The popular social website Reddit has banned two subreddits—forums dedicated to specific topics on the website—for violating its content policy.
The subreddit r/uncensorednews and r/European were both banned, with users of the anti-hate subreddit r/AgainstHateSubreddits suggesting that mass reporting of hateful content was the driving force behind the bans.
The moderators of r/uncensorednews have also reportedly been banned.
Posts to r/uncensorednews oftentimes were blatantly or subtly racist, with recent posts discussing a race war in South Africa and what could be done to help white people if such a war was to take place. Some users of the subreddit would have swastikas on their profiles.
Islamophobic posts were also common on both r/uncensorednews and r/European.
In reaction to the news, members of the r/Islam subreddit expressed their hope that the infamous Donald Trump subreddit (r/The_Donald) would be banned as well. Donald Trump himself is reported to have made a number of posts onto the subreddit.
One user in r/AgainstHateSubreddits suggested that r/uncensorednews was banned due to a debate which was taking place in the community about whether Jews or Muslims are more dangerous.
Reddit is one of the most popular websites on the Internet, with over 500 million monthly pageviews.
There is much debate surrounding the censorship of “hate speech” on social networks and sites such as YouTube and Reddit. Conservatives believe that their opinions are being silenced and argue that the term “hate speech” is too broadly defined. Those who oppose them argue that more work needs to be done to ensure the Internet is a safe space.
