[nerdsniper]

Both of those are heavily astroturfed / propagandized. Historically they often did reflect the views of supporters, because the subreddits mirror the talking points presented across all other conservative media - and most conservatives adopt their beliefs from those media sources. Thus, even though the voices you read on the subreddits are mostly "bots", they typically mirror the sentiment you'll hear from the actual people.

However, this is not guaranteed to always be the case - and regardless, the voices on r/conservative and r/asktrumpsupporters are not necessarily actual real people's voices, even if they usually say similar things as real people.

Yes, I recognize this has echoes of the "no true scotsman" fallacy, but it's just an accurate description of the system.

[JCattheATM]

> Both of those are heavily astroturfed / propagandized.

I'm pretty skeptical of that, honestly. I think if we apply Occam, it's just that there are enough people that do feel like that. Look at some of the Jubilee 'Surrounded' videos to see that such people are not in short supply.

There's not much financial motive in building up or buying accounts just for them to say they agree with what's going on - it doesn't help anyone in power right now. Anecdotal, but the users I check the profile history off seem legitimate posting across several different subs also.

[Timon3]

> I'm pretty skeptical of that, honestly. I think if we apply Occam, it's just that there are enough people that do feel like that.

After following that sub fairly closely in the days after big scandals on the GOP side since Jan 6th, I can personally vouch for r/conservative being incredibly controlled and propagandized.

Not only do the mods delete many even slightly critical comments by their own flaired conservative users pretty quickly, almost any thread about a scandal or gaffe that's not filled with one-sided commentary is also deleted after a few days. The last big example I remember was the tariff stuff over the last year - there were always at least three or more posts about any new announcement, and the ones with the most negative comments were gone after a few days.

I can't show you archived data since those tools stopped working due to AI scraping, but I implore you to at least follow a few negative threads and to take regular snapshots. I've never seen any other internet community that's modded so strictly without admitting to it.

Here's a post I've found recording some of this for the recent ICE murder: https://www.reddit.com/comments/1qlzhb3

And here someone analyzed the patterns of their major posters - showing that a few accounts make up most new posts: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1p1vx9n/oc...

[JCattheATM]

And yet, you can still go to any thread, find dissenting and sometimes negative opinions by users with accounts that are several years old.

I'm not claiming it's super reliable or super representative, but I do think it is representative as one point, and despite all the issues around the sub, that representation matches most other sources. Except a few polls, which I don't think count for much these days.

[Timon3]

It's as far away from representative as it can be. Again, I have not come across any comparably propagandized space anywhere else.

[JCattheATM]

> It's as far away from representative as it can be.

Nah. If that were the case, it wouldn't match conservative opinions from so many other sources.

Let me ask you something. You said you're 'from the GOP side above'. Can you rule out confirmation bias here, that you don't want to be affiliated with support of what is going on, so you're focusing on evidence that you think shows that your 'side' doesn't support it?

[estearum]

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trumps-immigration-approval...

https://www.gelliottmorris.com/p/new-poll-trump-slips-on-imm...

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2026/01/26/polls/times-s...

[Timon3]

I never said I'm 'from the GOP side above'. Yes, I can rule out confirmation bias.

[bigbadfeline]

> I think if we apply Occam, it's just that there are enough people that do feel like that.

Enough bots for sure. Who's got the bot farms? See them in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsl_sKYywEI

[JCattheATM]

Also enough real genuine people.

[direwolf20]

You can try an experiment for yourself. If you have a Reddit account, comment something on one of these subreddits that doesn't toe the party line. Wait less than 24 hours until your comment is removed and you are banned.

[JCattheATM]

What do you think that proves, though? Yes, they don't let anti-conservative people comment in the sub, that doesn't mean the people that are posting are bots or paid.

[nikau]

It's the same as all the Tesla subreddits, they ban and delete anything negative so casual readers don't get anything but a very biased and curated viewpoint.

They are propaganda from vested interests.

[muwtyhg]

Even worse, the subreddit they are using as their example of common "conservative thought" is a subreddit where only verified Conservative users can post, and any dissenting opinion is met with bans and post deletion. You have to go to their Discord and provide enough proof your are conservative (MAGA) before they will let you post.

It's not indicative of how people feel in general. It's a very specific, coaxed and managed image.

I am not lying when I say the front page of the Conservative subreddit is run by less than 10 accounts. You can go there now and see that most of the submissions on the front page of the subreddit is split between the same 3-4 users at any given time.

[JCattheATM]

It's representative of the opinions conservatives share. There are many more commenters than submissions, and other conservative subs like asktrumpsupporters show the same sentiments.

A lot of conservatives in this discussion suddenly seem embarrassed by the side they chose and really want to distance themselves from it.

[amenhotep]

The conservative subreddit isn't fake as such, it's just incredibly tightly curated and so not in any way representative. Number of deleted comments is a better barometer than tone of remaining comments, if still not a great one, because you're simply not going to see any significant number straying too far from the party line.

[JCattheATM]

I mean, there's plenty of disagreement to the point many call anyone who dissents "fellow conservative", which has become kind of a joke. The official line is they remove any non-conservative posts, which doesn't seem relevant when assessing to what extent conservative posters support what is going in with ICE currently.