Reddit announced policy changes to ban hate speech from the popular platform, bringing an end to pro-Trump forum “The_Donald.” Streaming platform Twitch also placed a temporary ban on Trump’s account for “hateful conduct.” These are the latest moves in the ongoing feud between Trump and social media platforms, including Twitter.
Reddit’s Policy Against Hate Speech
Reddit’s policy change said that subreddits and users promoting hate based on “identity or vulnerability” will be banned. The policy change is also to prevent spam and attempts to interfere with other communities. The change resulted in 2,000 subreddits being banned, including “The_Donald.”
They used the following criteria when placing bans:
- Abusive titles and descriptions (e.g. slurs and obvious phrases like “[race]/hate”).
- High ratio of hateful content (based on reporting and our own filtering).
- Positively received hateful content (high upvote ratio on hateful content).
Last year, the subreddit was “quarantined” — people trying to visit the subreddit would see a warning message before accessing it.
While Trump has no direct affiliation with the now-banned subreddit, NPR reports that Trump has also shared memes that were from the subreddit. The forum had more than 800,000 users before it was banned.
“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,” Reddit said in new content rules announced Monday.
Twitch’s Temporary Ban
Twitch banned Trump’s account after flagging a rebroadcast of Trump’s rally where he said that Mexico was sending rapists to the US. They also flagged racist comments from Trump’s Tulsa rally.
“Like anyone else, politicians on Twitch must adhere to our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines. We do not make exceptions for political or newsworthy content, and will take action on content reported to us that violates our rules,” a Twitch spokesperson told The Verge.
Trump’s Twitch page was first launched last year in October. The page broadcasted rallies and campaign events.
Reddit The Donald Ban — Sources
Reddit — Content Changes
NPR
The Verge