• The r/SouthAfrica sub-Reddit has joined hundreds of other communities banning members from posting links to X, formerly Twitter.
• The community is also gathering feedback on whether Facebook and Instagram links should be banned as well.
• Sub-Reddits are banning links to X following its owner, Elon Musk, performing what looked like a Nazi salute this week.

The South African community that gathers on Reddit within r/SouthAfrica which is 257 000 members strong, has banned links to X, formerly Twitter.

The sub-Reddit is the latest to implement a ban on links to the social network everything app following the actions of X’s owner Elon Musk this week. The billionaire made a gesture reminiscent of the Nazi salute twice during a speech at the Donald Trump’s Presidential inauguration on Monday. This action has been widely condemned online and Musk has since taken to mocking anybody accusing him of being a neo-Nazi.

But for many Reddit communities, the “gesture” as some have referred to it is the straw that broke the camel’s back.

The X platform has become a shadow of its former self and that’s keeping in mind that Twitter was already a trashfire long before Musk took over. That fire has now spread and these days misinformation antisemitism, homophobia, anti-trans rhetoric and racism are pervasive on X to the point where advertisers had to withhold spending on the platform for a long time until X addressed the problems.

The decision to ban X on r/SouthAfrica was floated earlier this week as other communities began implementing the ban. As part of the announcement that X links were banned, moderators of the community asked for opinions on whether screenshots would be permitted and whether links to Facebook and Instagram should be banned as well.

Skimming through the comments, there appears to be support for both allowing screenshots from social media to be posted as well as banning links to Meta’s social networks. We suspect that the decision to ban Mark Zuckerberg’s platforms stems from him doing an about face on fact checking, immediately tainting the accuracy of any links posted from Facebook and Instagram, and cosying up to Donald Trump on the back of his victory.

Other communities on Reddit that have implemented a ban on X links include r/WoW (3 million members), r/formula1 (4.8 million members), r/AnimalCrossing (2.7 million members) and many many more. The BBC reported two days ago that it has seen at least 100 sub-Reddits ban X links and that number has likely grown since.

How long this ban will be enforced by moderators remains to be seen. Even the r/Formula1 sub-Reddit said it was only implementing the ban for a trial period.

“Why a trial period? First of all, sometimes mods make bad decisions even if with the best intentions. (For example in 2015 this subreddit banned images & gifs, which caused a controversy that was only resolved after Will Buxton stepped in to mediate the situation.) Second of all, this is one of the strictest approaches to Twitter content and strict bans like this can have unintended consequences, so we might need to later refine this ban. We intend the trial period to last at least until the first races of the new season, after which a final form of the ban would be implemented,” the moderators wrote.

While the intentions may be admirable to some, X is still the main source of information for many people, especially as regards timely information. Various government services use the platform locally and when it comes to sports, following games on X is about as close to watching it live as you can get.

As such there are also many sub-Reddits that aren’t entertaining requests to ban X links at all possibly because the platform is still used by millions regardless of the owner’s behaviour and disregard for moderation.

X is still used by government departments, journalists and others so it’s power is still quite colossal. With that having been said, it’s bound to see reduced traffic coming from what was called the front page of the internet.