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by nabeelahmed13 4001 days ago
No one is "reducing" anything.

Altman is not justifying the arbitrary bans (or any Reddit admin shenanigans) here, that is not the topic of this sentence. He is talking strictly about one dangerous activity that gets offenders banned: death threats, which Ellen Pao (the human at the other end) received.

We don't know why Pao went out. We can suspect it was the backlash (more likely), or disagreements with the board [0] but we can suspect.

But that does nothing to make her opposition entirely legitimate, when at its strongest it was hijacked by namecalling, cyber-bullying, and yes, threats to Pao's life. The subset of Redditors who did this deserve to be told how shitty it is. The remaining, legitimate opposition should recognize the distinction.

[0] - http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/11/technology/ellen-pao-reddi...
3 comments
brighteyes 4001 days ago
> We don't know why Pao went out.

Why don't you believe her when she says it was a disagreement with the board over the future of reddit?

"We don't know" when the person in question is saying "this is why" is not very respectful.

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nabeelahmed13 4000 days ago
I understand your point. In the announcement over at Reddit, people have noted how much of a textbook PR move this is looking like, so I'm assuming the "this is why" is equally calculated and not the whole picture.

However, you're right. The two reasons are not mutually exclusive.

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mirimir 4001 days ago
Maybe she left after disagreeing with the board about how to respond to the backlash. Reddit could have easily nuked every account that disrespected and/or threatened Ms. Pao. But that would have been a different Reddit.
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stefantalpalaru 4001 days ago
> No one is "reducing" anything.

Do you see another reference to the overwhelming opposition inside the user base? Anything in the vein of "the mounting opposition convinced us that there's no point in fighting our users"?

Because from what I read in the announcement, the opposition is presented as a vocal, hateful and criminal minority that should absolutely not be mistaken for the "sweeping majority" that was "incredibly supportive" of the CEO.

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