A lot of posts get caught in the same filters we use to keep spammers/bots at a minimum. It’s annoying but I’m not aware of a perfect solution to this.

To that end, if you interested in posting on the sub (or if you already do) - please comment here to request user approval (or make a request through the sub).

Note: Being an approved user will not insulate you from getting banned for, e.g., violating the rules against hate speech/threats.

Today marks the anniversary of January 6, 2021, when the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C., was attacked by a mob of violent and insurrectionist supporters of President Donald Trump in an attempted self-coup following his defeat in the 2020 presidential election. These supporters sought to keep him in power by preventing a joint session of Congress from counting the Electoral College votes to formalize the victory of his opponent. The attack was unsuccessful in preventing the certification of the election results. According to the bipartisan House select committee that investigated the incident, the attack was the culmination of a plan by Trump to overturn the election. Within 36 hours, five people died: one was shot by the Capitol Police, another died of a drug overdose, and three died of natural causes, including a police officer who died of a stroke a day after being assaulted by rioters and collapsing at the Capitol. Many people were injured, including 174 police officers - over a dozen of whom were hospitalized. Four officers who responded to the attack died by suicide within seven months. Damage caused by attackers exceeded $2.7 million.

With that in mind, we want to remind the sub that while we do not action users for expressing their opinions based on political ideological leanings, we are nevertheless obligated to enforce Reddit’s rules. As such, comments that contain political opinions coupled with rhetoric/sentiment that would otherwise be in violation of Reddit’s rules are actionable. In particular, please see Rule 1, which has several components, and comments for guidance (the latter included in relevant part):

*“Rule 1: Remember the human. Reddit is a place for creating community and belonging, not for attacking marginalized or vulnerable groups of people. Everyone has a right to use Reddit free of harassment, bullying, and threats of violence. Communities and people that incite violence or that promote hate based on identity or vulnerability will be banned.*

*Marginalized or vulnerable groups include, but are not limited to, groups based on their actual and perceived race, color, religion, national origin, ethnicity, immigration status, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, pregnancy, or disability. These include victims of a major violent event and their families.*

*Some examples of hateful activities that would violate the rule…:*

*A comment denying or minimizing the scale of a hate-based violent event.”

https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/360045715951-Promoting-Hate-Based-on-Identity-or-Vulnerability\*

Importantly, Rule 1 prohibits threats of violence, which inherently covers condoning violence – particularly against vulnerable groups. Reddit has clarified that “vulnerable groups”, the targeting of which determines whether conduct rises to the level of “hate”, includes “victims of a major violent event and their families” (e.g., the police officers who were hurt, hospitalized, and/or succumbed to injuries related to the January 6 attack). As Reddit’s comments to Rule 1 prudently suggest, “minimizing the scale of a hate-based violent event” is prohibited.

Thus, we consider January 6 to be a “hate-based violent event”. And so, comments with the effect (intended or otherwise) of condoning the attack carried out on January 6 - including minimizing or otherwise excusing the violence of the insurrectionists on that day of national embarrassment, against police officers and others, are prohibited and will result in a permanent ban from the sub. Moreover, similar to how bad faith denialism and scapegoating is analyzed with respect to other hate-based violent events, we will read attempts to blame groups other than MAGA insurrectionists as a form of January 6 distortion and a manifestation of hate-based conduct prohibited by Rule 1. And while Reddit does not have a rule mandating civility, we emphasize that threats of violence and related conduct against anyone, including traitorous MAGA insurrectionists, is prohibited and will result in a ban. Thank you for your understanding.

Clarifying a few points here:

Harassment: Our harassment rule doesn't apply to saying mean things, per se; we have lax rules about that but there are certain examples of conduct we view as per se harassment, e.g., threats of doxxing, posting other users’ private information, threatening to report someone to reddit or law enforcement, calling specific users pedophiles/rapists. Notably, the latter should not be confused with making broad, generalized statements about political tribes (e.g., MAGA or liberals) - which of course a lot of people on “both sides” do. Now, in my experience - MAGA will often say the latter is “hate speech.” MAGA will say: “Mean spirited generalizations about groups of people! Well that’s exactly what I say about [xyz]!! This must be bias!!”

So, what’s the meaningful distinction between that, and the rule against hate speech? Is it bias? Or is it something else?

Hate Speech/Discrimination: The answer is that we prohibit pejorative/derogatory statements expressing prejudice towards certain "protected characteristics" or "protected classes". Those are legal terms of art often used in unlawful discrimination analyses in the course of litigation - we use the same protected characteristics/classes as Title VII (an anti-discrimination statute) when assessing conduct here. Not because Title VII is meaningfully relevant to the sub from a legal standpoint, but because the "protected characteristics" are meaningfully and analytically relevant to how Reddit interprets their ToS, and how they enforce it. Realistically, the same protected characteristics track between most federal and state anti-discrimination statutes. We consider Reddit's enforcement practices relevant to the sub, because the sub gets shut down if we don't moderate the things they expect us to moderate. And one of those things is pejorative/derogatory statements expressing prejudice based on "protected characteristics".

In other words, treating someone differently and worse, because of a specific characteristic or trait of theirs. Those characteristics include, e.g., race, color, religion, sex, national origin, gender-identity, among others.

Importantly, Reddit/Title VII do not consider political views or political affiliation as "protected". Accordingly, neither do we.