With Totes being censored and a TMOR megathread being pushed as the official agenda, let's not forgot this

1  2018-10-11 by 1-800-YoureAShill

Inspired by a comment made by u/couchumina

Ban any user who breaks the rule . But going on about it public just creates more trouble. Like suicide and mass shooting publicity just makes people more aware of it and sees it happen even more . Lets says i get banned fir arguing with you and i see it as unfair what do i do. I know tmor is a place that annoys you and a place trolls go to comment on conspiracy sub . I know this because you make post almost weekly about tmor . What do you expect to gain from all these post . Why dont you do similar ones about other subs like a right leaning one that trashes anything against the president .

The part that stuck out to me was the part where he said

Lets says i get banned fir arguing with you and i see it as unfair what do i do. I know tmor is a place that annoys you and a place trolls go to comment on conspiracy sub

With all the obvious right wing propaganda accounts constantly making posts about TMOR brigading their partisan tactics it started to make sense. When liberals are banned from r/conspiracy where do they go with the account? I'm sure they don't really want to go to r/politics to read everything they agree with or get mad because someone already commented the joke they thought of. Right wing users who are banned easily go to The_Donald who delves into conspiracies against them and against democrats. They also used to have greatawakening.

Where do liberal conspiracists go when banned from this sub for being anti-Trump and saying it over and over? They know that users in this sub are protected and have a very specific message. Also they constantly go after one particular sub. So why not join that sub when banned to annoy those who scheme to control r/con?

The best course of action concerning TMOR is always rejected. Never mention them and totes is already censored to not let their "crossposts" from being seen here.

Honestly, it feels like a symbiotic relationship at this point. Right wing people need "shills" to validate their claims and left wing people need to gang up on an unpopular opinion.

32 comments

1  yellowsnow2 2018-10-11

People only get banned for rule violations. These aren't crazy rules to follow. The people who get banned do so because they are nasty people who have lost emotional control of themselves and lost the ability to be civil. These aren't hard rules to follow.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

You can be banned for calling someone retarded. (unless you are right wing, of course).

Yet, either way. People getting banned all the time for "trolling", not for "rule violations".

Everyone knows you get banned for saying slur words.

1  lohan0 2018-10-11

I found a few examples of moderators approving comments that would violate rule 10. Some are more egregious than others.

https://imgur.com/a/YVBVBXl

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

wowowowowow

Exactly. I'm noticing a particular trend by one mod. It's almost like they use that one mod account to ban and censor and defend.

1  aleister 2018-10-11

Looks like I'm the belle of the ball here. Since I never show up to comment on this stuff in TMOR it's so nice of you to bring it here.

Did you want to nitpick about the particular context or vocabulary used in any of these cherry picked examples?

And yes, they are cherry picked to convey an agenda. As the most active mod on this sub there are literally thousands of actions available to build any picture you want.

1  lohan0 2018-10-11

With all due respect, I fear negative repercussions, especially from a mod.

1  JakeElwoodDim5th 2018-10-11

Stopped reading at "right-wing".

I received a month-long ban for asking a random user if they were john mccain and how they're brain cancer was doing. Your post is nonsense.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

So you weren't banned perm? Probably because you stop reading at right wing and lust for Trump.

1  JakeElwoodDim5th 2018-10-11

It was essentially a final warning. So i could be, sure.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

Wow you got a warning too? Lucky.

1  ShittingOutYourTwats 2018-10-11

It just depends on which side you are who gets to say retarded or troll. Anyone really think rules are good? It's all a big joke.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

We don't even have free speech in this sub. People think reddit is censoring them? It is all just a big joke.

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

I think the hope is if r/conspiracy users and mods can gather evidence and make enough noise, the admins will help.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

I get the reason the megathread was created.

I think there is a thin line between brigading and participating. I think a brigade is a more direct call to action. "Hey look at this guy, downvote him." over "Hey look at this guy." Goes to downvote.

If we really want to stop brigades then why don't we make accounts specifically for the subreddit and all crossposting banned then?

Like in order to comment in r/takingThe_D you need an account specifically for that subreddit that can only comment in that subreddit.

Sounds dumb, right?

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

I think a brigade is a more direct call to action.

I'd say it's also a brigade when a group of people visit and disrupt a thread with votes and comments because it was linked from a meta subreddit.

There's many examples of this happening in popular subreddits like SubredditDrama and bestof.

For example:

  1. The most downvoted r/conspiracy comment this year is this one at -1300. According to the archive the comment score was -46 when it was linked in SRD, 18 hours after the comment was made.

  2. The second most downvoted comment is this one at -800. According to the archive its score was 5 when it was linked in TMOR 1.5 hours after the comment was made.

  3. The third is this comment at -430. TMOR thread

etc. etc.

Out of the 1000 most-downvoted r/conspiracy comments this year, 736 are in threads linked from TopMindsOfReddit.

Being linked by a meta subreddit has a noticeable effect on comment scores whether voting was explicitly called for or not.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

So your prime example of a comment being brigaded is a guy claiming the Earth is flat?

Being linked by a meta subreddit has a noticeable effect on comment scores whether voting was explicitly called for or not.

I would agree but then my thought goes back to why don't we make reddit disallow crossposting at all and you can only have an account for a specific sub. You could be posting in r/con, see that comment in SRD and downvote it because it said the Earth is flat and you already participate in the sub. So many situations like that.

The next comment was basically a right wing propaganda account agreeing with Kayne because Kayne agrees with him. About slavery being a choice and the claim that the slaves outnumbered the slave holders. Which is just not true.

The third comment is just laughable. Do you really expect these comments to be upvoted to a high amount if they were not linked?

Especially when PLC's comment was at +5 and he definitely has more than 5 alt accounts.

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

I feel like you just ignored everything about scores and brigading, and talked about the content instead.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

I can't make it any more clear when I say a brigade is a direct call to action.

I feel like you're ignoring that part when you move the goalposts to define it more broadly.

I feel like you are ignoring the content and only worried about the score.

Let me ask again. Do you expect those comments to be upvoted?

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

I can't make it any more clear when I say a brigade is a direct call to action.

I understand that. I disagree and responded to that twice:

"I'd say it's also a brigade when a group of people visit and disrupt a thread with votes and comments because it was linked from a meta subreddit"

"Being linked by a meta subreddit has a noticeable effect on comment scores whether voting was explicitly called for or not."

I feel like you're ignoring that part when you move the goalposts to define it more broadly.

I didn't move any goalposts or ignore what you said. I gave my opinion on what brigading is and gave examples of the effects it can have.

I feel like you are ignoring the content and only worried about the score.

  1. Because I'm talking about the effect brigading has on comment scores.
  2. I don't see how the content of the comment is relevant to that.

Let me ask again. Do you expect those comments to be upvoted?

I think it's irrelevant because I'm not talking about whether they are or aren't upvoted, I'm talking about how much their scores changed, when it happened, and how unusual such low scores are.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

The content of the comment dictates the direction of the votes.

Sure maybe you came across someone being linked and downvoted. That is entirely possible. But the content of the comments was going to be downvoted either way so what's the real difference if it's -100 or -1000?

What about all the people who naturally came across it and downvoted it? Now they are branded as shills and participating in your broad definition of brigading.

If the content sucks it's going to be downvoted and people may link it and downvote it even more. But what if they already participate in the r/con sub and came across the linked thread/comment?

Are you just not allowed to participate in a sub you already participate in, just because you may see a thread or comment linked on your front page?

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

But the content of the comments was going to be downvoted either way so what's the real difference if it's -100 or -1000?

Since we're talking about how the huge change in scores is evidence of brigading, it seems you're asking if brigading really matters, especially if it's just amplifying the current sentiment.

I think it does. I think it disrupts discussion, frustrates regular users, discourages others from posting, and can manipulate reader's opinions on topics.

Keep in mind, these are just a few of the more extreme examples. There are many comments that had the direction of their score flipped. Even the second example went from +5 to -800.

What about all the people who naturally came across it and downvoted it? Now they are branded as shills and participating in your broad definition of brigading.

I'm not talking about people naturally coming across a post and voting, and I'm not calling anyone a shill just for voting.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

I've already rejected your premise that is brigading. Brigading is a direct call to action.

It sure does manipulate. People think they are being downvoted by professional shills. What's to stop PLC from upvoting his comment 5 times. Archive it or whatever then wait until his post saying slavery is a choice is downvoted and call it a brigade?

It seems to me like you expect those comments to not have any downvotes at all. That is the real reason for calling everything a brigade.

1  f_k_a_g_n 2018-10-11

We disagree on the semantics. Does it matter what you call it when one subreddit linking to another causes a heavy change in vote scores?

What's to stop PLC from upvoting his comment 5 times. Archive it or whatever then wait until his post saying slavery is a choice is downvoted and call it a brigade?

Even if the comment would have eventually been downvoted by the r/conspiracy community, it would not have been -800. A comment score that low in this subreddit is an extreme outlier.

Here's a scatterplot of that thread: https://i.imgur.com/NWRDqtF.png

It's a snapshot showing the current score for each comment, and the time the comment was made for the first 48 hours. Comments in the chain linked from TopMindsOfReddit are marked with a red x and comments outside the chain are blue dots.

You can see comments in the linked chain have a much higher variance in score than comments outside the chain. It's easier to see with a boxplot: https://i.imgur.com/RHqdghL.png Comments in the linked chain are on the right.

This is common with other linked threads. I have some more examples here

This one: https://i.imgur.com/0HTjg2N.png shows a thread that was linked after it was removed from r/conspiracy.

It seems to me like you expect those comments to not have any downvotes at all. That is the real reason for calling everything a brigade.

I never said I didn't expect them to be downvoted. I've already responded to this at least once. I'm also not calling every downvoted comment a brigade.

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

Does it matter what you call it when one subreddit linking to another causes a heavy change in vote scores?

That's why I said something about that. Such as we cannot crosspost ever to eliminate any threat of that. But it's a stupid idea.

1  Robyn_Greene 2018-10-11

The simple point is, non crazy shit isn't as likely to get "brigaded". If were gonna post crazy shit here from time to time, you have to expect some ire from the outside. Its part and parcel of a public forum. This kind of activity is rife throughout reddit, so its not unusual that its happening here, it just seems more compounded because we deal in material that is generally more " out there" than most people are used to dealing with.

1  BigPharmaSucks 2018-10-11

I got suspended for participating in a Reddit thread that got linked from voat. No call to action of any sort, and I didn't upvote or downvote. Just participated in the conversation.

1  Drake02 2018-10-11

"Ban any user who breaks the rule . But going on about it public just creates more trouble. Like suicide and mass shooting publicity just makes people more aware of it and sees it happen even more "

Not as silly as comparing complaining about online hate subreddit with mass shootings, when it's more in the realm of David Hogg spreading 'awareness' in this weird hypothetical.

Also, your asking for more niche forums in a place that has been previously exterminating troublesome niche subreddits.

1  FartfullyYours 2018-10-11

The brigading of the megathread is evidence enough.

1  Ailurion 2018-10-11

There’s no such thing as a liberal or conservative conspiracist, if you consider yourself liberal or conservative anything you are ignorant, and that’s all you are. It’s all fake, how hard is this to understand?

1  1-800-YoureAShill 2018-10-11

There’s no such thing as a liberal or conservative conspiracist

Yes there is.

if you consider yourself liberal or conservative anything you are ignorant, and that’s all you are.

Eh true.

It’s all fake

Not really. They have some fundamental differences in opinion that's why they are divided.

1  Robyn_Greene 2018-10-11

The whole left right paradigm is just fuckin' infuriating. Ignoring shitposters is totally the best way to go, though. Anything else just feeds then