r/PubicSphere

Reddit is a common public sphere that I use. Or rather, Reddit is a hub for a multitude of my own personal public spheres.

As each subreddit focuses on one specific topic or point of interest, each forum could be considered its own miniature public sphere. This allows for people to get news about their one particular interest and discuss it with others, without being bombarded by issues they aren’t concerned about.

While Reddit is a hub for like-minded people to meet and discuss their correlating interests, which allows for the inclusivity of every demographic, it can also allow for the forming of more negatively-driven communities. While the majority of the platform encourages respectful and supportive discussion, there are still many subreddits which support hateful, cruel or insulting posts.

As there is such an overwhelming number of subreddits, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for the site to locate and erase the harmful forums. It has also become much more challenging to regulate individual posts on the platform, so moderators (the subreddit creators) often have to maintain the communities themselves, which becomes difficult when hundreds of thousands of people are posting in the one subreddit. This usually means that the moderators rely on bots to regulate posts, however, which posts should be removed can be confused with what shouldn’t.

While nobody is expressly excluded from Reddit, a Redditor can have their account temporarily or permanently suspended if they violate Reddit’s content policy. Redditors can also be banned from specific subreddits if they break the rules concerning that forum. While this is mostly used to maintain the quality, integrity and purpose of the subreddit, it can be abused by moderators. This happened recently when the subreddit r/dankmemes removed European Redditors following the passing of Article 13 in Europe.

The range of communities on Reddit alone is astounding. While it is far from a perfect platform, with over one million subreddits, anybody could find personal communities concerning their own niche interests. But it shouldn’t be forgotten that Reddit itself is considered a public sphere. Many social media trends, memes and movements originate there, where the idea is spread from one community to another until bleeding into other platforms. Unlike other popular social media sites, you’re connected to complete strangers and people outside of your regular circle to discuss common interests, making it easier for people to create their own personal digital space.