Earlier this week, Reddit announced a perplexing new plan to “contain” the worst bigots on the site. Instead of simply banning the bigots, their subreddits would simply be “reclassified.” Redditors would have to sign into them much as they now sign into the site’s NSFW subreddits, and, presumably to avoid angering advertisers, Reddit would remove all ads from them.
In other words, as I noted the other day, Reddit has decided to fight the bigots … by funding ad-free forums for them.
Well, the folks in the 4/chan subreddit (not 4chan itself; the Reddit incarnation of it) want to get into that sweet, sweet ad-free action. So one enterprising channer suggested that they spam a thread with the n-word to prove they’re as hateful as the hateful assholes of r/coontown:
![NIGGER POSTAs many of you have heard, reddit admins are now providing ad-free bandwith to racist hate subs... (self.4chan) submitted 21 hours ago by reese_ridley/he does it for free/[M] - stickied post ...and apparently the admins think we aren't racist enough to receive these great benefits. What the fuck? ITT we spam "nigger" to remove ads from /r/4chan forever](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/4chann.png?resize=433%2C249&ssl=1)
And spam they did. Here’s a portion of the top comment in the thread:
The comment continues on for a time in this fashion.
Other commenters had similar ideas; this one was so relentless I made a half-hearted attempt at censoring it.
![TasselHat [score hidden] 14 hours ago If you smell something funny when you walk down the street, you're in Coon Town. You look and see garbage all over the street, you're in Coon Town. Up and down the street there ain't nothing but trash, nigger girls trying to get a nigger boy's cash. Then you even see a spook with a big moustache, in Coon Town. On the corner there's a nigger with a drink in his hand, that's Coon Town. Trying to bum a nickel from whoever he can, in Coon Town. Don't be surprised, you can make a bet, if you go back tomorrow he'll be there yet. He's trying to get drunk and drunk he's gonna get, in Coon Town. Niggers never bother about going to work, in Coon Town. They seem to think that work is for jerks, outta Coon Town. They don't do nothing but sleep and doze, he don't wake until his eyes are tired of being closed. It's half a day's work for him to scratch his toes, in Coon Town. It amazes me to see the way they live, in Coon Town. They do all the taking while we have to give, to Coon Town. The White man worries, the nigger don't care, cause at the end of the month his check will be there. Every nigger earns his living off the old welfare, in Coon Town. Every nigger earns his living off the old welfare, in Coon Town. I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO I HATE NIGGERS YES I DO I HATE NIGGERS AND YOU SHOULD TOO](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/f4channcens.png?resize=580%2C486&ssl=1)
You get the idea.
Brilliant move, Reddit admins! You surrendered to the bigots and now they’re walking all over you.
H/T — r/GamerGhazi
Oh my God. Offering them a chance to be able to operate in an ad-free space didn’t work?
The swavastika is the counterclockwise symbol. And yeah, the Nazis managed to infuse the swastika with a tremendous amount of evil connotations in a relatively short timeframe. (Aside: the original non-Nazi swastika was not rotated 45 degrees like the Nazi flag symbol.)
@ Nequam
Yeah, those trailing arms are supposed to show the way it’s spinning (widdershins for those people who don’t use clocks).
Nazi iconography is an interesting if controversial subject. The colour choices for the flag for instance. Of course, since that Mitchell & Webb sketch (“Heinz, are we the baddies?”) even their Hugo Boss fashions have been nicely undermined.
@ WWTH
Is there *any* webby type thing that isn’t a hive of scum and villainy? (apart from here of course)
There are a lot of great commenters at Gawker and Jezebel, which is why I’m a regular. The writing is mediocre and the leadership poor. So semi accurate?
Alan: Personally, I think most of Freethought Blogs fits the bill. Pharyngula is notoriously rough on trolls and idiots, and it’s possible to get misclassified if you wander in unawares.
About the Gawker thing:
I see it as a positive: they were a gossip magasine to start with, and this used to be the sort of content they wanted. But they grew and the bar has been raised since, and their current public and direction don’t find it acceptable anymore. Posting this article was a bad thing, but in the past they wouldn’t have aknowledged it as bad. Any dinosaur wants to quit over it being pulled? They can go, the rest will be better for it.
I’ve seen some commentary that suggests it’s the fact that your not interacting face to face that explains why arseholery is so ubiquitous on the net. I suppose there may be some truth in that. Those of us who grew up before online life soon came to realise that if you acted like a knob you’d get decked.
I am still capable of putting my foot in it of course (as I often demonstrate) but it’s novel that the worst you get in return is a bit of a telling off, and via text too. In essence it’s a consequence free environment now so maybe that explains things.
I think it’s only true to an extent that the anonymity makes people more rude. A lot of people have no problem being rude to people’s faces or saying bigoted things in public. Those are probably the same people who are assholes on the internet. I kind of doubt there are that many people who are wonderful human beings in meat space and have secret lives as assholes online. I think maybe people who are privileged or sheltered think that anonymity causes cruelty because the internet is the only place they really notice how poorly people can treat others. Anyone who belongs to a marginalized group or anyone who works retail and food service and customer service already know that people are assholes everywhere, usually with little to no repercussion.
You’re probably onto something there. I don’t really see a lot of rudeness in real life because of the people I hang out with and the places I frequent. Even when I lived in London the worst I’d encounter would be someone not saying ‘thank you’ when you let them out in traffic or something.
In my world, people are either impeccably well mannered or trying to kill you (surprisingly they’re not mutually exclusive) but rarely boorish.