Is Reddit an Escape from Social Media Madness?

[mike carey]

We've had references here to Reddit threads in all sorts of topics (and its range of subreddits is one of its characteristics). I confess I hadn't paid much attention to it, rather I'd read threads there in isolation.

I know that in the past it had a reputation for being something of a free-for-all sewer, but this article from the Atlantic paints a different picture. I was particularly taken by the reference to a Lurkers subreddit that had tens of thousands of followers but NO ONE had posted anything in it.

If nothing else, this is a rather whimsical read. I apologise to anyone who has already used their monthly quota of free Atlantic articles, but you could always clear them from your cache.

The Fundamental Humanity of Reddit - The Atlantic

WWW.THEATLANTIC.COM

---

Reddit’s not perfect, but it may be the best platform on a junky web.

I'd be interested in anyone else's opinions of, or experiences in Reddit.

[+ Cash4Trash]

I want to stay involved with social media in some way and visit Reddit daily. Dropped Facebook and never bothered with other sites. On Reddit you choose the subreddits you want to visit, there are thousands of them. I enjoy: r/movies, r/uppereastside (each neighborhood has a subreddit), r/askoldpeople, r/worldmews, r/television and r/aww (cute pets). You can build an internet community of like minded people and not have raging political nut jobs shoved down your throat. The site, in general, skews left but there are conservative subreddits as well, I just don't choose to visit them, mainly because they've all joined the Trump can do no wrong camp. Keeps me involved but in a most enjoyable way. I'd say more but now I have to go look at cute cats on Reddit. 

[mike carey]

@Cash4Trash thanks for some suggestions!

[+ Pensant]

I enjoy going down Reddit rabbit holes too. I’ve learned a lot, everything from supplements to neighborhood ratings.

[56harrisond]

1 hour ago, mike carey said:

 

The Fundamental Humanity of Reddit - The Atlantic

WWW.THEATLANTIC.COM

---

Reddit’s not perfect, but it may be the best platform on a junky web.

 

 

April 2025 Issue

Technology
The Nicest Swamp on the Internet
Reddit’s not perfect, but it may be the best platform on a junky web.

By Adrienne LaFrance

In the ever-expanding universe of obsolete sounds, few can compare to the confident yawp of a dial-up modem. Back in the early days, the internet was slow, but we didn’t know it yet. Or at least we didn’t care. And why should we have? The stuff of the web was organic, something you had to plant and then harvest. It took time. Websites popped up like wildflowers. Far-flung enthusiasts found one another, but gradually. Nobody owned the web, and everybody did. It was open, and everything seemed possible. Everything was possible. Maybe it still is.

Strange things are happening online these days. Strange bad, clearly. But also strange good. One unexpected development is that Reddit, long dogged by a reputation for mischief and mayhem, has achieved a kind of mass appeal. If you ask your friends where they’ve been hanging out online lately, you’re likely to hear some of them say Reddit, actually, perhaps with a tinge of surprise.

Reddit’s founders didn’t set out to save the web. College roommates Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian wanted to create a mobile food-ordering service. But their idea didn’t make sense, at least not at the time. It was 2005; the iPhone didn’t exist yet. So they built something else, no less ambitious: a site that promised to be “the front page of the internet.” Reddit was a place to share all manner of memes, photographs, questions, embarrassing stories, and ideas. Users could upvote posts into internet virality, or sometimes infamy. Eventually, they built their own communities, known as subreddits.

The joy of Reddit comes from it being simultaneously niche and expansive—like an infinite world’s fair of subcultures.
For the first decade of its existence, Reddit was not exactly a respectable place to hang out. Like its spiritual cousin 4chan, Reddit was primarily known for, among other things, creepshots, revenge porn, abject racism, anti-Semitism, and violent misogyny. Endearing corners of Reddit existed, but you couldn’t get to them without stumbling over some seriously disturbing material.

Some of that disturbing material is still there if you look for it, but lately, the gross stuff has been crowded out by the good stuff, and more and more people have congregated on Reddit. Last year the company went public, saw a huge swell in audience, and became profitable for the first time in its history. And though its runaway growth slowed last quarter, Reddit says it now has more than 100 million daily users and more than 100,000 active communities.

The joy of Reddit comes from it being simultaneously niche and expansive—like an infinite world’s fair of subcultures, fandoms, support groups, and curiosities. There seems to be a subreddit for everyone and everything. There are mainstream subreddits with popular appeal, such as r/askscience (26 million users) and r/technology (18 million users). But there are also more esoteric forums, such as r/rentnerzeigenaufdinge, the German-language subreddit that’s devoted to context-free photos of retirees pointing at random things. (That group’s stated purpose: Hier bekommen alte Menschen die Bühne, die sie verdienen. “Here, old people get the stage they deserve.”) There’s r/notablueberry, where people share images of berries that are not blueberries, which other people often warn them not to eat. Some subreddits exist just to deliver a punch line, like r/Lurkers, a community with more than 41,000 members in which no one posts anything at all.

Asking someone where they spend time on Reddit opens a window onto their personality that can be surprisingly intimate. Here, I’ll go: I love r/whatisit, where users share photos of confusing objects they encounter; r/Honolulu, which is a mix of island news and extremely local references; r/tipofmytongue, where people ask for help finding or identifying “un-googleable” songs, movies, books, or other scraps of cultural memory; r/metropolis, dedicated entirely to Fritz Lang’s 1927 film of the same name; and r/MildlyVandalised, a place to share milquetoast visual pranks, such as a shelf of World Book Encyclopedias rearranged so their spines lined up to say WEIRD COCK. (Reddit may be less hateful these days, but it is still juvenile.)

There is a subreddit where violinists gently correct one another’s bow holds, a subreddit for rowers where people compare erg scores, and a subreddit for people who are honest-to-God allergic to the cold and trade tips about which antihistamine regimen works best. One subreddit is for people who encounter cookie cutters whose shapes they cannot decipher. The responses reliably entail a mix of sincere sleuthing to find the answer and ridiculously creative and crude joke guesses.

Not everything on Reddit is merely cute, of course. I have lost count of the number of friends who have mentioned to me that they add the word Reddit to their Google searches—a shortcut to the place where they know they’ll find the best information online. Google, once the unsurpassed King of Search, has become hostile to its users, surfacing hilariously unhelpful AI responses (including telling people to eat rocks and glue) and making it woefully difficult to retrieve credible information, even when you know exactly what source you’re looking for. Reddit, by contrast, offers truly specialized knowledge for every need. It provides travel tips to every conceivable destination and practical advice for every imaginable home-improvement project. One friend told me about using Reddit to find the right tension for his tennis-racket strings and the best embroiderer for a custom hockey jersey. And although the wisdom of the crowd is not fact-checked, Reddit’s culture tends to be equal parts generous and skeptical—meaning that good, or at least helpful, information often rises to the top.

Recently, on the r/creepy subreddit, someone posted about having found a tiny skeleton under the floorboards in their house. “Am I cursed for eternity now?” they wanted to know. The top reply came from someone who explained that they were a zooarchaeologist and could therefore be “95% certain this is a mouse skeleton,” and offered to send their own photo of a mouse skeleton for reference. “Hell yeah,” someone else chimed in. “Ask a random question and get an answer from someone who specializes in the exact niche. Amazing.”

How did this happen? How did Reddit go from being a disgusting fever swamp to an oasis of happiness, expertise, exuberance? Excising the most egregious subreddits was the first step, and not an uncontroversial one. Good and necessary free-speech debates followed. But the site has always given its users more control than other major social platforms. Reddit’s moderators are almost exclusively volunteers, and they are power users. They set the rules for the subreddits they run, and they tend to take their job seriously. The subreddit r/AskHistorians has a reputation for being one of the most heavily moderated communities on Reddit—rather than deleting some comments, it seems to delete most of them. If you don’t like that, and there are plenty of people who don’t, you can join another subreddit for history buffs. Or start your own.

On Reddit, it’s people—not the platform—who decide what any one community should be. (Reddit does still ban whole subreddits sometimes, as it did recently with a group posting violent threats.) Even the most ridiculous forums make their expectations known. In the subreddit r/DivorcedBirds, which is for sharing images of birds that “look like serial monogamists,” moderators specify the following: “Please post pictures of birds who look like they are twice divorced (or more!) and an original caption about their backstory.” Also: No photos of “human women”; no art, paintings, or Photoshop; and “no dead birds.”

Giving users this much control over a major social platform is basically unheard-of anymore. It’s a throwback to the early web, when people had to tend to the sites they wanted to be a part of, and it’s a stark contrast to the way other social-media sites have evolved.

Reddit is surging at a time when much of the rest of the social web has curdled. The mainstream platforms are overrun with a combination of bots, bigots, and bad AI, especially because platforms such as X and Facebook have declared that the substance of what people post is of no concern to them. Which is how we got to the point that Reddit, of all places, has developed a reputation as a force for good, or at least a force for reminding people of the promise of a decentralized open web.

For now, Reddit remains wildly original and startlingly generous, which is to say, deeply and gorgeously human.
The social giants that worship at the altar of megascale—Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X—have chosen to do so at the expense of humanity. They train their algorithms to feed people the things that make them angry and afraid and keep them scrolling. Reddit has its own ambitions for exponential growth, but so far it has managed to retain a small-group feeling while still operating at scale.

The question is whether this is a sustainable model. What if this golden moment for Reddit is not a renaissance but a last hurrah—one final reminder of what could have been, before a tsunami of AI wipes out the places that once sparkled with humanity? Reddit recently unveiled its own AI product, Reddit Answers, to the disgust of many of its users. And some long-time users worry that something essential will be lost as normies flock to the platform.

For now, though, Reddit remains wildly original and startlingly generous, which is to say, deeply and gorgeously human. It provides connection to others, stokes curiosity, and—at least in some subreddits—leaves you with a feeling of time well spent, a rarity on other social platforms. Because as different as each Reddit community is, every good subreddit is irrepressibly captivating for the same reason: the people.

Recently, someone posted a question on r/AskReddit: “What have you done on this platform that you’re most proud of?” The answers ranged from earnest to irreverent. People described feeling good about having used Reddit to read more, and to challenge their understanding of the world. Others praised themselves for not posting mean comments when they had the impulse to. One person described having spent two years on a guitar subreddit learning 100 different solos. Another described how they’d posted a cookbook of reverse-engineered Panda Express recipes to the delight of other users (though not, apparently, to the delight of Panda Express). Somebody else felt proud of having taught fellow Redditors how to open a box filled with packing peanuts without making a mess. One wrote: “I’ve been helping strangers with their various math questions for over ten years!” Another: “I make people laugh from time to time.”

What Reddit does, it turns out, is give people a space that they can create and collectively control, and where they can ask one another question after question after question, in every possible permutation. The place is flooded with expertise and genuine wisdom, and it’s filthy with rabbit holes. But the only two questions that people ever really ask on Reddit, if you think about it, are these: Am I alone? Am I okay? And after all these years, in subreddit after subreddit, no matter what the topic at hand is, the same answers keep coming: You aren’t alone. And you might not be okay. But we’re here.

This article appears in the April 2025 print edition with the headline “The Internet Can Still Be Good.”

About the Author

Adrienne LaFrance

Adrienne LaFrance is the executive editor of The Atlantic. She was previously a senior editor and staff writer at The Atlantic, and the editor of TheAtlantic.com.

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

I enjoy Reddit, but stay clear of the political subthreads.  Not my thing.

It's a brilliant place to learn more about the things you already like.

It's also a great resource to diagnose (and treat) widespread issues with tech.

Some of the city/metro based subthreads are also incredible for food and culture suggestions.

[topunderachiever]

Which subreddits do you think are most comparable to the various forums here?  For example is there a similar "Questions about Hiring" subreddit?  

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

There's the /SexWorkers subthread, but it's pro-escort, predominantly female-based and really doesn't function much like this place.

The mods there are very present and aware.  One fuck up and they'll ban you.

Edited March 6 by BenjaminNicholas

[d.anders]

I know almost nothing about Reddit. Links have come up in some searches, and I read what is there, but nothing so far has struck me as special, and I didn't enjoy the user-interface. The only social media I use is YouTube. I've completely learned how to sew on YouTube during Covid, and I absolutely love it.

For sex talk, I like this board and lpsg. Lively discussion about handsome men on both.

(Edit) I meant to add, lpsg often offers photos or links that no other site seems to have. I have no clue how they get away with that.

Edited March 7 by d.anders

[MikeThomas]

Yup.  The Reddit UI is a train wreck.  Love YouTube.  Lots of interesting stuff.  I left FB years ago and left Twitter about 6 months ago.  No Insta, no TikTok.

 

[Jiminy]

r/AmItheAsshole is rife with interesting stories, although some are fake.

[+ azdr0710]

discovered reddit a couple or three years ago and it's now a part of my daily viewing....I'm subscribed to several "subs" that interest me and any question/comment posed by somebody will get honest, chatty replies.....there's a casual vibe to the whole operation.......I belong to no other "social media", but I don't think of reddit as social media (or I don't want to!).......soooo many subs (subreddits) on almost any topic.......it's a great place if, as usual, you can manage your viewing habits and sort out the bs......

[BuffaloKyle]

I only been on reddit when I goggle stuff and it takes me to a thread on there. The only two sites that I post comments on is here and YouTube.

[+ JamesB]

I´ve been a Reddit user for quite some time now. Reddit is a pretty versatile platform, depending on what you’re into. It’s great for diving deep into niche topics. There’s a subreddit for almost everything. It’s also solid for troubleshooting or getting quick answers especially for tech since the community is usually fast to chime in. Plus, the upvote/downvote system helps surface the better stuff, though it’s not perfect and can turn into an echo chamber if you’re not careful.

If you're looking for entertainment, subs like r/funny or r/askreddit are packed with memes and stories that can easily keep you scrolling for hours.

[Rudynate]

If you have an obscure health problem, you can be pretty sure sure there is a subreddit for it.

[soloyo215]

I know of Reddit and have followed some in the past, but I'm not fond of social media in general. The read is interesting, maybe I'll take a closer look.

Thanks for sharing this.

[LaffingBear]

I'm not finding reddit to be that much different than other platforms.

I should note that I'm older, close to Boomer age.  I'm still a member of Facebook, but I haven't posted since 2017.  I lurk, check every few months, because that's the only communications some folks use - it's how I'll learn if a relative or old friend died. 

I quit Twitter/X when Elon did all of the BS here in SF Bay.  I joined TikTok because I felt I should be more aware of current communications modes.  I quit - If I believed it humanly possible, I'd support banning TikTok for its potential to make people stupid.  Really - like a Surgeon General warning that repeated exposure can drop your IQ!  I was never too involved with Insta, watched a bit.  I suppose my account is linked to my Facebook- I deleted the app from all devices.

A friend recommended Reddit. I like the potential for organization and focus.  I suppose as a percentage of posts, there's less lunacy.  But there's still plenty.  I'm in no politics subs.  

Have we moved past the age of search engines entirely?   I get people are suspect regarding ads and targeted results, but people can't look up the most basic question?  But it doesn't occur to a user to look up a map?  Or search how many feet in a mile? 

For me, it's a disturbing exposure to people who seem to be unable to think for themselves.  "The water rises up near the rim when I flush my toilet.  Do you think it's clogged?"  There are plenty of Nextdoor-like "What was that noise?" posts.  

Everything is catastrophized. Or politicized.  One bad customer service experience, Amazon are crooks.  Stubhub is a 100% scam.  Paranoia runs wild.. so users are posting concerns before anything goes badly.  I posted a comment that I think Whole Foods quality and service is deteriorating, sharing specifics from recent visits; I got attacked with attitude for ever liking the elitist store.  There's passionate hate for the way people queue at the Costco gas pumps.  

There's the same BS about things like tipping, just without the angry videos of TikTok GrubHub drivers or restaurant servers.  Join a sub about your local region, and it's, "why can't people here learn not to drive slowly in the left lane?"   

I'm in the cooking sub.  The paranoia and passion over Teflon is insane.  People post pictures of a pot with ¼" scratch "is this safe to use?"  "I took my chicken out of the refrigerator and got a 15-minute phone call.  Is it still safe to eat?" 

There are some very focused subs, and some very tightly moderated subs, that can be fun and/or informative.   The rest aren't really that different than the other social media platforms.  And, candidly, it's another depressing indicator of human online behavior and impressionability.  I'm already cutting back, leaving a variety of subs.

[+ DrownedBoy]

Reddit is too deep a rabbit hole - I used it a little during the pandemic, then removed it from my phone.

It's just too time consuming, and impossible to hold a real discussion on anything.

[+ azdr0710]

4 hours ago, LaffingBear said:

I'm not finding reddit to be that much different than other platforms.

I should note that I'm older, close to Boomer age.  I'm still a member of Facebook, but I haven't posted since 2017.  I lurk, check every few months, because that's the only communications some folks use - it's how I'll learn if a relative or old friend died. 

I quit Twitter/X when Elon did all of the BS here in SF Bay.  I joined TikTok because I felt I should be more aware of current communications modes.  I quit - If I believed it humanly possible, I'd support banning TikTok for its potential to make people stupid.  Really - like a Surgeon General warning that repeated exposure can drop your IQ!  I was never too involved with Insta, watched a bit.  I suppose my account is linked to my Facebook- I deleted the app from all devices.

A friend recommended Reddit. I like the potential for organization and focus.  I suppose as a percentage of posts, there's less lunacy.  But there's still plenty.  I'm in no politics subs.  

Have we moved past the age of search engines entirely?   I get people are suspect regarding ads and targeted results, but people can't look up the most basic question?  But it doesn't occur to a user to look up a map?  Or search how many feet in a mile? 

For me, it's a disturbing exposure to people who seem to be unable to think for themselves.  "The water rises up near the rim when I flush my toilet.  Do you think it's clogged?"  There are plenty of Nextdoor-like "What was that noise?" posts.  

Everything is catastrophized. Or politicized.  One bad customer service experience, Amazon are crooks.  Stubhub is a 100% scam.  Paranoia runs wild.. so users are posting concerns before anything goes badly.  I posted a comment that I think Whole Foods quality and service is deteriorating, sharing specifics from recent visits; I got attacked with attitude for ever liking the elitist store.  There's passionate hate for the way people queue at the Costco gas pumps.  

There's the same BS about things like tipping, just without the angry videos of TikTok GrubHub drivers or restaurant servers.  Join a sub about your local region, and it's, "why can't people here learn not to drive slowly in the left lane?"   

I'm in the cooking sub.  The paranoia and passion over Teflon is insane.  People post pictures of a pot with ¼" scratch "is this safe to use?"  "I took my chicken out of the refrigerator and got a 15-minute phone call.  Is it still safe to eat?" 

There are some very focused subs, and some very tightly moderated subs, that can be fun and/or informative.   The rest aren't really that different than the other social media platforms.  And, candidly, it's another depressing indicator of human online behavior and impressionability.  I'm already cutting back, leaving a variety of subs.

really well-said!......the inane comments can be tiresome and frustrating, but all part of the fun.......I only try to join the subs that I can help with or find interesting.......I do find it is a bit free-wheeling and some comments that would be moderated out anywhere else remain at reddit......I suppose the different mods' tolerance varies from sub to sub

with 4.1 million members, my favorite sub:  https://www.reddit.com/r/IdiotsInCars/

Edited March 8 by azdr0710

[rvwnsd]

On 3/6/2025 at 11:38 AM, BenjaminNicholas said:

...The mods there are very present and aware.  One fuck up and they'll ban you.

I've found that to be true of many subreddits. 

[moonlight]

I don't like Reddit because the threads die off after a few days. They aren't "bumped" with new posts like on traditional message boards. So I'm sad that Reddit has largely killed off message boards/forums in general. There are still a few boards worth visiting (this site included).

[TonyDown]

Now and then I think about starting a post about the straight guy I fell in love with my freshman year, the places our relationship went, how he wanted to be sexual, and eventually shutting him out of my life, sophomore year.   I broke his heart.   But he was a Midwestern Catholic homophobe.  I had enough.  

Recently he found me on Linked in and asked if I was coming to our House reunion.

I'm not sure I want to meet his wife.

So yeah, I've thought about starting a thread on that personal topic, specifically on his frame of mind, and guys in general, male sexuality, etc., but then I realize it is the kind of topic guys post on Reddit. 

Reddit is like a place for a good reality check and a wealth of honest, helpful opinions, sometimes therapeutic.  Company of Men can be that.  But Reddit is more fertile ground for that sort of thing, with more replies.

Frankly I've read a lot of posts on this board discussing personal circumstances and asking for opinions, where I thought to myself how Reddit would be more useful. 

So that's my plan, to work up a good question and post it on Reddit.

 

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

On 3/7/2025 at 2:14 PM, LaffingBear said:

I'm not finding reddit to be that much different than other platforms.

I should note that I'm older, close to Boomer age.  I'm still a member of Facebook, but I haven't posted since 2017.  I lurk, check every few months, because that's the only communications some folks use - it's how I'll learn if a relative or old friend died. 

I quit Twitter/X when Elon did all of the BS here in SF Bay.  I joined TikTok because I felt I should be more aware of current communications modes.  I quit - If I believed it humanly possible, I'd support banning TikTok for its potential to make people stupid.  Really - like a Surgeon General warning that repeated exposure can drop your IQ!  I was never too involved with Insta, watched a bit.  I suppose my account is linked to my Facebook- I deleted the app from all devices.

A friend recommended Reddit. I like the potential for organization and focus.  I suppose as a percentage of posts, there's less lunacy.  But there's still plenty.  I'm in no politics subs.  

Have we moved past the age of search engines entirely?   I get people are suspect regarding ads and targeted results, but people can't look up the most basic question?  But it doesn't occur to a user to look up a map?  Or search how many feet in a mile? 

For me, it's a disturbing exposure to people who seem to be unable to think for themselves.  "The water rises up near the rim when I flush my toilet.  Do you think it's clogged?"  There are plenty of Nextdoor-like "What was that noise?" posts.  

Everything is catastrophized. Or politicized.  One bad customer service experience, Amazon are crooks.  Stubhub is a 100% scam.  Paranoia runs wild.. so users are posting concerns before anything goes badly.  I posted a comment that I think Whole Foods quality and service is deteriorating, sharing specifics from recent visits; I got attacked with attitude for ever liking the elitist store.  There's passionate hate for the way people queue at the Costco gas pumps.  

There's the same BS about things like tipping, just without the angry videos of TikTok GrubHub drivers or restaurant servers.  Join a sub about your local region, and it's, "why can't people here learn not to drive slowly in the left lane?"   

I'm in the cooking sub.  The paranoia and passion over Teflon is insane.  People post pictures of a pot with ¼" scratch "is this safe to use?"  "I took my chicken out of the refrigerator and got a 15-minute phone call.  Is it still safe to eat?" 

There are some very focused subs, and some very tightly moderated subs, that can be fun and/or informative.   The rest aren't really that different than the other social media platforms.  And, candidly, it's another depressing indicator of human online behavior and impressionability.  I'm already cutting back, leaving a variety of subs.

You basically just described the whole internet...  And society, in general.

It is what it is.  In life, you are tasked with separating the wheat from the chaff.

Sure, there's bullshit on Reddit, but there's also a plethora of good, solid info, intelligent discussion and some very funny people.

 

 

[Bokomaru]

It can be fun for porn. Twitter is so monetized in the porn department now that it no longer holds my interest. 

When I open the Reddit app the first thing I usually see is a post from r/MassiveCock.  

[rvwnsd]

9 hours ago, moonlight said:

I don't like Reddit because the threads die off after a few days. They aren't "bumped" with new posts like on traditional message boards. So I'm sad that Reddit has largely killed off message boards/forums in general. There are still a few boards worth visiting (this site included).

If you change your sort criteria to "New," new posts will be displayed first.