The Reddit purge is back in action ... again.
To weed out racist, sexist and other offensive material on the site, new CEO Steve Huffman updated the Content Policy on Wednesday.
One banned subreddit included comments from thousands of people, detailing how to rape women and providing justifications for doing so. It was banned for "inciting harm against other," Reddit said.
Huffman, who co-founded Reddit, also introduced a new policy called "Quarantining" where some subreddits will only be visible to those opt in to see them. They plan to target accounts which the average redditor is likely to find "extremely offensive."
Highly-critized racist subreddits were banned too.
The company said, they "[existed] solely to annoy other redditors, prevent us from improving Reddit, and make Reddit worse for everyone else."
First founded in 2005, Reddit -- "the front page of the internet"-- was known for encouraging all sorts of open dialogue. But Reddit has constantly been plagued by finding the right balance between allowing free speech and curbing hate speech.
Huffman put a few new rules in place when he resumed his past role as CEO last month. He prohibited the Reddit community from posting spam, illegal material, sexual images of minors, bullying and private and confidential information.
In February, Reddit banned revenge porn under former CEO Ellen Pao's leadership. In May, she put an anti-harrassment policy in place too.
Pao also attempted to oust fat shaming, gay slurs and racist speech in June. But she increasingly locked horns with moderators while obstructing posts and issuing bans. The backlash eventually compelled her to step down from her post in July.
