hearing from others that which one may find "offensive" or "tasteless" or "cruel", etc.
The real issue here is that while the reddit admins and owners are completely within their right to mold the website and the community it contains to take a shape of their choosing, there are better ways to go about this than the hamfisted and juvenile methods they've used up to now.
The real question is this: is their poorly thought out and even more poorly executed plan actually accomplishing their goal?
Obviously not.
As the admins, you don't create a higher quality community by poking users in the eye and dancing gleefully at their howls and ignoring any and all legitimate concerns they bring up in their attempt to engage you.
Here I'm referring to the /r/announcement comments where the admins go to great lengths to avoid any real dialogue to the many polite and well informed questions and comments that brought up the painfully obvious issues they won't or can't address.
It is very very difficult to mold and moderate an online community but it can be done. There are great examples out there. Go and study them and see what they did. Each experience is unique but they all have at least one lesson for reddit admins, should they care to listen and learn from them.
Bringing down the ban hammer indiscriminately on a 'fat hate' subreddit while allowing hundreds of others even worse (/r/coontown for example or /r/gasthekikes or many others) may be easier in the short term but it will accomplish nothing but worsening an already bad situation.
Here's just one example of a community doing it right:
>The real question is this: is their poorly thought out and even more poorly executed plan actually accomplishing their goal?
You're assuming that the politically convenient goal of "improving the community" is the primary motivation behind the decision. Banning those subs makes a hell of a lot more sense if it's viewed as a political favor. Imgur staff recently had a tiff with the admins of FPH, /r/neofag criticizes a specific forum that's popular with the social-justice crowd.
That's certainly a possibility. I wanted to give the admins the benefit of the doubt. Even in such a best case scenario they come across as grossly incompetent. In your case scenario they come across as corrupt.
Yes, free speech is exactly about saying and hearing from others that which one may find "offensive" or "tasteless" or "cruel", etc.
The real issue here is that while the reddit admins and owners are completely within their right to mold the website and the community it contains to take a shape of their choosing, there are better ways to go about this than the hamfisted and juvenile methods they've used up to now.
The real question is this: is their poorly thought out and even more poorly executed plan actually accomplishing their goal?
Obviously not.
As the admins, you don't create a higher quality community by poking users in the eye and dancing gleefully at their howls and ignoring any and all legitimate concerns they bring up in their attempt to engage you.
Here I'm referring to the /r/announcement comments where the admins go to great lengths to avoid any real dialogue to the many polite and well informed questions and comments that brought up the painfully obvious issues they won't or can't address.
It is very very difficult to mold and moderate an online community but it can be done. There are great examples out there. Go and study them and see what they did. Each experience is unique but they all have at least one lesson for reddit admins, should they care to listen and learn from them.
Bringing down the ban hammer indiscriminately on a 'fat hate' subreddit while allowing hundreds of others even worse (/r/coontown for example or /r/gasthekikes or many others) may be easier in the short term but it will accomplish nothing but worsening an already bad situation.
Here's just one example of a community doing it right:
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/monster-hu...
Want more examples? Metafilter, hackernews, etc.