I am not a fan of the overall ethos in /r/fatpeoplehate. But look. Sure, it's kind of sad that grown adults get together to feel self-superior and say hateful things about others. The way they dehumanize obese people disturbs me.

But people will do what they're going to do. There's no real point in banning that shit for "free speech" reasons. It's kind of shitty to take a cell phone pic of someone in a Walmart, just so that you can make fun of them online. That's low. That's some fucking middle school shit. But people can be unpleasant. No one is going to stop people from behaving that way. The only way they'll stop is if they look at themselves and realize that it's not right to dehumanize other people like that.

Look, I've been the /r/fatpeoplehate. People there like to circlejerk about how others on Reddit complain about them. It feeds into the perverse social solidarity that ties that place together. People unite when they feel somehow oppressed. Banning /r/fatpeoplehate will only strengthen that community, not dissolve it.

But let's get real. Naturally, "creating a safe space," and protecting people from being offended, isn't the real reason for banning "harassing" subreddits. As someone already pointed out in the comments on /r/announcements, it's about making Reddit more palatable and friendly to advertisers.

For example, let's look at why /r/fatpeoplehate was banned, but evidently, /r/coontown is still up and running. This is my hypothesis: subs that were targeted are the ones with higher traffic. As sad as it is, /r/fatpeoplehate is popular. It makes /r/all on a fairly regular basis. It's highly visible. The nail that sticks out gets pounded down.

It's all about making Reddit look good for advertisers. Reddit has struggled to monetize in the past, and like it or not, I strongly suspect that they're headed in that direction. If a sub that gets big enough is deemed "offensive," it will be eliminated. Why? Because Reddit probably doesn't care about what goes on with 100 people on some tiny little sub. But they only want "safe" content to make the signed-out Front Page and /r/all. They don't want Reddit novices or advertisers to pull up Reddit and see that stuff. They want some not-so-controversial news pieces and plenty of nice, vapid, palatable jokes and memes.

"Safe space" is right. But it's not about being "safe" for the individual. It's about being "safe" for advertisers to reach as many people as possible.

To me, the saddest thing about this, is that it's not some grand conspiracy of politicians or corporations. It's not even about trying to stifle free speech among the populace about political ideas or controversial views. It's about advertising. It's about selling more products to consumers. Reddit is curtailing free speech to sell more Coca-Cola, more iPads, more fast food. And that's just depressing.