There's this assumption about Reddit that they're not censoring all the truly shitty subreddits and speech because they've got a libertarian hard-on for free speech. Which is truly bizarre because an organization that functions entirely by "shadow banning" is about as free speech as Pinochet's Argentina.

And it's not like nobody saw what happened with the FPH fiasco or the Victorian era. It was abundantly clear to anyone watching Reddit from Low Earth Orbit or closer that nobody at Reddit from Alexis to the moderator of /r/(your username here) has the ability to do more than play whack-a-mole with hate speech.

Take it further back: The Fappening had every likelihood to cause dire financial damage to Reddit and Reddit had zero ability to keep naked celebrities off the front page. Or further back: well-meaning vigilantes caught up in the furor were all set to lynch the wrong guy for the Boston Marathon bombing ("good thing he was already dead," he said macabrely). Or further back: SomethingAwful spooked Reddit into pulling down /r/creepshots. What happens? /r/girlsinyogapants and a million other subreddits. To glance at the history of Reddit is to view a failed attempt at censorship. They just don't have the tools. They just don't have the manpower. They just don't have the architecture. And they never will.

Reddit's alignment with "free speech" isn't just pragmatic, it's craven. The way you build up an internet culture of respect is through leadership and hands-on community management. Reddit has never been about that and never will be. Alexis and Steve are hucksters that managed to fob off a BBS on Conde Nast for $7m. Then Y-Combinator managed to sell a 7-year-old eyesore to Silicon Valley as a "startup" for $50m. Could you build Reddit into a site that values personal expression but also civilized discourse? Sure... eight years ago. The fact of the matter is, anonymity breeds antagonism and when a negative statement has seven times the emotional impact of a positive one, upvotes and downvotes probably shouldn't be equally weighted.

Demanding Reddit be civilized is like demanding Donald Trump be sensitive. It makes you feel good but you both know nothing will ever change. They just don't have the tools. If they did, it wouldn't be Reddit.