The rot is also behind the scenes.

The "Anti Evil Ops" team are also full of braindead morons who do not distinguish between context and targeted harassment.

In a private sub (A PRIVATE SUB, FOR FUCK'S SAKE!), I quoted what a cop said to me when I went to report an assault and I got permanently suspended. (Cop said I was "probably being a [bundle of sticks].") The suspension reason? "Hateful speech."

Someone randomly posted a single word post ("N-hard-r!") in response to someone in a public sub. The post was still there one month later despite being reported by multiple people. Based on the user's posting activity, was not suspended for the slur, either.

There are people in trans subs who have been given suspensions for openly talking about the kind of harassment they've received and the things that have been said to them. Some of it instantaneous based on keywords. Some of the people I know who have appealed have had their appeals denied.

But apparently someone using a racial slur in a post all by itself with absolutely zero context for it is somehow acceptable in comparison.

Reddit had gone down some really questionable paths before, arguably tacitly allowing criminal behaviour on the site until it was noticed by the media... and then they draw the line at queer or trans people talking about their own experiences.

At this point I can only say "Everything." if someone were to ask me what is wrong with Reddit... and this is coming from someone who had a 14 year account on that site.

if I can be grandad for a second, I believe the internet got considerably worse when smartphones went mainstream.

This place has been impacted too, maybe I'm misremembering but I swear people never downvoted on here as much as they do today.

on reddit you can say something factual yet outside party line and can get downvoted to oblivion or get deleted on some subreddits but your post might survive on some other subreddit.

hn is just a big subreddit with one party line. we get bombarded by party propaganda. almost everything is anti-others. seeing through propaganda, stating the obvious or pointing the elephant in the room is autamatically and conveniently 'whataboutism'. and that is if you are lucky! you probably get deleted or worse shadowbanned. what a disgusting practice. what you are left with is posts written by seemingly brillant bigots and jingoists.

I wouldn't go that far, but it's certainly not a free speech platform. That does have its advantages, though. 4chan, for example, takes a toll on my mind -- even when I'm careful about which parts I visit.

for this particular thread you are right. i just hope the reason is not the volume of comments.