I lurked Reddit for a long time before creating an account which is now over 6 years old. I was a ‘Top Contributor’ and in the rewards program. 89k karma, never promoted violence or targeted any group, but I got a 7-day ban which was followed up hours later with a permanent ban. This is because of a comment criticizing Senator Radcliffe, trump, and Musk. The comment included profanity, (I called them hypocrites and cunts), but it wasn’t directed at any user or marginalized group. Just harsh political commentary.
Reddit initially issued a 7-day ban, which I appealed. That appeal was approved, the comment was restored, and they admitted it didn’t violate the rules. But the permanent ban still stands, and my follow-up appeals on that have been ignored. No explanation. No transparency. Just gone.
It’s made me realize how fragile “free speech” is on platforms like Reddit. You can insult regular users and get away with it, say horrendously racist, misogynistic, and homophobic things, but speak too plainly about powerful people and suddenly you’re promoting “hate.”
I combed through the Reddit rules, and nothing I have ever commented or posted violates them.
That’s the reason I’m here on Lemmy now. I’m trying to read more, scroll less, and engage with platforms that aren’t actively censoring political dissent. Who else is in the same boat? Is there anything that can be done to hold Reddit accountable or make people aware of they way they are censoring speech? This is my first Lemmy post. I marked it NSFW because of the profanity.
Congrats. Now you can go to lemmy.ml and get banned for the exact same thing.
Holy crap that is EXACTLY what happened to me this week. I wasn’t top contributor or anything so grand but I got a 7 ban after criticizing imperialism which after making an appeal that was rejected. I literally did nothing afterwards but woke up to a perma ban that was issued several hours after with no indication of why.
Edolf 🤣 using this from now on
I got banned for repeatly saying ashli babbit deserved a bullet. Got classified as promoting violence
FWIW, you’re right, she did.
Her estate should have been sued to recoup costs for the bullet and the officer’s medical expenses.
Well, that is pretty direct.
Same, happened to me hours ago, with no message stating why, or no recourse.
Elon whined to Spez to do something about Redditors being mean to him.
I guess it worked. Fuck both of them.
There is these blanket responses that goes like this: “Free speech is only that the government can’t punish you” and “It’s a private company it can moderate how it wants”. I take a lot of issue issue with it. In our times the wast majority of speech takes place on online on privately owned plattforms. I don’t se what the point is in freely submitting to a world where only corporate approved speech is allowed.
First permaban was for asking: “Any updates on Mitch McConnell? I could use some good news.” Mod appeal denied
Then on another account a year later (bc I got so many death threats from Nazis on Reddit), I forgot I had a ban on that sub and said, “We should spend money feeding our kids instead of spending it to blow up someone else’s kids.” And that was an IP ban.
Crazy, I’ve seen literal Nazis on there not even get comments removed. We live in dark times.
the first reason was ridiculous, jyust for asking that question? you know it turning right wing, when you cant even IMPLY things. i used accounts like you did, dint get ban that aggressively, maybe because i was also using multiple locations, confused reddit for a while.
Same loool Let’s make Lemmy grow and leave any centralised social network.
Sounds good to me!
I got banned about a year ago for… checks notes repeatedly calling a genocidal army “bastards” =,D
Edit… ok maybe I called them sons of bitches and nazis.
They especially hate it when you’re correct.
Or constantly criticize Capitalism.
Consider yourself lucky to be off that fascist bootlicking platform
My 11 year old account got banned and I’m not even sure why. I posed a lot over the years. They said I was banned, pointed to a deleted comment. When I asked what the comment said they replied the reviewed the ban and now I’m banned.
I believe it was for a comment about how America would be in trouble if they invaded Canada (I’m Canadian). I stated some basic facts that Canadians look like Americans and they will attack America on American soil. It was matter of fact, not promoting any sort of violence.
Whatever. America is dying. I suppose services hosted on American soil die right along with it. We’re actively avoiding as many US products and services as possible, so Reddit can kick rocks.
I discovered Lemmy, it suits my needs and I like it better.
right now, right wingers need to take over many western countries, and reddit wants to stop that discussion, at the behest of MUSK.
Likewise.
My first offense was recommending that we bring back the guillotine.
My second offense was saying that MTG and fElon needed to get punched in the face after they said that Sesame Street was woke trash that needed to be canceled.
Fuck those vile pieces of shit!
Over 13 years and a quarter million karma later, it has come down to this.
Perma-banned for fighting back against the fascist take over of Reddit
Welp, said Elon needs to be assassinated for involving himself in European politics as a non European plutocrat
I got shadowbannned after posting about politics.
I never called for or celebrated violence, didn’t upvote pictures of Luigi (which they have a STRANGE hard-on for) or any of that. I just posted neutrally-worded opinions.
Shadowbanning is an abusive behavior and Reddit has been about that for well over a decade. On Twitter, you do something they don’t like, they just tell you, “you have to delete this tweet and wait 12 hours” or whatever. On Reddit, your account just gets “weird” with strange error messages. You have to go digging for information on the phenomenon because they don’t display a message or send an email about it.
The cute little aliens are there to paper over the fact that Reddit’s leadership has no concept of user advocacy. You’re just rows in a few tables to them. You’re the product that’s being sold, and as far as they’re concerned that gives you the same rights as any other product on a shelf.
They are still sending me emails with cute little aliens in them, even though my account is hosed. This is how disjointed they are.
Someone else wrote that on Reddit, the users and admins hate each other. I think that’s true.
uusually they shadowban people for being repeat ban evaders, now they are doing it for any reason. thier filters also caught innocent in the crosshairs too.
