Reddit banned a community made up mostly of men who blamed women for not losing their virginity or forming a relationship. (Reuters)
Social news aggregator Reddit banned a message board this week made up largely of men who accused women for their celibacy after the website began clamping down on groups that incited violence.
The subreddit "incel," meaning “involuntarily celibate” had some 40,000 subscribers and touted itself as a “support group” for men who were not intimate with a woman and did not have a significant other, The Guardian reported.
Some of the popular posts that appeared on the message board were titled “All women are sluts” and “Reasons why women are the embodiment of evil.”
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Incel, like most subreddits, had a list of rules for its subscribers to abide by. The subreddit did not openly ban women from using the message board but encouraged females not to use it because they do not face the same problem men do.
“Those who continuously claim there are as many female incels in the same situation as male incels will receive a warning and then a ban. Most can agree that women can be incel in some rare situations such as extreme disfigurement, but their numbers do not come close to male incels,” the subreddit read.
“Incels” dubbed women “femoids” or “female human organisms” who have sex with men dubbed “chads” or males who have sex.
The Guardian reported the subreddit’s subscribers advocated rape at times.
Reddit banned the community after it concluded the group violated its content rules.
The website recently updated its policy to prohibit content “that encouraged, glorified, incited or called for violence or physical harm against an individual or group of people,” The Guardian reported.
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“Communities focused on this content and users who post such content will be banned from the site. As of November 7, r/Incels has been banned for violating this policy,” a Reddit spokeswoman told The Guardian.
“Reddit is the home to some of the most authentic conversations online. We strive to be a welcoming, open platform for all by trusting our users to maintain an environment that cultivates genuine conversation,” the spokeswoman concluded.
The website has banned communities before including far-right group "alt-right," "fatpeoplehate," where subscribers posted pictures of overweight people, and "jailbait," where users posted pictures of underage teenagers.
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