The Big Reddit Quarantine Begins

Since new CEO Steve Huffman took the reins at reddit, its community has been bracing itself for a promised purge of the site’s “dark side”, where users engage in discussion and activity related to, let’s say, ‘taboo’ subjects. And so, it has begun, but in a far more humane manner than was anticipated. Rather than ban the edgier subreddits, they have instead been ‘quarantined’; effectively, groups such as /r/gore, /r/CuteFemaleCorpses, and /r/SpaceDicks are now locked away as subscription entities.

So, what does that mean? We’ll let reddit itself explain:

Reddit’s content policy update was implemented two weeks ago with the censoring of a handful of violence-inciting racist groups. The policy has been increasing in magnitude over the last two weeks, and is set to continue indefinitely.

The quarantined subreddits will continue to exist, but reddit will essentially pretend that they don’t, so that new users don’t accidentally stumble upon them.

Quelle surprise, some users are not happy:

While others are happy to compromise:

While most of reddit’s “dark side” has been sent to the naughty step, there are a handful of truly offensive subreddits that have been ejected from the premises entirely. The hateful subreddits /r/GasTheKikes and /r/KillingWomen – amongst a number of other aggressively racist, misogynistic, and homophobic groups – are now subject to outright bans.

Thank you NMR for providing us with this information.