I don't appreciate the insinuation, I generally expect more from HN. But I'll bite.
I've only ever been banned once, myself. I used the words "January" and "6" in close proximity in a discussion, and it turns out it is an unwritten rule that you may not mention that date. I've had friends get banned because they posted in an unrelated subreddit that the moderators did not like. And I've seen randos banned for nothing more than observing that the moderators were reactionary. No attacking, no profanity or anything like that, just an observation and -bam-.
You can see hints of the frequency by the sheer number of "[deleted]" accounts that show up in a typical large discussion.
Reddit is a cesspool these days. Virtually all major subreddits are now dominated by politics, and you get banned quickly if you say something which is perceived to be against the preferred ideology of the moderator.
That is where the problems have risen, by allowing politics in discussions. There's a very good reason politics and religion were historically banned in forums and groups. It appears we need to learn the lesson again.
Also, moderators are people and they're not perfect. Unfortunately allowing political discussion in also brings out political bias in the mods and it gets out of hand.
Twitter on the other hand pretends we don't need moderation, but then arbitrarily bans people because something. There's no clear guidelines, no consistent behaviour and mod-by-ML is useless in the end. It's a perfect example of 'free speech' implemented by someone who has no real idea what that means.
Comments
I don't appreciate the insinuation, I generally expect more from HN. But I'll bite.
I've only ever been banned once, myself. I used the words "January" and "6" in close proximity in a discussion, and it turns out it is an unwritten rule that you may not mention that date. I've had friends get banned because they posted in an unrelated subreddit that the moderators did not like. And I've seen randos banned for nothing more than observing that the moderators were reactionary. No attacking, no profanity or anything like that, just an observation and -bam-.
You can see hints of the frequency by the sheer number of "[deleted]" accounts that show up in a typical large discussion.
Reddit is a cesspool these days. Virtually all major subreddits are now dominated by politics, and you get banned quickly if you say something which is perceived to be against the preferred ideology of the moderator.
That is where the problems have risen, by allowing politics in discussions. There's a very good reason politics and religion were historically banned in forums and groups. It appears we need to learn the lesson again.
Also, moderators are people and they're not perfect. Unfortunately allowing political discussion in also brings out political bias in the mods and it gets out of hand.
Twitter on the other hand pretends we don't need moderation, but then arbitrarily bans people because something. There's no clear guidelines, no consistent behaviour and mod-by-ML is useless in the end. It's a perfect example of 'free speech' implemented by someone who has no real idea what that means.